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Looking for Solidarność in Central Asia: The Role of Human Rights Organizations in Political Change

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 January 2017

Brian Grodsky
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Abstract

According to scholars of resource dependency, foreign funding can weaken rather than strengthen civil society abroad, ultimately impeding its effectiveness. Yet the spate of recent “democratic revolutions” in semiauthoritarian, postcommunist states suggests that pumping foreign money into the nongovernmental sphere can be an effective strategy. In this paper Brian Grodsky argues that a critical factor in assessing the likelihood that a given organizational movement will succumb to the ills of resource dependency is the type of politicization within that movement. Those organizations composed of members primarily motivated by ideology are logically less likely to succumb to resource dependency than those organizations dominated by political aspirants intent on converting democratization into their own political power. Two case studies, communist-era Poland and contemporary Uzbekistan, provide support for this theory.

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Articles
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Slavic Review , Volume 66 , Issue 3 , Fall 2007 , pp. 442 - 462
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Copyright © Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies. 2007

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References

I would like to thank the two anonymous reviewers for Slavic Review for their helpful comments on an earlier draft of this paper.

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17. Both groups may value democracy, but Type B activists might be prone to use the term instrumentally (in exchange for international legitimacy) and be willing to compromise on half-measures (e.g., partial liberalization) that profit them politically.

18. Freedom House measures political repression using two variables: political rights and civil liberties. According to Freedom House data, Poland was an authoritarian state with few freedoms when KOR began its activities (6,6—political and civil scores, respectively). It progressed only slightly from 1977 to 1980 (6,5) then after a brief opening at the height of Solidarity (5,4) bounced back into repression (6,5) until 1987. From the mid-1990s through the early 2000s, Uzbekistan was similarly non-free, with scores of 7,6. In the context of elite and mass mobilization, the difference in political scores between 6 (Poland) and 7 (Uzbekistan) is practically meaningless. According to the definitions employed by Freedom House, both systems entail nondemocratic regimes (e.g., oneparty or autocratic) in which the majority of citizens are deprived of political rights. Elites in both cases are expected to face exclusion, though in countries with the lower score, specific groups may experience “some degree of representation or autonomy for minorities.“ Such representation seems to assume that the represented group is not in opposition to the ruling regime. (For full definitions, see http://www.freedomhouse.org/template.cfm?page=35&year=2006 [last consulted 25 May 2007].) It should also be stressed that Poland's lower (i.e., improved) civil rights score after 1976 reflects the effective rise of the organizational opposition (which appeared and began mobilizing under conditions of repression) and does not therefore affect this argument concerning mobilization efforts.

19. In Uzbekistan, differences in support for the opposition may have shifted after the Andijon massacre in May 2005. For more on the brutal repression of protesters by Uzbek security services, see “The Aftermath of the May 13 Shootings,” Human Rights Watch, available at http://hrw.Org/reports/2005/uzbekistan0605/6.htm (last consulted 25 May 2007).

20. For a brief background, see Freedom House report on Uzbekistan, available at http://www.freedomhouse.org/template.cfm?page=47&nit=410&year=2006 (last consulted 25 May 2007).

21. I attempted to locate members of religious organizations on several occasions, primarily by asking my local contacts (in the human rights, diplomatic, and banned opposition communities) who was still in Uzbekistan. None of my contacts could provide such information.

22. This research is based on interviews with elites conducted in Tashkent in winter and fall 2004, funded by a Fulbright-Hays Doctoral Dissertation Research Abroad award. Approximately sixty-three interviews were conducted with the heads of local political opposition parties and human rights organizations, international human rights and prodemocracy nongovernmental organizations, as well as western diplomats.

23. In numerical terms, the political party Erk dominates the human rights movement. This is partly a result of internal party fragmentation, since one branch of Erk (under Atanazar Aripov) controls two organizations (Mazlum and Mezon), while another Erk splinter group (under Abduhoshim Gaforov) controls the breakaway Independent Human Rights Organization and die Electoral Resource Center. The banned opposition party Birlik originally created the Human Rights Society of Uzbekistan (which now claims to be apolitical) and, more recently, Ezgulik. The Committee for the Defense of Human Rights is controlled by the leader of the unregistered Agrarian Party, Marat Zakhidov. Only Mothers against die Deadi Penalty and Torture, the Independent Human Rights Initiative Group, and the registered Independent Human Rights Organization of Uzbekistan are unconnected to any of the banned opposition movements. The only major political party without a human rights counterpart is the Free Peasant Party, but this party (in early 2005) forged an alliance with the Human Rights Society of Uzbekistan.

24. Interviewee 1, member of the political opposition party Erk and high-level member of the breakaway human rights organization Independent Human Rights Organization, Tashkent, 12 March 2004.

25. Interviewee 2, high-level member of the political opposition party Birlik and the human rights organization Ezgulik, Tashkent, 11 March 2004. Interviewee 3, member of Human Rights Society of Uzbekistan (HRSU), Tashkent, 11 March 2004, makes a similar comment.

26. In the mid-1990s Erk leaders created the Independent Human Rights Society of Uzbekistan (IHRSU), which also included some independent rights activists. Interviewee 1, Tashkent, 12 March 2004. Then in 2000, the Erk leadership launched a purely Erk human rights organization, Mazlum. Interviewee 4, high-level member of the political opposition party Erk and the human rights organization Mazlum, Tashkent, 12 March 2004.

27. For more on the evolution of the Polish opposition, see Frentzel-Zagorska, janina, “Civil Society in Poland and Hungary,” Soviet Studies 42, no. 4 (October 1990): 757-77CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Kennedy, Michael D., “The Intelligentsia in the Constitution of Civil Societies and Post- Communist Regimes in Hungary and Poland,” Theory and Society 21, no. 1 (February 1992): 29–76 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also Kubik, Jan and Ekiert, Grzegorz, “Civil Society from Abroad: The Role of Foreign Assistance in the Democratization of Poland,” The Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Working Paper Series 00-01 (Harvard University, February 2000)Google Scholar.

28. In their appeal to the Polish Sejm in 1976, KOR members referred to their organization as a group that was necessary to fill the void, since in the wake of recent attacks on strikers, “victims of the reprisals cannot count on any help or defense from the established institutions.” See Barker, Colin, Festival of the Oppressed: Solidarity, Reform and Revolution in Poland 1980-81 (London, 1986), 12 Google Scholar.

29. Kennedy, “The Intelligentsia in the Constitution of Civil Societies.” KOR members used international media oudets and high-level diplomatic attention to fight off government aggression. For example, when seven of their own faced possible jail sentences in spring 1977, a series of press conferences for foreign reporters appears to have successfully pressured the Gierek government into issuing the July 1977 amnesty. See Szulc, Tad, “Living with Dissent,” Foreign Policy 31 (Summer 1978): 180-91CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

30. Zuzowski, Robert, Political Dissent and Opposition in Poland: The Workers'Defense Committee “KOR” (Westport, Conn., 1992), 62 Google Scholar; Lipski, Jan Jozef, KOR: A History of the Workers'Defense Committee in Poland, 1976-1981 (Berkeley, 1985)Google Scholar.

31. Osa, Maryjane, Solidarity and Contention: Networks of Polish Opposition (Minneapolis, 2003), 134 Google Scholar. See also Kolakowski, Leszek, “The Intelligentsia,” in Brumberg, Abraham, ed., Poland: Genesis of a Revolution (New York, 1983), 54–67 Google Scholar.

32. Zuzowski, , Political Dissent and Opposition in Poland, 97 Google Scholar.

33. Ash, Timothy Garton, The Polish Revolution: Solidarity 1980-82 (London, 1983), 23 Google Scholar.

34. Lipski, KOR; Zuzowski, Political Dissent and Opposition in Poland.

35. Bakuniak, Grzegorz and Nowak, Krzysztof, “The Creation of a Collective Identity in a Social Movement: The Case of ‘Solidarnosc’ in Poland, ,” Theory and Society 16, no. 3 (May 1987): 401-29CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Wasilewski, Jacek and Wnuk-Lipinski, Edmund, “Poland: Winding Road from the Communist to the Post-Solidarity Elite,” Theory and Society 24, no. 5 (October 1995): 669-96CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

36. According to Uzbek human rights activists, foreign donors (almost exclusively the United States and U.S.-sponsored nongovernmental organizations) are aware of the advantages opposition politicians receive from this funding, despite official stipulations forbidding using this money for expressly political enterprises. Interviewee 1 commented, “[Western donors] understand completely that we are part of the party. They know who they are standing behind.” Interviewee 1, Tashkent, 12 March 2004.

37. Interviewee 1, Tashkent, 12 March 2004. As one western observer in Uzbekistan commented, “Politics is a 24-hour-per-day job. If they have some kind of existence guaranteed, that helps them survive.” Western observer, interview, Tashkent, 16 March 2004. Leaders of human rights organizations justify their political activities as essential to and inseparable from the human rights movement, remarking that although human rights organizations can defend individuals, “political parties defend the rights of the entire society.“ Interviewee 2, Tashkent, 11 March 2004. “To make these [violations] stop we have to change the regime. To do this you need a political party.” Interviewee 4, Tashkent, 12 March 2004. Even organizations claiming to be apolitical either have (as in the case of Independent Human Rights Initiative Group) or have had (as in the case of HRSU) political aspirations. The result is often a lack of differentiation between political and human rights activities. One “dual elite,” who was asked, “Could human rights organizations cooperate on some particular goal?” responded, ‘You mean, for example, create a coalition to enter parliament?” Interviewee 5, high-level member of the opposition Agrarian Party and the human rights organization Committee for the Defense of Human Rights, Tashkent, 4 March 2004. Excluded political actors “have found a way to be able to operate,“ commented Per Normark, the Human Dimension Officer for the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) in Tashkent. “They go through human rights to reach their [political] goals.” Per Normark, interview, Tashkent, 10 March 2004.

38. Interviewee 2, Tashkent, 11 March 2004, and Interviewee 5, Tashkent, 4 March 2004. According to opposition (and human rights organization) leaders, human rights organization members in outlying areas make up the social infrastructure vital for political mobilization in distant regions, should democratic conditions suddenly return to Uzbekistan.

39. Over the course of numerous interviews outside Tashkent, I found evidence for this, ranging from charges against favoritism within an organization to candid acknowledgment that interviewees were not being given funds to carry out human rights work per se.

40. All human rights organization members interviewed, as well as several western diplomats, made this claim.

41. During one interview, for example, a high-level member of the Human Rights Society of Uzbekistan complained that donors were often unable to differentiate between “real” human rights defenders such as himself and “pseudo” human rights defenders. Interviewee 6, high-level member of the Human Rights Society of Uzbekistan, interview, Tashkent, 2 March 2004.

42. Ele Pawelski, Freedom House Senior Program Officer, Rights Program, Uzbekistan, interview, Tashkent, 10 March 2004.

43. Birlik leaders left HRSU to create the human rights organization Ezgulik in part as a response to grant-related conflicts. Interviewee 2, Tashkent, 11 March 2004.

44. When Erk fragmented after 2000, for example, human rights organizations were viewed as a vital resource; those who split from Erk attempted to take control of them, and those who stayed behind created new ones. In their quest to appeal to the limited financing available from the donor community, the Erk leadership created several niche human rights organizations, including an organization focused on torture victims (Mazlum), one to deal with the problem of fear (Mezzon), and another to concentrate on women's rights (Azod Ayollar). Interviews with leaders and members of each suggest that none of these groups is active.

45. Kubik, and Ekiert, , “Civil Society from Abroad“; Shapiro, Ian, “Fiscal Crisis of the Polish State: Genesis of the 1980 Strikes,” Theory and Society, 10 no. 4 (July 1981): 469–502 Google Scholar; Zbigniew Romaszewski, former KOR activist and senator, interview, Warsaw, 19 January 2004.

46. The same was true for the Helsinki Committee, which was created largely by KOR members in the early 1980s. Romaszewski, interview, Warsaw, 19 January 2004; Jerzy Ciemniewski, co-founder of the Helsinki Committee and former advisor to Prime Minister Tadeusz Mazowiecki, interview, Warsaw, 30 December 2003; Danuta Przywara, vicepresident and co-founder of the Polish Helsinki Committee, interview, Warsaw, 9 December 2003; Zofia Romaszewska, former KOR activist, interview, Warsaw, 19 January 2004.

47. Kubik and Ekiert, “Civil Society from Abroad.“

48. Kennedy, Michael D., Professionals, Power and Solidarity in Poland (Cambridge, Mass., 1991), 41 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Other organizations included the Gdansk and Silesia Free Trade Unions, student organizations such as Movement of Polish Youth (RMP), the Polish Alliance for Independence (PPN), and the Helsinki Committee. See Wasilewski and Wnuk-Lipinski, “Poland“; Kubik and Ekiert, “Civil Society from Abroad.“

49. Zuzowski, , Political Dissent and Opposition in Poland, 161 Google Scholar.

50. Interviewee 7, high-level member of the government-recognized Independent Human Rights Organization of Uzbekistan, Tashkent, 9 March 2004; see also Interviewee 5, Tashkent, 4 March 2004.

51. At one demonstration I attended, most of the ten to fifteen demonstrators were organization members. This was the protest organized by several human rights organizations in front of the General Prosecutor's Office, Tashkent, 2 March 2004. I neither observed nor heard of attempts to encourage groups outside their own human rights circle to participate; a few human rights victims in contact with human rights organizations did tell me, though, that they had been told by the organization working with them to come to this event. In one unusual case in late 2004, one human rights organization paid approximately thirty workers picked up at a bazaar to attend a “mass” protest in support of the British ambassador, outspoken for his support of human rights. “Uzbek Police Round Up Rent-a-Protestors,” AgenceFrance Presse, 7 December 2004. If these people participated for only $2.70 each, it seems unlikely that the threat of repression is a key factor explaining why Uzbeks do not more often become active protesters. Indeed, there are numerous cases where economic conditions have led to spontaneous protests. See, for example, “Uzbek Farmers Protest over Seizure of Their Land Plots,” Global Nexvs Wire—Asia Africa Intelligence Wire, 25 February 2005.

52. Bakuniak and Nowak, “The Creation of a Collective Identity“; Romaszewski, interview, Warsaw, 19 January 2004; Przywara, interview, Warsaw, 9 December 2003; Kolakowski, “The Intelligentsia,” 1983.

53. Zuzowski, , Political Dissent and Opposition in Poland, 97 Google Scholar.

54. One of the most important of these publications was Robotnik (Worker), a newspaper that sought to widen workers’ understanding of their situation, from concerns about low pay to information about far-reaching systemic failure, and to suggest a new repertoire of collective action. Mason, David S., “Solidarity as a New Social Movement,” Political Science Quarterly 104, no. 1 (Spring 1989): 44 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. By supplying workers with new strategies and organizational concepts, the tactics described in these pages later became a model for the workers’ strikes of 1980-1981. Pravda, Alex, “Poland 1980: From ‘Premature Consumerism' to Labour Solidarity,” Soviet Studies, 6 no. 2 (April 1982): 167-99CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

55. Frentzel-Zagorska, “Civil Society in Poland and Hungary.“

56. As a result of this small sample size, findings from this study should be considered only preliminary. But given the few efforts to explore non-elite opinion under such repressive conditions, I believe these lessons are nevertheless important. Geographically, I limited this study to Tashkent, the base for human rights activists, where I expected to find a higher than average awareness of the human rights movement. Before departing for my sites, I determined how blocks would be chosen at each location, randomly selecting from a list of orientation points (e.g., eleventh bus stop) and then establishing a mapping scheme from there (e.g., first street to the left, then next street to the left). Once I arrived on a street, I followed the General Social Survey block quota technique, beginning from the closest corner and proceeding door-to-door through the apartment building, until I had carried out five to seven interviews. In order to diminish the risk of selection bias (for example, a disproportionate number of unemployed, retired, or sick respondents, who tend to be home during normal weekday business hours), I carried out research trips on Saturdays. Response rates were surprisingly high (70 percent), though the time respondents were willing to give me varied from as little as 5 minutes to as much as 60 minutes.

57. I chose three towns in the most densely populated part of Uzbekistan, the Ferghana Valley (Ferghana, Namangan, and Andijon). I then selected other high-population centers in a broader geographical area, including Samarqand, Bukhara, Khiva, and Nukus.

58. For this reason it is not particularly helpful to quantify this indicator (e.g., which organizations have representatives in which cities).

59. Frentzel-Zagorska, “Civil Society in Poland and Hungary“; Mason, “Solidarity as a New Social Movement.“

60. Biezenski, Robert, “The Struggle for Solidarity 1980-81: Two Waves of Leadership in Conflict,” Europe-Asia Studies 48, no. 2 (March 1996): 261-84CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Frentzel-Zagorska, “Civil Society in Poland and Hungary.“

61. Kolakowski, , “The Intelligentsia,” 66 Google Scholar. See also Pravda, Alex, “The Workers,” in Brumberg, Abraham, ed., Poland: Genesis of a Revolution (New York, 1983), 68–91 Google Scholar.

62. Biezenski, “The Struggle for Solidarity 1980-81.“

63. Pravda, “Poland 1980.“

64. Ibid.

65. Ibid.; Biezenski, “The Struggle for Solidarity 1980-81.” Biezenski points out, for example, that intellectuals pressed workers to drop demands for a free labor union, believing this was too radical.

66. Lipski, , KOR, 454 Google Scholar.

67. Kennedy, “The Intelligentsia in the Constitution of Civil Societies.“

68. Frentzel-Zagorska, “Civil Society in Poland and Hungary.“

69. Kubik and Ekiert, “Civil Society from Abroad.“

70. Michnik, Adam, former parliamentarian and editor-in-chief of Polish daily newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza, interview, Warsaw, 14 January 2004 Google Scholar.

71. Wujec, Henryk, former parliamentarian and secretary of Solidarity's 1989 electoral commission (Komitet Obywatelski “Solidarnośći“), interview, Warsaw, 3 February 2004 Google Scholar.

72. The exception here is a number of Internet publications that are published in Russia and available only on the Internet (such as ferghana.ru and centrasia.ru). This form of samizdat is, again, limited in influence by the number of Uzbeks who have regular access to the Internet. It is also not an initiative of local human rights organizations.

73. Zuzowski, Political Dissent and Opposition in Poland.

74. Lipski, , KOR, 68 Google Scholar.

75. Wujec, , interview, Warsaw, 3 February 2004 Google Scholar.

76. Explanations based on international factors are also quite weak. If Polish rights workers were sheltered by the Helsinki Accords, for example, we should expect Uzbek rights activists to experience even more protection as a result of Uzbekistan's membership in organizations such as the OSCE and the active and open support from western embassies in Tashkent. Another alternative interpretation is that the international environment in Poland (1989) and Uzbekistan (pre-2005) was fundamentally different with respect to foreign support opportunities. In other words, Uzbekistan's pro-democracy forces have been drawn to donors, not because of their political type, but because formal donors nonexistent in the 1980s are now available. Yet given the hefty amount of foreign money circulating within the Polish rights movement, competition from informal sources could have created a similar base of resentment. (One interviewee recalled collecting more than $300,000 in assistance from various organizations in the United States in the 1980s—see Romaszewska, interview, Warsaw, 19January 2004.)

77. For Poland see, Avery, William P., “Political Legitimacy and Crisis in Poland,“ Political Science Quarterly 103, no. 1 (Spring 1988): 111-30CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Shapiro, “Fiscal Crisis of the Polish State.” For Uzbekistan, the case of fifty residents who blockaded a street in the town of Andijon to protest poor electric and gas services is typical. See “Mass Rallies Taking Place in Uzbek East,” Global News Wire—Asia Africa Intelligence Wire, 17 February 2005.

78. The western press provides frequent reports of economic-based protests that occur with no involvement from the opposition community.

79. Carothers, and Barndt, , “Civil Society,” 20 Google Scholar; see also Fisher, William F., “Doing Good? The Politics and Antipolitics of NGO Practices,” Annual Review of Anthropology 26 (1997): 439-64CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

80. Backer, and Carroll, , “NGOs and Constructive Engagement,” 13 Google Scholar.

81. “Uzbek Leader Scorns ‘Revolutions’ as Nation Votes,” New York Times, 26 December 2004. Indeed, these cases (like Kyrgyzstan and Serbia) are quite different in that they were illiberal democracies in which the political opposition routinely competed (if not on a level playing field) for power.