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The Logic of Clan Politics: Evidence from the Central Asian Trajectories

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 June 2011

Kathleen Collins
Kathleen Collins
Affiliation:
University of Notre Dame
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Abstract

This article argues that clans, informal organizations based on kin and fictive kin ties, are political actors that have a profound impact on the nature of posttransitional regimes and the potential for regime durability. The article first develops the concept of “clan” conceptually. It then develops several propositions about clan politics and explores them empirically in the context of the post-Soviet Central Asian cases. These cases suggest the limits of the prevailing transitions and institutionalist approaches; these theories cannot explain regime transition in the Central Asian cases because they focus on the formal level and ignore the crucial informal actors—clans—and the informal politics that shape these cases. The distinct mode of transition, new regime institutions, and leadership and elite ideologies evident at the formal level have a very short-term effect; withinfiveyears, these cases converge toward a pattern of informal, clan-based politics. By contrast, this article draws upon the insights of the early literature on political development as well as the state-society literature to develop an alternative framework for explaining the dynamic between clans and the regime. Clan networks and clan deals penetrate and transform the formal regime in several ways—by clan-based appointments and patronage, by stripping state assets to feed one's clan network, and by crowding out other mechanisms of representation. As they undermine formal institutions, clans create an informal regime best understood as “clan politics.”

Type
Research Article
Information
World Politics , Volume 56 , Issue 2 , January 2004 , pp. 224 - 261
Copyright
Copyright © Trustees of Princeton University 2004

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132 Alisher Khamidov, “Kyrgyzstan: Organized Opposition and Civil Unrest,” December 16, 2002 (www.eurasianet.org/departments/rights/articles/eavl21602.shtml, accessed December 2002).

133 Author interview with political party expert, Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, June 1998.

134 Author interview with political party leader, Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, October 1996.

135 Author interview with journalist, Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, January 2002.

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141 Author interviews with Feliks Kulov, former vice president, with akim of Chui oblast', Bishkek, August 1995, and with other Kyrgyz officials, 1995–2001.

142 Alisher Khamidov, “Kyrgyzstan's Unrest Linked to Clan Rivalries” (www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/earO6O52.shtml, accessed June 2002). And author interview with Kyrgyzjournalist, Osh, August 2002.

143 Author interview with Raya Kadyrova, NGO leader and sociologist, Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, Bishkek, August 2002.

144 Author interview with Uzbek expert, Tashkent, January 2002.

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147 This is not an element of all authoritarian regimes but is a critical element in building “socialist” authoritarianism in Uzbekistan, which has sought to maintain a centrally planned economy.

148 International Crisis Group (ICG), “Uzbekistan's Reform Program: Illusion or Reality?” (Osh/Brussels: ICG, February 18,2003); Asia Report no. 46 (www.crisisweb.org/home/index/.cfm?idsl466Il=l, accessed February 2003).

149 Author interviews with Uzbek businessmen, Tashkent 2000 and 2002. See also Farangis Said, “Machinations Mar Uzbekistan's Banking System,” Central Asia-Caucasus Analyst, November 8,2000 (www.cacianalyst.org/view_article.php?articleid=308, accessed May 2003).

150 Author interview with World Bank adviser, Tashkent, Uzbekistan, August 2002.

151 ICG (fn. 148), 25.

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153 Usman Khaknazarov, “Vozrozhdenie ‘serogo kardinala uzbekskoipolitiki,” Tsentr Azna, January 2, 2003 (www.centrasia.ru, accessed January 2003; also found at www.navi.kz/articles/?artid+2280, accessed July 2003); and Alisher Taksanov, “Kanonizirovanie klanov,”Internet-gazeta, Kazakhstan, December 20, 2002 (www.navi.kz/articles/?artid+2176, accessed December 2002). The articles were quickly blocked in Uzbekistan.

154 Author interview with anonymous official in Uzbekistan, Tashkent, 2002.

155 Author interview with dissident Tajik journalist, Moscow, August 1998.

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159 Author interview with former U.S. official in Tajikistan, Baku, August 1998.

160 Author interview with UNOCHA representative, Dushanbe, March 2001.

161 Nasrin Dadmehr, “Tajikistan: Regionalism and Weakness,” in Rotberg (fn. 117).

162 Shirin Akiner, Tajikistan: Reconciliation or Disintegration? (forthcoming); and Dadmehr (2003). On clans and mafias, see , Chubb, Tie Mafia and Politics: The Italian State under Seige (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1989)Google Scholar.

163 Author interviews with Abdumalik Abdullojanov, former prime minister, Tajikistan, and with other Tajik officials, Tashkent, August 1998.

164 Author interviews with Tajik journalist and with OSCE representative, Dushanbe, August 2002.

165 See Roy (fn. 85); and Rubin (fn. 157).

166 Author interview with member of the Islamic Renaissance Party, Dushanbe, March 2001.

167 Author interview with UNDP representative, Dushanbe, Tajikistan, August 2002. See also Roger McDermott, “The Army in Tajikistan: Ten Years of Independence,” Central Asia-Caucasus Analyst, March 12,2003 (www.cacianalyst.org/view_article.php?articleid=1143, accessed April 2003); and former ambassador R. Grant Smith, “Dealing with Warlords,” Central Asia-Caucasus Analyst, January 30, 2002 (www.cacianalyst.org/view_article.php?articleid=45, accessed March 2002).

168 According to one Tajik journalist, clans have become increasingly criminalized since the war. Author interview with journalist, Moscow, August 2000.

169 Schatz, Edward, “The Politics of Multiple Identities: Lineage and Ethnicity in Kazakhstan,” Europe-Asia Studies 52 (2000)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See Biriukov (fn. 156).

I70 Olcott(fn. 104), 202–3.

171 Author interview with OSCE official, Tashkent, June 2000.

172 Author conversation with lawyer based in Kazakhstan, August 2003.

173 RFE/RL, Kazakh News (October 10,2001).

174 Aldar Kusainov, “Kazakhstan's Critical Choice,” January 1,2003 (www.eurasianet.org/departments/rights/articles/eavOl1303.shtmlwww.eurasianet.org/departments/rights/articles/eav011303.shtml, accessed February 2003).

175 Ibid.

176 Fairbanks, Charles, “Disillusionment in the Caucasus and Central Asia,” Journal of Democracy 12 (October 2001)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

177 Ochs (fn. 104), 317.

178 International Crisis Group (ICG), “Turkmenistan: Cracks in the Marble” (Osh/Brussels: ICG, January 17,2003), 21 (www.crisisweb.org/home/index.cfm?id=1445&l=l, accessed January 2003).

179 Rustem Safronov, “Turkmenistan Purge Indicative of Instability” (www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/eavO312O2.shtml, March 12,2002, accessed March 2002).

180 ICG (fn. 178), 7–9.

181 Author interview with Turkmen dissident, Moscow, August 2000.

182 Expert, “Turkmenistan Faces Multiple Sources of Domestic Strife,” February 12, 2003 (www.eurasianet.org/departments/recaps/articles/eav021203.shtml, accessed February 2003).

183 Rustem Safronov, “Opposition in Exile: Turkmenistan,” December 9,2002 (www.eurasianet.org/departments/rights/articles/eavl20902.shtml, accessed December 2002).

184 Roger McDermott, “Shake-up in Turkmen Spy Agency Hints at Pending Crisis,” September 30, 2002 (www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/eav093002_ pr.shtml, accessed October 2002).

185 “Analyst Predicts ‘Radical Change’ Near for Turkmenistan,” October 21, 2002 (www.eurasianet.org/departments/recaps/articles/eavl02102.shtml, accessed November 2002).

186 ICG (fh. 178), 3–7.

187 Ariel Cohen, “Confronting Kazakhstan's ‘Dutch Disease,’” Central Asia-Caucasus Analyst, March 26,2003 (www.cacianalyst.org/view_article.php?articleid=1263, accessed April 2003); and Karl, Terry, The Paradox of Plenty (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999)Google Scholar.

188 Ross, Michael L., “Does Oil Hinder Democracy?” World Politics 53 (April 2001)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.