[lg policy] Kazakhstan ’s Plan to Create ‘Civic Nation’ Said a Threat to Ethnic Russians There

[Harold Schiffman]

Kazakhstan’s Plan to Create ‘Civic Nation’ Said a Threat to Ethnic
Russians There

November 16, 2009
Paul Goble

Russian nationalists have long complained that efforts to create a
supra-ethnic national identity in the Russian Federation represent a
threat to the future of the ethnic Russian nation. Now, one of their
number has charged that a parallel effort to create a supra-ethnic
national identity in Kazakhstan threatens ethnic Russians there. This
critique of the program laid out by Kazakhstan President Nursultan
Nazarbayev at the end of October deserves attention for three reasons:
First, it highlights the fears of some ethnic Russians living outside
of the Russian Federation concerning their future as a community and
their relations with Moscow. Second, it provides a useful example of
the Russian nationalist critique of efforts to promote a civic
identity inside the Russian Federation. And third – and this is by far
the most important – this commentary calls attention to the increasing
sense among many Russians that they are a nation at risk of
assimilation by others rather than one that is doing the assimilation.

In an essay for the Orthodox web portal Stoletie.ru entitled “Will
Russians Become Kazakhstanis?” Aleksandr Shustov analyses the speech
Nazarbayev delivered October 27th to the Assembly of Peoples of
Kazakhstan on the nationality policy he plans for at least the next
decade (www.stoletie.ru/rossiya_i_mir/stanut_li_russkije_kazahstancami_2009-11-13.htm).
Nazarbayev said he wants to develop “a civic nation,” in which
attachment to the country is more important than ties to an ethnic
group, Shustov says, but the Kazakhstan leader’s intention is in fact
to elevate the status of Kazakh language and culture and reduce the
role of all others to that of “ethnic diasporas.”

In his programmatic address, Nazarbayev said that his proposed
“Doctrine of National Unity” provides answers to three “main”
questions: “what should be understood under national unity, why it is
important to strengthen it [at the present time and in the future],
and what is its foundation?” According to Nazarbayev, national “unity”
rests on three foundations: a common history, common values, and “a
common future,” the result of which “with the acquisition of
Independence, Kazakhstanis jointly made a free choice of their own
fate” as a separate and distinct community. Shustov concedes that
ethnic Kazakhs and ethnic Russians do have much in common, especially
given the tolerance of the former to the latter. But he insists that
“a common history in no way is a guarantee of a common future.”
Instead, it may be “just the reverse,” as the fate of various peoples
around the world has shown.

(The Russian commentator does not mention it, but Nazarbayev’s
promotion of “Kazakhstantsy” as opposed to “Kazakh” identity recalls a
similar campaign by republic leaders there during the run-up to the
adoption of the Brezhnev Constitution in 1976, an idea the leaders of
some other republics accepted but others, along with Moscow, opposed.)
“If a sufficiently large number of ethnic Russians remain in
Kazakhstan,” Shustov argues, “it will be possible to form here as in
other countries of Central Asia a Russian subculture.” But if the
number of Russians declines precipitously either by emigration or
assimilation, then such a subculture will not emerge but rather will
be swallowed up.

Despite Nazarbayev’s claims to the contrary, Shustov says, Kazakhstan
is already moving along that second path. The number of ethnic
Russians is declining, especially given their underrepresentation in
government bodies, a problem the commentator suggests will be
exacerbated in 2010 when the government there shifts to the exclusive
use of Kazakh.  That in turn will lead to even more ethnic conflicts
in the short term, Shustov argues. There have been at least five in
recent times, although “Russians and other European groups” have not
been involved in them. But he strongly implies that this could change
if Kazakhstan goes ahead with its language plans.

Indeed, Shustov argues, what Nazarbayev describes as a process of
creating “a civic nation” in Kazakhstan closely resembles the program
of “Kazakhization” long advocated by Kazakh historian and political
scientist Azimbay Gali who has written that “the Kazakhization of
non-Kazakhs will broaden the social basis of Kazakhstan.” According to
Gali, Shustov says, Kazakhs will first assimilate the closely related
Central Asian ethnic groups living among them and then force the
others to choose between living in a segregated fashion, actively
resistance assimilation primarily through emigration, or “an attempt
to assimilate the assimilators.”

Millions of ethnic Russians left Kazakhstan in the 1990s, Shustov
points out, but if the language policy Nazarbayev is promoting goes
through, many more will join them, threatening the remainder with
assimilation or segregation and clearly reducing the influence of
Russians and Russia on the future of Kazakhstan. Although Shustov does
not mention it – such a concession would undercut the outcomes he
wants – the arguments he makes against Nazarbayev’s nationality
policies because of their impact on ethnic Russians are exactly the
same as those advanced by non-Russians living within the Russian
Federation against Moscow’s Russianization policies. And in many ways
the arguments of the latter may be more important: The number and
percentage of non-Russians inside the Russian Federation is increasing
whereas the number and percentage of ethnic Russians in Kazakhstan is
falling, a pattern that makes Shustov’s argument suggestive in a way
he certainly did not intend.

http://georgiandaily.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=15636&Itemid=72

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