Social protests in Kazakhstan: Factors and trends

Abstract

The authors discuss the features of protests in Kazakhstan and identify their factors and causes. The analysis of the content of the sociological surveys, the posts on the social networks, the web sides and blogs of Kazakhstan’s top officials enabled the authors to establish the issues of social and economic nature that are the most probable triggers of protests. The authors conceptualize their root causes as a discrepancy between the articulated goals of modernization and poor performance of the public administration responsible for their implementation. The authors’ analysis goes beyond the changes of protest behavior and includes the responses of the state organs and the role of the Internet. Further, the article provides a typology of the protests occurred in Kazakhstan and deals with their scale and scope. The article also touches upon the means employed by the state to diffuse social tensions and the respective role of civil society institutions, which is argued to be insufficient. The authors conclude that the protests in Kazakhstan are spatially and topically limited, as is their destructive potential. Kazakhstan shall not anticipate massive protest actions due to the impact of the currently implemented social and economic reforms, commitment of the majority of its citizens to maintenance of political stability and their fear of possible destructive consequences, as well as the lack of any organized political force capable of transforming public discontent into political actions and underdevelopment of civil society.