Research Center for East European Studies (Forschungsstelle Osteuropa)

Nationalism has been recognized as common phenomenon in response to crises of post-Soviet regimes. While it is
considered a convenient legitimation strategy by different governments, the intensity of nationalist discourse and
corresponding policies has often exceeded the level deemed sufficient to unify a nation, especially as nationalism in
the Eastern hemisphere has often been classified as 'ethnic', as opposed to its Western counterpart of 'civic'
nationalism. Furthermore, in some cases it became apparent that not only the discourse about the nation and the
stories surrounding it are on shaky grounds, but that the very crises that leaders purport to resolve are to varying
extent constructed in order to provide a basis for consolidating power under a nationalist flag.
Our study ventures to identify the ways in which a nationalist discourse has been used in Belarus and Kyrgyzstan,
respectively, in order to mobilise the electorate and consolidate political leadership in the eye of political and
economic turmoil. While in Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko opted to change the neo-Soviet national identity of the
1990s (with a strong drive for unification with Russia) in the beginning of the 2000s to a civic nationalist statecentered
discourse to legitimize his regime on the backdrop of a perceived threat to the country’s sovereignty, a
nationalist discourse about the Kyrgyz as the titular ethnic group constituting the core of Kyrgyz statehood became
increasingly dominant in Kyrgyzstan in the late 2000s. However, different factors and processes led to different
outcomes. The nationalist discourse in Belarus took more modest forms based on statehood and sovereignty leading
to a stable regime legitimation trajectory, whereas in Kyrgyzstan it led to the politicization of ethnicity and, although
causal connections are vague, to the outbreak of major interethnic violence between Kyrgyz and Uzbeks in 2010. We
will shed light on legitimation strategies and the trajectories leading to these differential outcomes by looking at the
discursive and ideational dimensions of nationalism in Belarus and Kyrgyzstan.
By analyzing field work data as well as primary and secondary sources we will inquire how, firstly, nationalist
narratives were employed by government and other in the political landscape. In a second step, the way in which
nationalist discourse materializes on the ground, i.e. how different groups and layers in society experience policies
and practices, formal and informal, will be inquired in order to illuminate the extent to which rhetoric becomes reality.
We will show how a centrally produced discourse of a more civic nationalism as a reaction to perceived crisis of
national sovereignty has contributed to regime stability in Belarus, while in Kyrgyzstan ethnic nationalism became
part of the political discourse after president Akaev’s ouster and his successor Bakiev’s failure to engage in this
debate. This explains the divergent paths of the two countries: Looking at the level of popular support and everyday
persepctives, we show how opposition groups had difficulty to delegitimize the regime in Belarus while ethnic
nationalism served to destabilize the regime and the whole country in Kyrgyzstan through the instigation of ethnic
conflict, and continues to do so to this day.

Am 10. September 2017 wurden in 15 russischen Regionen und im annektierten Sewas-topol neue Gouverneure gewählt. Die Wahlen haben gezeigt, dass der Kreml der gestie-genen sozioökonomischen Anspannung in den Regionen mit neuem Führungspersonal begegnen will. Immer mehr ältere, in der regionalen Elite verwurzelte Landesfürsten müssen besser kontrollierbaren jüngeren Polit-Managern aus Moskau weichen. Auch die finanzielle Unabhängigkeit der Regionen wurde weiter eingeschränkt. Für den Kreml ver-lief der letzte Test vor den Präsidentschaftswahlen, die für den 18. März 2018 angesetzt sind, überwiegend erfolgreich. Mit Putin wird 2018 aber auch die Unsicherheit über seine Nachfolge in den Kreml einziehen. Die Zentralisierung soll möglichen politischen Risiken schon im Vorfeld entgegenwirken. Sie schwächt jedoch die Anreize für die Gou-verneure, in die langfristige Entwicklung der Regionen zu investieren.

Fifteen Russian regions and annexed Sevastopol elected new governors on 10 September 2017. The process reveals the Kremlin’s response to rising socioeconomic tensions in Russia’s regions: changing their leaders. A string of older regional bosses rooted within their local elites have been forced to make way for a younger generation of political managers over whom Moscow holds greater sway. The regions’ financial independence has been curtailed again too. For the Kremlin, this round of voting represented the final test before the presidential election scheduled for 18 March 2018 – and it passed off largely successfully. But the next presidential term will also see growing uncertainty over Vladimir Putin’s successor in the Kremlin. These latest centralisation moves are designed to counter potential political risks ahead of time. But they weaken the incentives for governors to invest in the long-term development of their regions.