The Soviet Union In Asia

With the end of the Soviet Union in 1991, a major turning point in all former Soviet republics, Central Asian and Caucasian countries began to reflect on their history and identities. As a consequence of their opening up to the global exchange of ideas, various strains of Islam and trends in Islamic thought have nourished the Islamic revival that had already started in the context of glasnost and perestroika--from Turkey, Iran, the Arabian Peninsula, and from the Indian subcontinent; the four regions with strong ties to Central Asian and Caucasian Islam in the years before Soviet occupation. Bayram Balci seeks to analyse how these new Islamic influences have reached local societies and how they have interacted with pre-existing religious belief and practice. Combining exceptional erudition with rare first-hand research, Balci's book provides a sophisticated account of both the internal dynamics and external influences in the evolution of Islam in the region.

In examining the economic and social reforms of Gorbachev's Soviet Union, the contributors to this new study provide a broad portrait of the state of current soviet relations with the countries of the Asia-Pacific region, the prospects for change, and the perceived role of the Soviet Union in that change. Leading established scholars and specialists from the countries of the Asia-Pacific region study this new Soviet phenomenon and evince a mixture of enthusiasm and apprehension about Moscow's new policy overtures to the region. Mikhail Gorbachev's speech in the Soviet Far East city of Vladivostok on July 28, 1986, was widely read and commented upon throughout East and Southeast Asia, and raised many unanswered questions: How much has the Soviet Union really changed? Will China, the principal target of Soviet overtures, respond positively and, if so, what will the implications be for the rest of the region? What do these sweeping changes mean for the region in practical terms? The Soviet Union and the Asia-Pacific Region considers these questions and offers insight and provocative commentary on the current attitudes of the many Asia-Pacific countries toward the Soviet Union.

Gorbachev’s major speech at Vladivostok on 28 July 1986 signalled an increased awareness by the Soviet Union of the importance of the Asia-Pacific region. Subsequently there have been significant changes in Soviet foreign policy, paralleling the programme of wide-ranging internal reform and imparting a new look to the USSR’s international image. The aim of the present work is to chart the development of Soviet policy towards the region since the start of the Bolshevik regime, with whether there was any pattern or consistency in that policy. Concentration on Soviet activity in a particular part of the world might also serve to throw further light on the much discussed question whether Moscow’s policies have in the past been conceived in ideological terms (and therefore in some measure pre-determined) or whether they were truly ad hoc, ideology being used merely as justification.

The demise of the Soviet Union in 1991 resulted in new state-led nation-building projects in Central Asia. The emergence of independent republics spawned a renewed Western scholarly interest in the region’s nationality issues. Presenting a detailed study, this book examines the state-led nation-building projects in the Soviet republics of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. Exploring the degree, forms and ways of the Soviet state involvement in creating Kazakh and Uzbek nations, this book places the discussion within the theoretical literature on nationalism. The author argues that both Kazakh and Uzbek nations are artificial constructs of Moscow-based Soviet policy-makers of the 1920s and 1930s. This book challenges existing arguments in current scholarship by bringing some new and alternative insights into the role of indigenous Central Asian and Soviet officials in these nation-building projects. It goes on to critically examine post-Soviet official Kazakh and Uzbek historiographies, according to which Kazakh and Uzbek peoples had developed national collective identities and loyalties long before the Soviet era. This book will be a useful contribution to Central Asian History and Politics, as well as studies of Nationalism and Soviet Politics.

Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, the independent republics of central Asia enjoy a greater degree of autonomy, but are faced with a range of complex social, political and economic problems. This book addresses these problems.