The Political Role of Clans in Central Asia

Abstract

Ethnonational and religious identity has been highlighted as a causal variable in the protracted conflicts of the last decade in the former Soviet Union, eastern Europe, Africa, and Asia. However, it has not led to conflict in post-Soviet Central Asia. To explain its absence, it is necessary to focus on the clan as the critical unit of analysis in Central Asia. Studies of conflict and transition have ignored the clan. By focusing on the clan, it is possible to understand the limits of ethnonational and religious identity mobilization and thus the absence of identity-based conflict. Clan dynamics also better explain why and how conflict occurs. The long-term rise in ethnic war, from 1945 to 1998, has put identity conflict at the center of scholarly concerns.1 Realists, rational choice theorists, and constructivists alike often advocate an implicitly essentialist view of identity groups as actors in conflict.2 Assuming that ethnic or religious differences lead to or form the basis of nationalism, many scholars predict conflict when an ethnic group and state boundaries do not coincide.3 Yet few studies look at a range of potential identities and ask why some identities are more salient than others. Further, few explore the social roots of stability or nonconflict. A methodologically complete research agenda must address instances of both conflict and nonconflict.4 How is the absence of ethnic and religious conflict in Central Asia explained? Data from three Central Asian countries-Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan-suggest that clan identity is more salient than ethnonationality and religion and is the critical variable in understanding stability and conflict.5 Ronald Suny has argued that Western scholars erred most egregiously in deducing behavior from essential religious and cultural characteristics of Central Asia.6 In contrast to their assumptions, ethnonationality and religion are not always powerful mobilizing identities. The clan is an informal identity network based on kinship ties and is common in semimodern societies. In such societies identities embedded