Product Description

Exploring the varied roots of clans, and their political role and transformation during the Soviet and post-Soviet periods, this volume argues that clans are informal political actors critical to understanding regional politics. It demonstrates that the Soviet system was far less successful in transforming and controlling Central Asian society by eradicating clan identities, than has often been assumed. Clans actually influenced and constrained the regime's political trajectory increasingly, during the later Soviet and post-Soviet periods, and made liberalizing political and economic reforms very difficult.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #240342 in Books
• Published on: 2009-06-25
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 400 pages

Review
"The author is to be commended for seeking to reorient comparative politics toward the study of informal relations and politics and for her attention to Central Asia's pre-transition history. The book is stimulating."
Sada Aksartova, Japanese Journal of Political Science

"Clan Politics and Regime Transition in Central Asia is a stunning piece of scholarship on regime transformation. It is, by far, the best work to date on the dynamics of Central Asia's weak states. Collin's empirical research is impeccable and based on an array of sources gathered during three years of fieldwork. She buttresses every point, large and small, with on-the-ground interview material, ethnographic data, and well-considered secondary accounts. One can only hope that her attention to empirical detail will become the new standard among scholars of comparative politics. This is an empirically rich and theoretically stimulating book that deserves to be read adn deeply considered, by anyone who cares about Central Asia or the phenomenon of weak states." - Edward Schatz, University of Toronto The Russian Review

"...should be welcomed by all scholars of contemporary Central Asia for their detailed and comparative description of the politics of independence in these three republics." --Marianne Kamp, University of Wyoming, Journal of Interdisciplinary History

About the Author
Kathleen Collins is Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of Notre Dame and Faculty Fellow at the Kellogg Institute for International Studies. She has published articles in World Politics, Comparative Politics, the Journal of Democracy, and several edited volumes. She has received grants from the MacArthur Foundation, the United States Institute for Peace, IREX, and the National Council for Russian, East European and Eurasian Research, among others. Dr Collins was named a Carnegie Scholar in 2003 for her research. She has been conducting research throughout Central Asia for eleven years, since 1994.

Customer Reviews

The Politics of Clan
Be warned, this book is not for the faint of heart, the chapters are lengthy and they are packed with information that can confuse the reader if they are not careful. Really needs to read more than once to fully comprehend fully all the information that's heaved at the reader. However, Clan Politics and Regime Transition in Central Asia does offer a very detailed look at clan politics from Soviet times through 2004 and the problems that clan politics has caused throughout Central Asia by preventing consolidation of power and promoting a culture of indebtedness to the clan, even though this culture leads to state and economic weakness that creates poor conditions for those citizens not connected to the clan.