Image by neweurasia's Schwartz.

Editor’s note: Although they are neighbors, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan are worlds apart economically and politically.  neweurasia’s Annasoltan examines some of the big differences with some potentially controversial arguments.  The picture she paints of her homeland, Turkmenistan, doesn’t look good.  Readers are invited to share their thoughts.

Speaking as a Central Asian, it’s sometimes weird to see how disembodied discussions about my region’s political and economic development can be.  Academic papers and expert panels just cannot capture the strangeness of watching Kazakh and Turkmen travelers at Istanbul’s airport and seeing just how much two nations in the same neighborhood can be so different.  The Kazakhs wore Western-style business suits or leisure outfits and carried small suitcases with cameras.  The Turkmens wore their colorful traditional outfits.  It’s a symbol for post-Soviet Central Asia.

Once our two nations were part of the same system and were even called “brotherly republics”.  Twenty years later, they vie for Caspian oil and tourism.  Kazakhstan pursues a multi-vector foreign policy that Turkmenistan, traditionally isolationist, increasingly seems ready to follow, albeit with a much lesser intensity and capacity.  Kazakhstan is also shaking off its command economy and agrarian-nomadic past, striving to integrate more deeply with the international system; Turkmenistan remains reluctant to follow the same path, and has even turned back the clock, becoming rigidly Stalinistic.

As the economic situation has improved in Kazakhstan, people there have been able to make foreign trips and enjoy new freedoms. My Kazakh friends tell me that in the recent years Kazakhstan has become like a magnet for labor emigrants from other Central Asian countries while the Kazakhs themselves are not going to Russia in search for jobs.  When they do go abroad, they stay at four star hotels and are earning a reputation as big spenders.   Compare this to my countrymen in Turkmenistan, who have to request permission to even leave the country, are unskilled, and have an average monthly income of only $150.  I’ve previously written about how many Turkmens flock to Turkey for jobs.

Kazakhstan has astronomically higher per capita income than Turkmenistan, and more importantly, it has a lot more entrepreneurship and diversification.  My country’s authoritarian government has taken a reluctant stance toward liberalization.  Heavy government interference remains  in almost every sector, private ventures are almost unheard of, and the entire country is practically a rentier state, dangerously dependent upon its natural gas exports.  Indeed, Turkmenistan, like Uzbekistan, is almost hobbled by its addiction to raw materials exports: the government hopes to use gas and cotton sales to continue providing its urban population free gas, electricity, and water, in exchange for the cities’ silence.

There is another remarkable, if controversial, difference: the two governments’ demographic policies.  In the first years of independence, ethnic Kazakhs barely comprised 40% of Kazakhstan’s population. The government adopted a program to increase the Kazakh population by, among other things, inviting exiled Kazakhs to return and resettle in the country of their  ancestors.  Since 1991, approximately 1-1.5 million émigré Kazakhs from Mongolia, China, Pakistan, Afghanistan , Uzbekistan, and other countries have obtained Kazakh citizenship.  They have received large financial, material, and moral support from the Kazakh government,  including livestock and cheap housing.

According to the most recent available census, the one from 2009, it would seem that the policy is working, because Kazakhs now make up over 60% of the country.  I should note that this change also unfortunately has to do with Russian expatriation.  The Kazakh government even worries that their northern provinces, which have Russian-Slavic majorities, might seek unification with Russia.  But my broader point stands: Kazakhstan says it’s the homeland of Kazakhs and it’s willing to put its money where its mouth is.  Indeed, it has begun to profit from this policy, since the government is able to train émigré Kazakhs in skills the economy needs and put them to work.

Now compare that to Turkmenistan.  Ethnic Turkmens compose some 85% of the country’s 5.2 million citizens.  More than 3 million ethnic Turkmen live in neighboring Iran and Afghanistan, as well as in smaller numbers in Syria, Iraq, Pakistan, Turkey, and the other post-Soviet states, throughout which they complain of discrimination.  For twenty years our government has talked about repatriating émigré Turkmens, but the government has taken no concrete steps toward achieving this goal.  Why?  Because (a) the borders would have to be opened – a horrifying idea for the government, and (b) with the country’s tribal balance in favor of the Teke tribe, including the political elite, there is fear that émigré Turkmens, who are mostly from rival tribes, would destablize the status quo.

Finally, the numbers of students from Kazakhstan who are studying abroad are far higher than that of Turkmenistan.  Kazakh students can also expect government financial support for their studies overseas, whereas Turkmen students must be financed by their families, that is, when they are even allowed to leave the country.  Kazakh students are also confident that jobs will be awaiting them when they return; Turkmens pretty much know they don’t have such luck, and so try their best to stay out.

Are my comparisons and criticisms fair?  Maybe not.  Leave a comment below and tell me what you think.