Carnegie Moscow Center
While the regime in Turkmenistan remains the most authoritarian of all Central Asian states, its stability depends on the availability of financial resources coming from the gas sales.
In Uzbekistan, Central Asia’s most populous country, Islam has been an ever-present factor in the lives of its people and a contentious force for political officials trying to build a secular government.
To forge an effective partnership with Moscow, the EU must first understand Russia’s political, economic, and security designs, and how best to deal with another round of Putin.
Tajikistan is among the most problematic countries in Central Asia. The country faces a number of challenges, including an economic crisis, regionalism, domestic political confrontation, and radical Islam.
Independent Kyrgyzstan is unique in its recent political history. Over the last two years this country has functioned under a non-authoritarian system and has started moving in a different direction from its Central Asian neighbors.
The turbulent events of 2011 in Kazakhstan have forced the country's ruling elite to consider economic and even political change in order to enable their continued rule.
The North Caucasus remains economically and politically a part of Russia, but the internal situation there is increasingly regulated by the region’s own local traditions.
While Vladimir Putin is unlikely to give up power any time soon, the political and economic system he created is incapable of dealing with Russia’s rapidly changing conditions. Crises are likely unavoidable unless Russia changes and modernizes.
Enormous societal and political shifts 20 years ago opened prospects for a new, united Europe. Despite Russia’s role in this peaceful departure from totalitarianism, the country’s course in the subsequent two decades was not so straightforward. While the demolition of the Berlin Wall is no guarantee of success, democratic transformations are a necessary precondition.
The unrest that has swept through Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya resulted in large part from the inability or unwillingness of the ruling regimes to make significant improvements in the lives of the general public. The departure of the heads of these regimes, however, does not necessarily signal an end to the revolutionary process.