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The -stans of central Asia: the Turanian bioregion

Whole Earth, Fall, 1998 by Eric Sievers

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8 Central Asia voluntarily relinquished its Soviet nuclear arms, but still has nuclear capability. While some Central Asian places and practices situate the area dearly in the developing world, Central Asia also holds military and civilian monuments and hardware that serve as reminders of the unique history and potential of the region. Among these is the nuclear power plant on Kazakstan's Caspian coast that desalinizes water for human consumption, and two more planned nuclear plants in Kazakstan.

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9 Central Asia is arguably the most secular, westernized part of the Islamic world. While the region is largely Islamic, for the bulk of the region's inhabitants Islam is a cultural identifier, not an ideology. Islamic law is nowhere threatening to replace civil law, and society in general is tolerant of a range of behavior and practices not so tolerated in other Islamic areas. In this way, Central Asia's recent re-entrance into the Islamic world could bridge current gulfs between the West and Islamic states.

10 Central Asia suffers developmentally from being overshadowed by Russia and Eastern Europe. While the post-communist world receives European and American aid to facilitate the transition from communism, Central Asia has pulled the short straw in the distribution of such assistance, especially assistance related to environment and civil society. Even worse, with the exception of the Soros Foundations, private organizations in the West have almost entirely ignored the region, preferring instead to work in richer and more European states such as Russia, the Czech Republic, and Poland.

Eric Sievers emailed all this to us while on the road in Kazakstan, a much-appreciated feat. he is executive director of Law and Environment Eurasia Partnership, and is an MIT Ph.D./Yale J.D. Candidate. His years in Central Asia include work as a USSR-era interpreter and, later, on several post-Soviet development and legal projects. Eric is seeking a publisher for the Last Soviets, an analysis of private democratic associations and development assistance in Central Asia.

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The -stans of central Asia: the Turanian bioregion

Whole Earth, Fall, 1998 by Eric Sievers

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