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Despite the growing attention to the everyday, nation-building literature has paid insufficient attention to the ways in which national identity is strengthened as a side effect of measures that are not initially conceived of as nation-building activities. This article examines contemporary examples of such non-traditional processes of nation-building by reviewing the unintended consequences of political measures not directly targeting identity construction. We focus on processes of identity construction in Kyrgyzstan and Estonia that have emerged as a side effect of nation branding. In both cases, the primary goal of the national government was not necessarily to boost national identity but rather to re-brand the country for international audiences. We argue, however, that these efforts at external image projection and change have also influenced the ways in which national identities are understood, perceived, and reproduced by domestic populations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In October 2020 the world witnessed the third sudden change of power in Kyrgyzstan since its independence. In 2005, 2010 and 2020 repeated mass protests led to the violent fall of the political regimes of Akaev, Bakiev and Zheenbekov. Although these events were more or less similar in terms of the conditions contributing to the protests, they were different in the way the political elites were viewed by the protesters. The aim of this contribution is to critically analyse the role of political elites during these three revolutions. This piece underlines the declining role of these elites on the one hand, namely in terms of the decline of the political capital of the leaders, and points out the rise in public grievances and worsening of socio-economic life on the other hand. These latter processes have led to an increase in distrust toward the political establishment and the emergence of populist leadership after October 2020. In contrast with the previous Kyrgyz revolutions, the October 2020 revolution failed to establish clear leadership from among the established elites and was chaotic. In the paper we challenge the existing scholarship on protests in Central Asia as elitist and reductionist, as they completely ignore the roles of society and social grievances. Instead, we suggest that the role of the political elites in protests and their political capital are diminishing, and they are not the rigid and powerful actors that they seem. The study is based on 20 in-depth interviews with Kyrgyz political elites and leaders of three revolutions, 10 interviews with representatives of society, online ethnography (online observation of three Kyrgyz revolutions, including available live-streams) and news sources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In contrast to existing nationalism studies on Central Asia, I argue that state‐sponsored celebrations in Kyrgyzstan were multi‐functional and were used to maintain political legitimation based on the politics of Kyrgyz mega‐celebrations held during the presidency of Askar Akaev (1991–2005). I propose that in weak democracies like Kyrgyzstan, with widespread electoral malpractice, political legitimacy is shaky and that therefore the political leadership seeks to maintain its legitimacy using various means. Rule by coercion is not a practical option for such regimes because it does not provide them with long‐term legitimacy. As I demonstrate in the paper, Akaev's regime relied on the cultural performance mode of self‐legitimization because it lacked other options for legitimation. Specifically, the mega‐celebrations for the 1,000‐year anniversary of The Epic of Manas in 1995, for the 3,000‐year anniversary of the city of Osh in 2000, and for the 2,200‐year anniversary of Kyrgyz statehood in 2003 – each of them led and promoted by Akaev – secured his re‐election and ensured the political stability and legitimacy of his regime. I conclude that in Central Asia nation‐building and legitimacy do not exist as separate processes and that state‐sponsored celebrations should therefore be treated as both nation‐building and legitimation projects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines ‘invention’ of a new ‘tradition’, that is of nomadic games in Kyrgyzstan blessed by its prehistoric past of nomadism. Since 2012 the Kyrgyz government had introduced the World Nomad Games (the WNGs) in Kyrgyzstan. The country hosted three spectacular games in the northern oblast of the country – Yssyk-Kul. Hundreds of sportsmen worldwide took part in these events and thousands of tourists rushed into the country to watch the games. In fact, Kyrgyz nomadic games are more than just a revival of old nomadic traditions, but they are political inventions. Using Hobsbawm’s framework of ‘invented traditions’ (1983), I examine the World Nomad Games as invented tradition. I argue that the Kyrgyz leadership invented tradition of nomadic games to tackle with contemporary issues, such as a need for attraction of foreign investment and promotion of tourism. As I illustrate the WNGs project was a timely response to improve the country image after a series of political instabilities the country underwent in its recent history. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper offers an analysis of a post-conflict policy document: 'The Concept on strengthening of the national unity and inter-ethnic relations in the Kyrgyz Republic', as a policy driven by values of multiculturalism based on international standards. The paper problematizes the relationship between the norms of multiculturalism and the politics of nationalism in Kyrgyzstan using field data collected in 2015. This paper will argue that the 'Concept' adopted by the Kyrgyzstani government is a top-down project, rather than a community-owned and community-shared project. It does not consider broad public opinion and does not enjoy public support for most of policy ideas contained in it. The paper critically studies the values behind the 'Concept', which were aimed at engendering inter-ethnic cohesion and observance of minority rights, against the political reality of interethnic relations on the ground. Informed by key literature on nationalism in post-Soviet Central Asia, the paper concludes that Kyrgyzstan's 'uneasy' management of diversity speaks more broadly to the issue of 'titular ethnicization' in post-Soviet Central Asia, and questions the applicability of the idea of multiculturalism in the post-Westphalian nationstate reality, especially in post-conflict or conflict-prone settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]