| An explosion of work on identity is all but silent on subethnic politics. Dominant approaches anticipate that subethnicity becomes decreasingly important with the rise of the modern state. In former Soviet Central Asia, where subethnic divisions propel the power dynamic, such approaches find a paradox.; Two interrelated questions animate this dissertation. First, what accounts for the persistence of subethnic identities, when dominant approaches expect their progressive marginalization? Second, what explains the distinctive political forms that subethnic competition assumes?; Part one argues that low-aggregate solidarities persist not in spite of attempts at modernization, industrialization, and cultural homogenization, but because of the particular ways in which these practices are carried out. Specifically, it suggests that two aspects of Soviet modernization promoted subethnic divisions. The political economy of shortage encouraged access networks to proliferate. Across the Soviet southern tier, these access networks often fell along subethnic lines. Moreover, Soviet nationalities policy stigmatized subethnic affiliations as “backward” and the “remnants of feudalism.” In doing so, it drove them into underground; their utility rose, becoming illicit, sub rosa, and unlikely to be detected by the agents of Soviet surveillance.; Part two addresses the particular forms that subethnic politics assumes. It argues that subethnic politics routinely involves “meta-conflict” (defined as conflict over the terms of the conflict itself). Because subethnicity is an essentially contested phenomenon, social and political actors vie to shape its nature and role in modern political life. This meta-conflict over subethnicity is not, however, uniformly salient across space and time. Its salience varies according to three factors: (1) the degree of ethnic dominance of the polity (i.e., whether ethnic groups contest the nature of state authority, or whether there is ethnic hegemony, (2) the degree of openness of the polity, and (3) the predominant policy emphasis of the state (from a focus on development to an emphasis on distribution).; Subethnic politics occurs broadly—from the Middle East to Siberia, from East Africa to the North Caucasus. This project uses material from the Central Asian region to analyze a form of identity politics that remains undertheorized in the literature. |
