Strategies of Sovietization in Central Asia, 1924-1930: The Uzbek case

Abstract

The thesis examines four cases of sovietization (modernization) as realized in Central Asia and especially in Uzbekistan in the 1920s, with particular emphasis on the period between 1924 (the regionalization of Central Asia) and 1930 (the end of the last general purges of the 1920s). Showing how Moscow intended to transform the region along the lines of Soviet ideology with the idea of converting the Homo Islamicus speaking Muslim into Homo Sovieticus speaking Bolshevik, the cases embodied by the four main parts of the thesis represent the intersection of soft-line and hard-line policies and bureaucratic control. Women, as a surrogate of the proletariat and as communicators between the population and the establishment, are the central subjects that tie the four cases together. The first part focuses on visual propaganda and introduces the first level of soft-line control with state-sponsored posters being regarded as direct means for modifying the attitudes of Central Asians using images and slogans. The second part, devoted to the Red Cross and the Red Crescent, represents the second level of soft-line bureaucracy with nuances of hard-line control, highlighting the interconnections between a supposedly neutral international (front) organization and party-state and Red Army institutions. The third part of the thesis is devoted to gender policy with particular emphasis on the hujum, the reactions among the indigenous population that emerged in the form of resistance in the second half of the 1920s, and the counter-reactions by the establishment through the first stage of purges, illustrating the transition from soft-line to hard-line policy, and leading both chronologically and conceptually to the fourth part dealing with the general purges of the 1929-1930, which represent the highest degree of hard-line policy and further confirm that the Soviets intended to sovietize the region beginning with its women.