Engagement with empire as norm and in practice in Kazakh nomadic political culture (1820s–1830s)

Virginia Martin

Central Asian Survey, 2017, vol. 36, issue 2, 175-194

Abstract: This article offers an analysis of the Kazakh nomadic political culture of the 1820s–30s with focus on two issues: (1) service and loyalty as elements of Kazakh engagement with the Russian Empire; and (2) the place in local political practice of the regional administrative offices (diwans) created for Middle Horde Kazakh nomads in 1822. While Russia’s goal was ‘bureaucratization’ and creation of ‘order’ in the steppe, in part through directing nomads to engage with the diwan and its elected Kazakh officials, Kazakh political actors variously embraced and rejected formal structures, and continued to define relevant norms and practices of governance. The analysis challenges both statist and nationalist narratives of nineteenth-century Kazakh steppe history by acknowledging the complexities of the Kazakh nomadic experience of empire-building. The ultimate purpose is to suggest new approaches for interpreting historical change throughout the nineteenth century and into the twentieth.

Date: 2017
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/02634937.2016.1203289 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:ccasxx:v:36:y:2017:i:2:p:175-194

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/ccas20

DOI: 10.1080/02634937.2016.1203289

Access Statistics for this article

Central Asian Survey is currently edited by Raphael Jacquet

More articles in Central Asian Survey from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().