Democracy and counterinsurgency in Central Asia

In this study of democratization in Central Asia, Gregory Gleason examines the relationship between pro forma institutional change and the survival of traditional authoritarian patterns of behavior rooted deeply in civil societies that, even during the soviet era, combined elements of modernity with traditional practices. He concludes that the post-communist states of the region are not functioning democracies in the dual sense that authoritarian presidents, themselves former high-level officials of the communist era, have clung to power, and that viable civil societies and party systems have not emerged to reign in their control. Paradoxically, he argues that one of the greatest threats to any prospect Of real democratization comes from insurgency movements that would create Islamic states to replace the secular pseudo - democracies that have emerged as a consequence of the disintegration of the Soviet Union.