10 ms·

I traveled many post-Soviet countries in the past years with my old camping car. My personal impressions in Kazakhstan were frightening. A deeply corrupt state,

I traveled many post-Soviet countries in the past years with my old camping car. My personal impressions in Kazakhstan were frightening. A deeply corrupt state, much worse than Russia. Aggressive armed bandits in police uniform tried to rob me several times. Kazakhstan is true mafia state where every part of the regime tries to enrich itself at the expanse of the people. In contrast to the rich oil elite there are the normal people who often not even have tap water in the villages. And who live often in constant fear of being robbed by the armed forces. But why is such a dysfunctional dictatorship so stable? Why did it last for three decades? The situation is very similar to Azerbaijan. I believe the answer is: it is backed by the West because a stable dictator in Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan guarantees the oil flow.

jacobolus 5y ago
In the case of Azerbaijan, my understanding is that western European companies have just blanket bribed more or less every official they interact with up and down the Azeri government for the past few decades, to help them set up contracts that are grossly unfair to the Azeri public. Oil money that does go to Azerbaijan gets embezzled away, with those companies’ knowledge and implicit support. I haven’t heard of anyone from e.g. BP getting punished for this, though I believe the British government asked it to investigate itself a few times.
- cblconfederate 5y ago
  And vice-versa. Azerbaijan is known to bribe politicians in european and EU organizations, aka the "Azerbaijani laundromat" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azerbaijani_laundromat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azerbaijani_laundromat https://www.dw.com/en/how-german-politicians-have-aided-the-aliyev-regime/av-59036114 https://www.dw.com/en/how-german-politicians-have-aided-the-...
mlindner 5y ago
"Backed by the west" is a common conspiracy theory pushed by Russian government. You should be asking yourself who's benefiting. The west does not benefit from anything related to those states, all oil they produce first flows through Russia. Russia benefits by having these states as basically feudal subservient states that they can extort for profit. (I will note that most western oil comes from the middle east with Europe also getting a decent amount from Russia.)
- sam_lowry_ 5y ago
  Kazakh elite keeps its money in western banks, flies western planes to western capitals and owns land and property in top western locations. Same for Russian elite. In the Cold War, dealing with Soviets was unthinkable. Now, the West is complacent, there is even a term for it, Schröderizatsiya. See this opinion piece by the former Estonian president [1]. [1] https://news.err.ee/1608362130/toomas-hendrik-ilves-alexei-navalny-and-the-west-s-schroderizatsiya https://news.err.ee/1608362130/toomas-hendrik-ilves-alexei-n...
  - mlindner 5y ago
    > Kazakh elite keeps its money in western banks, flies western planes to western capitals and owns land and property in top western locations. Same for Russian elite. So does the Russian elite as you say, even Putin himself. The US's currency is the reserve currency of the world and the currency most commerce is done in so western banks are used. They also are much more stable than banks in their own countries where other elites could steal their money. This doesn't mean that the US or the west is somehow controlling their countries.
    - ericmay 5y ago
      Don’t bother wasting your time. These trolls just want to make you hate yourself and your country. Of course it’s your fault comrade, if you didn’t buy caviar from Russia then they wouldn’t have to invade Ukraine to feed the workers who make the caviar. It’s always your fault nobody else’s. The goal with these sorts of comments is to try and get liberal democracies to stop engaging in the rest of the world. If you keep getting told it’s your fault eventually you say “fine I’m done” and then that’s when they win.
      - jessaustin 5y ago
        Is there some sense in which this is not a "conspiracy theory"?
        5y ago
pjc50 5y ago
> But why is such a dysfunctional dictatorship so stable? Why did it last for three decades? Ceaușescu went from addressing a mass crowd in the square to execution in five days after ruling for about 25 years. Dictatorships are like steam boilers: so long as the pressure is contained, everything looks fine, until suddenly it isn't. (Interestingly having looked him up https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolae_Ceau%C8%99escu https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolae_Ceau%C8%99escu he's one of the few leaders to have achieved what is now denounced as "neoliberal", the paying down of the country's national debt. It only took starving the country to do it.)
- kspacewalk2 5y ago
  Exactly. The supposed "stability" of authoritarian dictatorships is a complete illusion. They look stable because there's no one exposing how very brittle they are, how much discontent is bubbling below the surface. That's why nothing at all was happening in Tunisia until a fruit stand owner set himself on fire and it all came crushing down. So it is here in Kazakhstan, except Russians come to the rescue to prop up the dictatorship. They probably realize the parallels with their own.
- lucian1900 5y ago
  He and his wife were assassinated during a military coup. Assassinations are a pattern during coups. Neoliberalism also has nothing to do with debt. It attempts to increase profit rates through privatisation, deregulation and austerity measures. Only the latter happened in România in the 80 and it was imposed by the IMF. Suspiciously, the loan had just been paid off in 89 when the coup happened.
fivea 5y ago
> But why is such a dysfunctional dictatorship so stable? (...) I believe the answer is: it is backed by the West because a stable dictator in Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan guarantees the oil flow. And yet, it's Russia and it's strong-arm tactics that are desperately trying to keep Kazakhstan's regime in power. Think about it: Russia is even sending it's paratroopers to Kazakhstan to stomp out unrest. Not the US. Not the EU. Not Switzerland. No, Russia. How do you fit that into your mental model?
- scotty79 5y ago
  Do you assume Putin and western corporations are antagonistic? Putin is just closest strong arm and most appropriate politically.
  - fivea 5y ago
    > Do you assume Putin and western corporations are antagonistic? Please don't try to change the subject. Putin sent Russia's paratroopers to Kazakhstan to use them against Kazakhstan's civilian population to quelsh unrest. It's not the US, Switzerland, Finland, the EU, nothing. This is Russia intervening in Kazakhstan to preserve Russia's interests, and no amount of whataboutism changes this.
    - scotty79 5y ago
      Russia's interests are aligned with western companies interests that buy Russian exports. Also I'm not changing the subject because we have a whole branching forum here, not a single coversation that can talk only about one thing at a time. If you are not interested in that branch of the discussion simply skip it.
      - ericmay 5y ago
        > Russia's interests are aligned with western companies interests that buy Russian exports. Just to be clear you are blaming “the west” (US, UK, Sweden, France, Canada, Switzerland, etc.) for Russian intervention in Kazakhstan because those countries buy Russian products? (Leaving aside all the other countries in the world which do the same but w/e).
mrighele 5y ago
> But why is such a dysfunctional dictatorship so stable? Why did it last for three decades? The situation is very similar to Azerbaijan My bet is natural resources.If i remember correctly Kazakhstan is the biggest uranium producer in the world. With big natural resources, you don't need a solid economy supported by a state of law to keep the regime running. Something similar can be said for Azerbaijan. The trick is to keep regular people calm by letting them have enough of the cake so that they don't revolt, but sometimes the money flow reduces, or the ruling elite becomes too greedy, and the problems starts. That's what may be happening here.
- tyingq 5y ago
  The government lifted price controls on liquefied petroleum gas on January 1st. I assume LPG is used for home heating, hot water, cooking, etc. Prices supposedly doubled overnight. Edit: Apparently most cars use LPG there as well.
jcfrei 5y ago
It's certainly not "backed by the west". These dictatorships exists because they allow the elites to exchange the profits from the sale of natural resources in exchange for dollars and euros. That money then flows into western equities, bonds and real estate. It's the (western) dependence on these natural resources that enables the regimes not the backing by the governments.
- cookieswumchorr 5y ago
  it's tolerated by the west. The most effective way to punish regimes would be to: - take away (arrest, freeze, whatever) the elite's real estate in the west - same thing with other assets, banc accounts etc - ban them from living in the west or going to the west on vacation, for medical treatment. - ban their families from living in the west, their kids from studying there. this is not my idea, you will find similar suggestions a hundred times in different forms on the Russian-speaking internet. maybe there is no legal base right now to do it as described, but the alternative is broad sanctions that hit the small people harder then regime collaborators. edit: formatting
  - SXX 5y ago
    This. So much of this. Most of the money that disctatorship regimes steal out of their countries are actually invested into western countries by their family members, friends and their pet oligarchs. US, EU and UK profit from oppressive regimes and don't have any interest of actually hurting them. And why should they? They have their own people to think of.
    - LaunchAway1 5y ago
      Cuba and Iran have been under sanctions for a long time. Dictators are very interested in not losing their jobs. I think, from the comfort of my home, that there are two paths out of a dictatorship: one is military and involves a brutal invasion of the country with the willingness to stay there for decades, the other is a progressive improvement of life conditions and gentle external influence
  - 5y ago
thomcano 5y ago
I agree with this one, I hope things will turn out for the betterment of the country.
kleton 5y ago
> it is backed by the West because a stable dictator Nazarbayev gave up over 1000 nuclear weapons to be disarmed when he came to power. This came with some explicit and implicit guarantees to not be color-revolutioned by the West.

jacobolus 5y ago

In the case of Azerbaijan, my understanding is that western European companies have just blanket bribed more or less every official they interact with up and down the Azeri government for the past few decades, to help them set up contracts that are grossly unfair to the Azeri public. Oil money that does go to Azerbaijan gets embezzled away, with those companies’ knowledge and implicit support. I haven’t heard of anyone from e.g. BP getting punished for this, though I believe the British government asked it to investigate itself a few times.

cblconfederate 5y ago
And vice-versa. Azerbaijan is known to bribe politicians in european and EU organizations, aka the "Azerbaijani laundromat" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azerbaijani_laundromat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azerbaijani_laundromat https://www.dw.com/en/how-german-politicians-have-aided-the-aliyev-regime/av-59036114 https://www.dw.com/en/how-german-politicians-have-aided-the-...

mlindner 5y ago

"Backed by the west" is a common conspiracy theory pushed by Russian government. You should be asking yourself who's benefiting. The west does not benefit from anything related to those states, all oil they produce first flows through Russia. Russia benefits by having these states as basically feudal subservient states that they can extort for profit. (I will note that most western oil comes from the middle east with Europe also getting a decent amount from Russia.)

sam_lowry_ 5y ago
Kazakh elite keeps its money in western banks, flies western planes to western capitals and owns land and property in top western locations. Same for Russian elite. In the Cold War, dealing with Soviets was unthinkable. Now, the West is complacent, there is even a term for it, Schröderizatsiya. See this opinion piece by the former Estonian president [1]. [1] https://news.err.ee/1608362130/toomas-hendrik-ilves-alexei-navalny-and-the-west-s-schroderizatsiya https://news.err.ee/1608362130/toomas-hendrik-ilves-alexei-n...
- mlindner 5y ago
  > Kazakh elite keeps its money in western banks, flies western planes to western capitals and owns land and property in top western locations. Same for Russian elite. So does the Russian elite as you say, even Putin himself. The US's currency is the reserve currency of the world and the currency most commerce is done in so western banks are used. They also are much more stable than banks in their own countries where other elites could steal their money. This doesn't mean that the US or the west is somehow controlling their countries.
  - ericmay 5y ago
    Don’t bother wasting your time. These trolls just want to make you hate yourself and your country. Of course it’s your fault comrade, if you didn’t buy caviar from Russia then they wouldn’t have to invade Ukraine to feed the workers who make the caviar. It’s always your fault nobody else’s. The goal with these sorts of comments is to try and get liberal democracies to stop engaging in the rest of the world. If you keep getting told it’s your fault eventually you say “fine I’m done” and then that’s when they win.
    - jessaustin 5y ago
      Is there some sense in which this is not a "conspiracy theory"?
      - 5y ago

pjc50 5y ago

> But why is such a dysfunctional dictatorship so stable? Why did it last for three decades? Ceaușescu went from addressing a mass crowd in the square to execution in five days after ruling for about 25 years. Dictatorships are like steam boilers: so long as the pressure is contained, everything looks fine, until suddenly it isn't. (Interestingly having looked him up https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolae_Ceau%C8%99escu https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolae_Ceau%C8%99escu he's one of the few leaders to have achieved what is now denounced as "neoliberal", the paying down of the country's national debt. It only took starving the country to do it.)

kspacewalk2 5y ago
Exactly. The supposed "stability" of authoritarian dictatorships is a complete illusion. They look stable because there's no one exposing how very brittle they are, how much discontent is bubbling below the surface. That's why nothing at all was happening in Tunisia until a fruit stand owner set himself on fire and it all came crushing down. So it is here in Kazakhstan, except Russians come to the rescue to prop up the dictatorship. They probably realize the parallels with their own.
lucian1900 5y ago
He and his wife were assassinated during a military coup. Assassinations are a pattern during coups. Neoliberalism also has nothing to do with debt. It attempts to increase profit rates through privatisation, deregulation and austerity measures. Only the latter happened in România in the 80 and it was imposed by the IMF. Suspiciously, the loan had just been paid off in 89 when the coup happened.

fivea 5y ago

> But why is such a dysfunctional dictatorship so stable? (...) I believe the answer is: it is backed by the West because a stable dictator in Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan guarantees the oil flow. And yet, it's Russia and it's strong-arm tactics that are desperately trying to keep Kazakhstan's regime in power. Think about it: Russia is even sending it's paratroopers to Kazakhstan to stomp out unrest. Not the US. Not the EU. Not Switzerland. No, Russia. How do you fit that into your mental model?

scotty79 5y ago
Do you assume Putin and western corporations are antagonistic? Putin is just closest strong arm and most appropriate politically.
- fivea 5y ago
  > Do you assume Putin and western corporations are antagonistic? Please don't try to change the subject. Putin sent Russia's paratroopers to Kazakhstan to use them against Kazakhstan's civilian population to quelsh unrest. It's not the US, Switzerland, Finland, the EU, nothing. This is Russia intervening in Kazakhstan to preserve Russia's interests, and no amount of whataboutism changes this.
  - scotty79 5y ago
    Russia's interests are aligned with western companies interests that buy Russian exports. Also I'm not changing the subject because we have a whole branching forum here, not a single coversation that can talk only about one thing at a time. If you are not interested in that branch of the discussion simply skip it.
    - ericmay 5y ago
      > Russia's interests are aligned with western companies interests that buy Russian exports. Just to be clear you are blaming “the west” (US, UK, Sweden, France, Canada, Switzerland, etc.) for Russian intervention in Kazakhstan because those countries buy Russian products? (Leaving aside all the other countries in the world which do the same but w/e).

mrighele 5y ago

> But why is such a dysfunctional dictatorship so stable? Why did it last for three decades? The situation is very similar to Azerbaijan My bet is natural resources.If i remember correctly Kazakhstan is the biggest uranium producer in the world. With big natural resources, you don't need a solid economy supported by a state of law to keep the regime running. Something similar can be said for Azerbaijan. The trick is to keep regular people calm by letting them have enough of the cake so that they don't revolt, but sometimes the money flow reduces, or the ruling elite becomes too greedy, and the problems starts. That's what may be happening here.

tyingq 5y ago
The government lifted price controls on liquefied petroleum gas on January 1st. I assume LPG is used for home heating, hot water, cooking, etc. Prices supposedly doubled overnight. Edit: Apparently most cars use LPG there as well.

jcfrei 5y ago

It's certainly not "backed by the west". These dictatorships exists because they allow the elites to exchange the profits from the sale of natural resources in exchange for dollars and euros. That money then flows into western equities, bonds and real estate. It's the (western) dependence on these natural resources that enables the regimes not the backing by the governments.

cookieswumchorr 5y ago
it's tolerated by the west. The most effective way to punish regimes would be to: - take away (arrest, freeze, whatever) the elite's real estate in the west - same thing with other assets, banc accounts etc - ban them from living in the west or going to the west on vacation, for medical treatment. - ban their families from living in the west, their kids from studying there. this is not my idea, you will find similar suggestions a hundred times in different forms on the Russian-speaking internet. maybe there is no legal base right now to do it as described, but the alternative is broad sanctions that hit the small people harder then regime collaborators. edit: formatting
- SXX 5y ago
  This. So much of this. Most of the money that disctatorship regimes steal out of their countries are actually invested into western countries by their family members, friends and their pet oligarchs. US, EU and UK profit from oppressive regimes and don't have any interest of actually hurting them. And why should they? They have their own people to think of.
  - LaunchAway1 5y ago
    Cuba and Iran have been under sanctions for a long time. Dictators are very interested in not losing their jobs. I think, from the comfort of my home, that there are two paths out of a dictatorship: one is military and involves a brutal invasion of the country with the willingness to stay there for decades, the other is a progressive improvement of life conditions and gentle external influence
- 5y ago

thomcano 5y ago

I agree with this one, I hope things will turn out for the betterment of the country.

kleton 5y ago

> it is backed by the West because a stable dictator Nazarbayev gave up over 1000 nuclear weapons to be disarmed when he came to power. This came with some explicit and implicit guarantees to not be color-revolutioned by the West.