Surviving the Transformation: Social Quality in Central Asia and the Caucuses

Pamela Abbott 0 1 Claire Wallace 0 1 Roger Sapsford 0 1 0 R. Sapsford National University of Rwanda , Butare, Rwanda 1 P. Abbott (&) C. Wallace School of Social Sciences, University of Aberdeen , Aberdeen, UK This paper develops a sociologically informed understanding of what influences the lives and life-choices of people living in Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan (Central Asian Republics) and Armenia and Georgia (the Caucasus), four of the successor states of the Soviet Union that suffered significant social and economic changes following the collapse of the Union in 1991. The focus is on the nature of these societies for their citizens; ultimately we are concerned to understand what makes a society liveable for all, what type of society enables people to be generally satisfied with their lives. To do this we use the Social Quality model to derive indicators from which to model what makes for a liveable or at least tolerable society. The model is validated by reference to subjective satisfactionhow people feel about life in generalas the ultimate outcome indicator of individual well-being. The data we use were collected as part of a broader study of living conditions, lifestyles and health in eight of the successor states of the Soviet Union, the Confederation of Independent States (CIS). - Research to date on subjective satisfaction in Europe and Eurasia has focused mainly on the European Union, including the former communist countries of Central and Eastern Europe that have now joined the EU. With the notable exception of the Russian Federation much less attention has been paid to the former Soviet Union (FSU) and virtually none to the Central Asia Republics and the countries of the Caucuses. However, the development trajectories of the countries of Eastern and Central Europe (CEE) have been very different from those of the Commonwealth of Independent States. Most of the former had entered on a virtuous path of economic, political and civic development by the start of the twentyfirst century, with reported levels of subjective satisfaction improving (Abbott and Wallace 2009a, b, c; Easterlin 2009; Wallace and Haerpfer 2002). The length and depth of the economic recession was much greater and recovery much slower in the successor states to the Soviet Union and the future more uncertain. There has not been the same move towards the establishment of regulated market economies, democratic government and the development of civil society found in the countries of Eastern and Central Europe (Grun and Klasen 2000; Haerpfer 2009). It is now well established that the disintegration of the Soviet Union in 1991 has had a negative impact on the health, wealth and well-being of the population. The social transformation and structural change, backed and fuelled by economic collapse, led to a breakdown of the normative structure and predictability of the social orderwhat Durkheim referred to as anomie (Abbott and Beck 2003; Durkheim 1952; Galip 2009; Genov 1998; Krivosheyev 2004; Pridemore et al. 2007). Much of the research on the impact of the post-1991 structural transformation on the well-being of the societies and the citizens of the former USSR has focused on the Russian Federation and has demonstrated that the changes have had a dramatically negative impact on the welfare of the societies and the population (see e.g. Abbott 2007; Abbott and Sapsford 2006; Abbott and Wallace 2007, 2009a; Burawoy 1997, 2000, 2001; Burawoy et al. 2000; Shevchenko 2009; Rose 2009; Wallace and Abbott 2009). However, much less is known about the impact of the transformation on the life-satisfaction of those who have survived in other CIS countries, including the Central Asian Republics and the Caucasus, although the very limited research, mostly looking at the Central Asian Republics, suggests that there has been a negative impact (Abbott 2002; Abbott and Wallace 2009a; Cockerham et al. 2004; De la Sablonniere et al. 2009; Galip 2009; Kanji 2007; Namazie and Sandfrey 2002; Nazpary 2002; Richardson et al. 2008; Wallace and Abbott 2009). An index of well-being for children, developed for 21 CEE and CIS countries (excluding the CEE countries that joined the EU in 2003) and using a range of objective and subjective indicators, suggests that the four countries considered here are below the regional average in this respect, with Kazakhstan being marginally better than the other three countries (Richardson et al. 2008). The data we use are about individuals, but the focus of the paper is on the nature of the societies in which they livewhat makes a society more or less tolerable, gives more or less space for citizens to take control of their lives. Satisfaction is used as an indicator of the good societypeople will necessarily be dissatisfied with intolerable societies, and even where people have come to terms with societies which are far from optimal, their level of satisfaction is likely to be lower than in societies which give a better than tolerable life-style. The focus of the paper is not individual satisfaction per se, however, but what it is about societies that makes satisfaction possible. 2 Background The shock therapy that resulted in system disintegration of the political and economic structures in the FSU was unprecedented in modern times. It resulted not only in systems disintegration but also in social disintegration, with people having to negotiate between old familiar practices and the new realities which faced them in their daily lives. People experienced the transformation as living in a permanent state of chaos/crisis (Nazpary 2002; Shevchenko 2009) with no known outcome. The transformation involved four interdependent processes: the construction of new state formations and related institutions; a shift from planned and administered co-ordination of markets to economic markets and private property; the move from the hegemony of the Communist Party to authoritarian regimes; and a realignment of states in the arena of international relations. All aspects of social, economic and political life changed at once, and it was a painful process for the majority of the population. New states emerged that lacked the institutional mechanisms for social integration and social stability (Fligstein 2001; Walder 1994). New class relationships were unleashed, and there was an intense struggle to secure access to and control over resources. The transition from a bureaucratic-redistributive order to an imperfect market order was accompanied by a dramatic decline in GDP, a decline in state spending on health, education and social security benefits both in absolute and real terms, an increase in unemployment and under-employment, the non- and late payment of wages, a decline in the influence of the trade unions, an increase in inequalities, poverty and malnutrition and a growth in informal economic activity (Abbott 2002). The vast majority of the population were losers (Haerpfer and Zeilhofer 1995; (...truncated)