ABSTRACT
The year 2010 represents a watershed not only for the history of Kyrgyzstan, but also for that of post-Soviet Central Asia as a whole. In Kyrgyzstan, a second ‘revolution’ led to the overthrow of President Kurmanbek Bakiyev and to the country's transformation — in theory at least — into the first parliamentary democracy in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). In themselves, these were unique events. But the pogroms in Osh in June 2010 added an additional effect to the signals of destabilisation that the country has been emitting for many years. They reveal the failure of Kyrgyzstan in terms of statehood. The trauma of the Osh events has enabled new political forces to cohere around nationalist claims, which are now going to play a key role in the modes of political legitimisation in Kyrgyzstan. However, it is the deep transformations of the social fabric that constitute the essential background of Kyrgyz developments, and attempts to rebuild the political consensus in the country will have to take them as their point of departure. This chapter places the Osh events in the Kyrgyz political context, and discusses the major role of social transformations and the lack of economic prospects in fostering tensions.
