ABSTRACT
This article analyses the political and social discourses towards Eurasian integration in Central Asia. I concentrate on the independent non-Russian political elites and wider popular responses to the integration in Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan and on the motivations leading these decision makers and societies to Eurasian economic integration. The focus is on Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, the only Central Asian countries in the Eurasian Economic Union, and on their respective populations. I demonstrate how post-Soviet Kazakhstani and Kyrgyz regimes facilitated ideas and ideals of Eurasianism so closely connected to their own interests in economic and socio-political contexts. The article also aims to reveal the complex web of interests, identities and mobilities of groups and individuals behind the political façade of integration talks in Central Eurasia. In doing so the study focuses on the historical approach and political elite-led discourses combined with the sociological data of social responses to the integration projects at different stages of their development.
