Fairbanks, Charles. "Disillusionment in the Caucasus and Central Asia". Journal of Democracy, Vol.12, No.4 (2001): 49-56.

Fairbanks, Charles. "Disillusionment in the Caucasus and Central Asia". Journal of Democracy, Vol.12, No.4 (2001): 49-56.

• Immediately following the collapse of the Soviet Union, Western analysts had an incredible hope for the future of the region, a dream largely shattered a decade after independence (49). A few major patterns emerge in these contemporary states is a strong presidential system without effective power sharing, parties are usually organized without ideology, a complacency among the ruled, electoral processes are the limit of actual democracy, and the state has become weak, sometimes to the point of collapse (49-51).
• The weakening of the state from the totalitarian model of Soviet governance has been an especially important change, as the collapse of Soviet-era social security schemes and the breakdown of the Soviet economic planning has thrown much of the population into deep poverty without access to essential services (51).
• The small size of the state and growing discontent seem to live an opportunity for a socialist government to seize power if they wished, based on public support for benefits. The small size of the state could also leave plentiful room for civil society groups, but right now that space is occupied by client networks and organized crime (52).
• Much of the population, especially in Armenia, Tajikistan, and the Kyrgyz Republic, yearns for the days of the Soviet Union with all of its social guarantees. Support of governments is extremely low, and most feel that only societal elites are benefiting from the new capitalist systems (51).
• Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan have an entirely different state system, where the strong Soviet state and its structures of control have been maintained in some form. State collapse has not affected these countries; the bureaucracy is forced to listen to the presidents, and the average citizens can assume protection from their local elites (53).
• "To be an Uzbek or Turkmen is to give up all freedom, but to belong to a state capable of furnishing order and protection" (53).
• Certain parts of the post-Soviet experience are characterized by state breakdown to the degree that they become 'stateless communities', an organization of polities and patronage groups which share a common identity, but lack administrative and organizational control over a territory. The brief Chechen Republic of Ichkeria stands on one end of a continuum, with all embassies being expected to over their own costs, but most Caucasian and some Central Asian states have faced similar issues (54).
• The author believes that democracy is likely to come, in some form, to the former Soviet Union because there is no principled alternative to democracy at this time. In the face of losing the Communist ideology, public elites are turned towards several alternative sources: the West for the Caucasian republics, and the model of 'Asian authoritarianism' for Central Asia (55).