Bazaar politics: The fate of marketplaces in Kazakhstan

Problems of Post-Communism

Volumn 55, Issue 6, 2008, Pages 42-53

  Spector, Regine A ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 58149236771     PISSN: 10758216     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.2753/PPC1075-8216550604     Document Type: Article

References (85)

1. Gulnoza Saidazimova, "Kazakhstan: Economy Expands, But Experts Say Growth Unsustainable," RFE/RL (January 23, 2006).
2. The word "bazaar," used colloquially by traders in the Kazakhstan, has a distinctly negative connotation in Almaty, especially for government officials and higher-level entrepreneurs. They prefer to use the Russian word for "marketplace," rynok.
3. For example, author interview with analyst at PRAGMA, Almaty, Kazakhstan, May 14, 2006.
4. For example, author interview with administrator of Almaty wholesale bazaar, Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, May 21, 2006.
5. Paul Pierson, Politics in Time: History, Institutions, and Social Analysis (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004).
6. Author interview with trader in Almaty wholesale bazaar, Almaty, Kazakhstan, October 25, 2006.
7. 7.Andrew Barnes, Owning Russia: The Struggle over Factories, Farms, and Power (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2006).
8. Barbara Junisbai and Azamat Junisbai, "The Democratic Choice of Kazakhstan: A Case Study in Economic Liberalization, Intra-Elite Cleavage and Political Opposition," Demokratizatsiya 13, no. 3 (2005): 373-92.
9. Bavna Dave, "Kazakhstan's 2004 Parliamentary Elections: Managing Loyalty and Support for the Regime," Problems of Post-Communism 52, no. 1 (January/February 2005): 3-14.
10. Martha Brill Olcott, Kazakhstan: Unfulfilled Promise (Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2002).
11. "Bazar," in Alma-Ata Encyclopedia (Alma-Ata: Kazakhstan, 1983), p. 137.
12. Narodnoe khoziaistvo Kazakhstan v 1988 g. Statisticheskii ezhegodnik (Economy of Kazakhstan in 1988, Statistical Yearbook) (Alma-Ata: Kazakhstan, 1989), p. 67.
13. Almaty Akimat's Program for the Development of Trade Infrastructure in the city of Almaty for 2006 (2000-2005).
14. "Torguiushchaia Strana?" (Trading Country?), Kazakhstanskie novosti (June 12, 1996): 1.
15. "Poddannye 'strany bazarii' mechtaiut dozhit do vtornika" (Citizens of the "Bazaar Country" Dream of Living to See Tuesday), Vechernii Almaty (October 1, 1997): 3. This is a play on the Russian phrase "dozhivem do pone-delnika," which roughly translates as "We'll live until Monday and then see what happens." On Mondays, the bazaars are often closed, hence the substitution of Tuesday in the headline.
16. These include the famous Green Bazaar and others in the city regions, including Tastak, Orbit, and Almaty I.
17. For a map and multiple articles discussing this, see Megapolis (March 6,2006): 11.
18. For example, in recounting what one did today, one might say, "I went to Barakholka," or "I bought some shoes at Barakholka," which refers to this set of bazaars.
19. The bazaars in Barakholka are stratified by cost of goods. Newer structures that resemble trading centers and buildings (such as Evropeika, Adem, and Al Farabi) are considered more middle-class shopping establishments, while others are known to be the cheapest place to buy goods in the country (Bolashak, Kulager, Rakhat, Ialian). For a SWOT (Strength-Weakness-Opportunity-Threat) analysis of Barakholka bazaars with more details on specific features (parking, rent, security, etc.) see Marketing 27, no. 3 (March 2004): 15-16.
20. For typical journalistic accounts along these lines, see Alexander Stolpovskii, "Oh, optovka, ty optovka, za tebia uzhe nelovko" (Oh, Optovka, Optovka, Shame on You), Vechernii Almaty (February 10, 1997): 2.
21. Nurakym Raikhanyfy, "Bazarymyz kandai?" (How Are Our Bazaars?), Akhikhat, no. 1(2003): 27-29.
22. Ostap Bender is a classic con man who appeared for the first time in Ilya Ilf and Evgeny Petrov's classic 1928 novel 12 Stools. One sentence from the article sums up the conventional wisdom: "Vmeste s tysiachami pokupatelei siuda napravliaiutsia i sotni moshennikov, vymogatelei, karmannykh vorov i prochikh grabitelei" (Together with thousands of consumers, hundreds of swindlers, racketeers, pickpockets, and other con men, head for the bazaar). See Natalia Fakhrus, "Barakholnye Ostapy Bendery" (The Ostap Benders of Barakholka), Vechernii Almaty (January 24, 2000): 4.
23. For an example of this, see lana Delfii, "Stikhiinyi bazaar" (Spontaneous Bazaar), Vechernii Almaty (March 24, 2000): 1.
24. For more on this part of the retail sector, see Iulia Semykina, "Bystree, Luchshe, Krupnee" (Faster, Better, Bigger), Kontinent (April 14-27, 2004): 38-40.
25. 21.Interview with Limit Kyvanch Altynaz, head of the Marketing Division of Ramstore, Marketing 29, no. 5 (May 2004): 22-23.
26. Author interview with representative of Almaty Akimat, Almaty, Kazakhstan, May 1, 2006.
27. Data according to the Program of Development of Trade Infrastructure in the City of Almaty for 2006.
28. Ivan Petrov, "Za bazar otvetili" (They Have Answered for the Bazaar), Liter (August 18, 2005), www.liter.kz/site.php?lan= russian&id=151&pub=1825/. Other estimates from opposition groups and trade unions suggest that the number employed in Almaty bazaars totals closer to 300,000.
29. "Kazakhstan: Poverty Persists Despite Impressive Economic Growth," Irin News (May 13, 2004).
30. For more on how poorer people shop at bazaars, and richer people at supermarkets and boutiques, see Aleksei Ikonnikov, "Kak sozdat potrebitelckii rai" (How to Create Consumer Heaven), Kontinent (December 31, 2003-January 20, 2004): 38-40.
31. Zhamilya Abenova, "Kontrabanda v 'Zangare'" (Uncertified Trade in "Zangar"), Vechernii Almaty (July 14, 2000): 2.
32. For more on this episode, see Natalia Zhdanova, "A voz i nyne tam" (The Carriage [Problem] Is Still There), Iuridicheskaia gazeta (March 14, 2006);
33. idem, "Khoziain-Barin" (The Owner Is the Boss), Iuridicheskaia gazeta (February 7, 2006).
34. For more on the lack of traders' rights and the work of various associations attempting on behalf of traders, see Albina Akhmetova, "Kakoi bazar?" (Which Bazaar?), Liter (May 21, 2005), www.liter.kz/print. php?lan=russian&id=151&pub=1428/.
35. There are protests however; for an example of the protests at two large Barakholka bazaars, see Madina Aimbetova, "Torg zdes neumesten!" (Trade Here Is Inappropriate), Vremia (April 23, 2008), www.time.kz/index.php?newsid=4343/.
36. For more on traders in Kyrgyzstan, see Gul Berna Ozcan, "Djamila's Journey from Kolkhoz to Bazaar: Female Entrepreneurs in Kyrgyzstan," in Enterprising Women in Transition Economies, ed. Friederike Welter, David Smallbone, and Nina Isakova (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2006), pp. 93-116;
37. in Russia, see Caroline Humphrey, The Unmaking of Soviet Life: Everyday Economies After Socialism (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2002);
38. in Uzbekistan, see Markus Kaiser, "Informal Sector Trade in Uzbekistan," Journal of Central Asian Studies 2, no. 2 (1998): 2-19;
39. for Russia and Turkey, see Hatice Deniz Yenal, "Weaving a Market: The Informal Economy and Gender in a Transnational Trade Network Between Turkey and the Former USSR" (Ph.D. diss., State University of New York at Binghamton, 2000);
40. and for Lithuania, see Pernille Honen, A Market Out of Place? Remaking Economic, Social, and Symbolic Boundaries in Post-Communist Lithuania (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004).
41. Bazaar owners appoint bazaar administration directors, known as bazarkhom, to oversee the collection of daily fees by employees known as "controllers," and to manage relations both within the bazaar and with municipal agencies and organs.
42. Alexander Cooley, "Imperial Wreckage: Property Rights, Sovereignty, and Security in the Post-Soviet Space," International Security 25, no. 3 (winter 2000/2001): 100-27.
43. Iulia Semykina, "Arifmetika mechty" (Arithmetic Dreams), Kontinent (February 1-14, 2006): 36-40.
44. Sergei Tunik, "Bazar zhok!" (No Bazaars!), Megapolis (November 20, 2006), www.megapolis.kz/show-article.php?art-id=3896/.
45. Author interview with analyst at PRAGMA, Almaty, Kazakhstan, May 2006.
46. Author interview with union employee, Almaty, Kazakhstan, October 20, 2006.
47. James Scott, Seeing Like a State: How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Condition Have Failed (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998), p. 92. An interesting application of an argument similar to Scott's in the Soviet/post-Soviet region is by Peter Holquist, who argues that the rise of military statistics in Europe and their adoption in Russia led to the ability of the Soviet forces in the 1920s to count, extract, and exterminate Chechen and other ethnic groups. See Peter Holquist, "To Count, to Extract, and to Exterminate: Population Statistics and Population Politics in Late Imperial and Soviet Russia," in A State of Nations: Empire in the Age of Lenin and Stalin, ed. Ronald Grigor Suny and Terry Martin (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001), pp. 111-42.
48. For another example of the application of Scott's conceptualization of high modernist ideology to the analysis of state-bazaar relations in Iran, see Arang Keshavarzian, Bazaar and State in Iran: The Politics of the Tehran Marketplace (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007).
49. See Gulsum Kunelekova, "VTO protiv barakholok" (WTO Against Barakholkas), Megapolis (March 6, 2006): 1.
50. Roman Tokbergenov, "V Ademe kak v Edeme" (In Adem like in Eden), Vechernii Almaty (November 20, 2002): 1.
51. Natalia Fakhrus, "Rynki-sputniki-ditia bez glazu" (Marketplaces, Sputniks), Vechernii Almaty (July 18, 2001): 5.
52. Author interview with union employee, Almaty, Kazakhstan, October 20, 2006.
53. For example, in 2004, the Green Bazaar was taken to court for numerous sanitary violations and threatened with closure: "Almaty namereno zakryt zelenyi bazaar za postoiannye narusheniia sanitarnykh norm" (Almaty Is Intending to Close the Green Bazaar for Continual Violations of Sanitary Norms), Kazakhstan Today (August 6, 2004), available at gazeta.kz.
54. Tunik, "Bazar zhok!"
55. Data from Program of Development of Trade Infrastructure in the City of Almaty for 2006.
56. Author interview with representative of Almaty Akimat, Almaty, Kazakhstan, May 1, 2006.
57. Data from Program of Development of Trade Infrastructure in the City of Almaty for 2006.
58. Tunik, "Bazar zhok!"
59. Joel Migdal, Atul Kohli, and Vivienne Shue, State Power and Social Forces: Domination and Transformation in the Third World (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1994).
60. Author interview with one of the administrators of Baian Aul bazaar, Almaty, Kazakshtan, May 16, 2006.
61. Gulzat Tabyn, "Bir kinge eki ereyil kop ernes pe?" (Aren't Two Strikes Too Much for One Day?), Zhas Alash (January 27, 2005): 1-2.
62. Erkin Merzhakypov, "Kto vozmestit ubytok" (Who Will Cover the Damages?), TanTV (February 1, 2005).
63. Olga Ten, "Avtorynok: Izgnanie torgovtsev s rynka" (Car Market: Expulsion of Traders from Market), Liter (January 26, 2005), www.liter.kz/site.php?lan=russian&id=l 50&pub=897/; TV channel 31, report from on events of Baian Aul, "My zhe zhivye liudi ⋯" (We Are Humans ⋯), January 26, 2005, available at zakon.kz.
64. Ten, "Avtorynok."
65. Channel 31 TV report, "My byli kak bydlo, proshli te vremena! Torgovtsy zakrytogo avtorynka Almaty" (We Were Like Cattle Traders of the Closed Car Market in Almaty), January 28, 2005.
66. "Deputat Nazarbaeva prosit proverit zakonnost zakrytiia avtorynka v Almaty" (Deputy Nazarbaeva Asks to Confirm the Legality of the Closure of a Car Market in Almaty), Kazakhstan Today (August 28, 2005).
67. Rinat Saidllin, "Baian-aulskoe srazhenie: Vlasti Alma-Aty vtoroi god pytaiutsia likvidirovat avtorynok" (Battle at Baian Aul: For the Second Year, Almaty Authorities Try to Liquidate a Car Market), Ferghana.ru (July 5, 2006), www.ferghana.ru/article.php?id=4487/.
68. Irina Saveleva, "Kto otvetit za bazar?" (Who Is Responsible for the Bazaar?), Liter (July 12,2006), www.liter.kz/site.php?lan= russian&id=151&pub=4126/.
69. "Primenili protiv rabotnikov avtorynka 'Baian Aul' elektroshokery" (Authorities Used Electric Shocks Against Workers of Baian Aul), Channel 31 News (July 10, 2006).
70. Younger athletes sometimes have ties to groups, often illegal or informal, specializing in violence. On the role of athletes who became contract enforcers and businessmen in the context of a liberalizing economy in 1990s Russia, see Vadim Volkov, Violent Entrepreneurs: The Use of Force in the Making of Russian Capitalism (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2002).
71. Channel "Almaty," report on Baian Aul situation (April 3, 2006).
72. Saveleva, "Kto otvetit za bazar?"
73. Author interview with one of the administrators of Baian Aul bazaar, Almaty, Kazakhstan, May 16, 2006.
74. See Rinat Saidllin, "Baian-aulskoe srazhenie: Vlasti Alma-Aty vtoroi god pytaiutsia likvidirovat avtorynok" (Battle at Baian Aul: For the Second Year, Almaty Authorities Try to Liquidate a Car Market), Ferghana.ru (July 5, 2006), www.ferghana.ru/article.php?id=4487/.
75. "Direktor almatinskogo avtorynka schitaev, chto intsident v torgovom komplekse 'baian aul' i ego izbienie sviazano s peredelom spher vliianiia" (Director of Almaty Car Bazaar Thinks That the Incident in the Trading Complex Baian Aul and His Beating Is Connected to the Redistribution of Spheres of Influence), Kazakhstan Today (August 18, 2006), www.kz-today.kz/index. php?lang=rus&uin=1133168996&chapter=1153398113/;
76. "Prokuratura Almaty vozbudila ugolovnoe delo v otnoshenii akima Auezovskogo raiona" (Prosecutor of Almaty Brings a Case Against the Akim of Auezovskogo Region), Kazakhstan Today (September 20, 2006), www.kz-today.kz/index.php?lang=rus&act=arch&uin=1133168996&chapter= 1153400319&n-date=2006-09-20/.
77. Author interview with union employee, Almaty, Kazakhstan, October 20, 2006.
78. GaukharTursynkhozha, "Bararymyz dardai, tauarymyz kandai?" (Our Bazaars Are Plenty, But What Kind of Goods Do They Have?), Kazakhstan Zaman (December 24, 2004): 6.
79. Alpiyev created numerous big bazaars, including Rakhat, Baris I, and Baris III. Alpiyev also is the director of the Altyn Orda bazaar, completed in 2001-2 and located near Baian Aul. It is a huge wholesale fruit and vegetable market, as well as a regular retail market for beverages, consumer goods, clothing, etc. Altyn Orda, which has hotel, better parking facilities, and other buildings, represents a new, more civilized model of trade, according to one article. For more on Altyn Orda, see Meirambek Tolepbergen, "Uly zhibek zholy boiynda" (Along the Great Silk Road), Egemen Kazakhstan (October 31, 2002): 2.
80. Alpiyev was assassinated in October 2007, unleashing allegations of his criminal ties. See Askar Dzhaldinov, "Kriminalnye razborki v Kazakhstane prodolzhaiutsia" (Criminal Struggles in Kazakhstan Continue), Liter (October 20, 2007), www.liter.kz/site.php?lan=russian&id= 154&pub=8604/.
81. Bolot Nazarbaev has been involved in other energy and consulting businesses in the past. His bazaars include Altyn Orda (large wholesale produce market), Barys I (large wholesale clothing market in Barakholka), Barys II at Kordai (in southern Kazakhstan on the border with Kyrgzystan), Barys III (huge car bazaar outside Almaty), and Barys IV (across the street from Optovka). Another one is scheduled to be built in Astana. This information was confirmed by two independent informants (interview with businessmen and volunteer at union, Almaty, Kazakhstan, May 13, 2006; author interview with administrator of Almaty wholesale bazaar, Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, May 21, 2006).
82. See Olcott, Kazakhstan.
83. It is rumored that Zhibek Zholu belongs to a relative of Tasmagambetov (the akim of Almaty) or one of Nazarbaev's relatives, but I was not able to confirm this (Zarina Alisher, "Aielderdi zhylatyp zhurgen 'Baianaul' zhyry" [The Story of "Baianaul" That Made Women Cry], Azat [July 6, 2006]: 1).
84. Author interview with young businessmen and volunteer at union, May 13, 2006.
85. Catherine Alexander, "Value, Relations, and Changing Bodies: Privatization and Property Rights in Kazakhstan," in Property in Question: "Value Transformation in the Global Economy, ed. Katherine Verdery and Caroline Humphrey (New York: Berg, 2004), pp. 251-74.