Open Government as authoritarian upgrading or political modernization? Evidence from the realization of the Listening State concept in Kazakhstan.

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Bakhytzhan Kurmanov (University of Central Asia)

The Open Government reform has been actively adopted across a variety of non-democratic

regimes including post-soviet Central Asia. Though the reform is supposed to foster open

participation and collaboration through the active use of information-communication

technologies, several transition regimes in Central Asia have recently adopted and deepened the

reform to ensure its own durability and to promote political modernization. In this work we study

whether the open government reform contributes to the authoritarian upgrading or political

modernization. We investigate the concept of Listening State recently adopted in Kazakhstan

through the analysis of novel primary data. A survey assessing the perception of the Listening

State by ordinary citizens of Kazakhstan is analysed to reveal that the open government reform

in the country has not led to the realization of its key goals of enhancing participation of citizens.

Therefore, we conclude that the reform serves the goals of authoritarian upgrading through the

shallow liberalization by mechanisms of satisfying and containing the civil society through

“reactive state” and the function of government to respond to requests of citizens on social

media. The aspired goal of activism of state apparatus in social media and inherent allows the

regime to achieve manage political contestation and to promote economic efficiency.

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