Abstract:

The five Central Asian countries are major recipients (albeit to different degrees) of China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), which was officially announced in 2013 in Kazakhstan. Since then, China has funded more than 100 infrastructure projects in this region. These are primarily meant to boost China’s exports, allow for importing much-needed energy from Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan, and help develop and stabilize China's northwest Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, which borders Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan. For the landlocked Central Asian countries, reduced transportation costs, infrastructure development, and overall improved regional connectivity stand out as key benefits.

The paper suggested for presentation at the CESS annual conference in Almaty delineates protest and resentment in Central Asia in the context of China’s BRI, which have emerged since the mid-2010s. Specific aims of protests and grievances vary. They are directed against the BRI as a whole or individual BRI projects and associated obstacles, but sometimes additionally against Chinese conduct not immediately related to the BRI. As we show, protests are directed at the BRI as a potential “debt trap”, BRI-related environmental problems, conditions for land acquisition or lease, abuses against ethnic and religious minorities in Xinjiang, or generally at the (perceived) growing influence of China in a given country.

Yet it is puzzling that pertinent protests have almost exclusively occurred in Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan. The key aim of the paper is to explain this variance. Potential explanatory factors are different degrees of repression, dissimilar BRI-related drawbacks, and varying numbers of ethnic Central Asians repatriated from Xinjiang which may (not) act as catalysts for grievances and protest. To corroborate our arguments, we use data from the Tracking Protests in Central Asia database of the Oxus Society which distinguishes protest causes as per country and issue area. To delve more deeply into single demonstrations if necessary, we use sources particularly from RFE/RL, BBC, and Eurasianet. To ascertain the attitudes of respective populations in Central Asia, we draw on polling data from the Central Asia Barometer.