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Abstract

Following the leadership transition in Uzbekistan resulting from the death of the first president, Karimov, and the election of Mirziyoyev as the new president in 2016, the new government came with a renewed vision of domestic affairs and direction for external relations. Prioritising the Central Asian region in its foreign policy, Mirziyoyev tried to mend strained relations with the neighbouring countries that led to the thaw in relations. The advent of a new leader marked a transformative phase in Uzbekistan's foreign policy, as evidenced by a series of strategic modifications that considerably shaped the trajectory of its external relations, diverging notably from the foreign policy pursued under Karimov's administration, orienting toward more regionalism policy. This policy caused more positive outcome in addressing regional issues such as water management, border demarcation and delimitation, and climate change.

This paper aims to examine Uzbekistan’s regional foreign policy in addressing regional cooperation in security, economic, and transport connectivity in Central Asia in Mirziyoyev’s Presidency. In this study, I will focus on the main research question: Why do new leaders choose regionalism. My hypothesis is focused on the argument that for understanding of recent shift in Uzbekistan’s foreign policy it is vital to examine political elites’ perception and reputation building. My methodology for this research is based on conducting semi-structured interviews with the Uzbek political elites and content analyse of 71 speeches of President Mirziyoyev.

Key words: Central Asia, Uzbekistan's foreign policy, regional security, regionalism, water management, border disputes.

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Abstract

Migrant remittances have proven markedly resilient through global crises. At the same time, international financial institutions routinely invoke the notion of ‘remittance dependency’ to warn of structural distortions in states reliant on these flows. While celebrating remittance-driven increases in GDP, they simultaneously diagnose the risks of economic specialisation around labour export and advocate institutional reforms to harness and discipline remittance markets. Despite sustained reliance on migrant transfers, however, the Central Asian republics of Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan have been slower than other migrant-sending states to adopt the policy prescriptions of the so-called ‘remittances-to-development’ agenda. As remittances account for a growing share of GDP relative to other sectors, this presents a puzzle: when remittances are central to economic survival, why do states not pursue stronger mechanisms to manage and institutionalise them? Moreover, does ‘remittance dependency’ reside at the level of the state alone, or should it be located within a broader set of transnational relations linking migrant households, financial infrastructures and state-bound actors?

This paper addresses this puzzle through two lines of inquiry. Firstly, it traces the emergence of remittance dependency as a policy construct among international, national and local actors, with particular attention to Central Asia. Secondly, it interrogates the normative assumptions underpinning the remittances-to-development paradigm, identifying contradictions that render a coherent regime of remittance-led development politically and institutionally illegible. Drawing on expert interviews conducted in Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan and analysis of policy documents and ‘grey’ literature, the chapter advances a situated political economy account of remittance dependency. It argues that migrant remittances in Central Asia are embedded in multiscalar power relations that connect international financial institutions, moral economies of obligation and quasi-formal networks, thereby exposing the limits of state-centred accounts of dependency.

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Abstract

Since the death of Islam Karimov in 2016, Uzbekistan has embarked on a series of pro-market reforms under

President Shavkat Mirziyoyev, accompanied by rapid urban redevelopment, privatization initiatives, and efforts

to attract foreign investment. These reforms are frequently presented by the state as part of the construction of a

“New Uzbekistan,” yet they unfold within institutional structures inherited from the Soviet period and under

conditions of continued authoritarian governance. This paper examines how market-oriented reforms reshape

urban landscapes in the capital of Uzbekistan and how these processes intersect with path-dependent governance

practices.

The paper analyses how neoliberal policies are selectively implemented through presidential decrees, institutional

enforcement, and everyday practices. Empirically, it focuses on urban restructuring in Tashkent, where large-scale

redevelopment projects and real estate expansion have led to widespread demolitions, evictions, and new forms

of commodification of urban space. The state extracts value from land and infrastructure through: demolition,

redevelopment, and investment projects. While these transformations are framed as modernization, they often

reproduce hybrid arrangements in which market logics coexist with coercive governance, informal mediation,

and patronage networks.

By tracing the trajectory from policy formulation to lived experience, the paper highlights the tensions between

formal reform narratives and the realities of everyday governance.

It contributes to debates on (post)industrial transformation in the post-Soviet region by showing how neoliberal

reforms are layered onto socialist-era institutions, producing distinctive hybrid regimes of urban development.

The Uzbek case demonstrates how post-industrial restructuring in post-Soviet contexts must be analysed through

the interaction of inherited socialist structures, authoritarian governance, and global economic pressures.