The political economy of oil in Kazakhstan

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Tezin Türü: Doktora

Tezin Yürütüldüğü Kurum: Orta Doğu Teknik Üniversitesi, İktisadi ve İdari Bilimler Fakültesi, Uluslararası İlişkiler Bölümü, Türkiye

Tezin Onay Tarihi: 2007

Öğrenci: HAYRİYE KAHVECİ

Danışman: MELİHA ALTUNIŞIK

Özet:

This thesis analyzes the political economy of oil in the post-Soviet Kazakhstan. After the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Kazakhstan, which is one of the newly independent states of the former Soviet geography, became very popular in the international arena with its hydrocarbon riches. There have been discussions in the scholarly and international political agendas that the country will suffer from the so called “curse” that is associated with the producing states. This dissertation looks at the political, economic and social dynamics associated with the post-Soviet environment in Kazakhstan and the impact of oil revenues on each one of those domains. It discusses Kazakhstan’s political economy by engaging three relevant literatures on the issue. To this end first it is argued that the rentier state model which has been developed based on the experiences of other oil producing states is useful to understand the political economy of post-Soviet Kazakhstan, however it fails to explain its dynamics fully. Therefore, the dissertation engages with post-Soviet transformation as well as critical geopolitics literatures to overcome some of the gaps in the rentier state model. It has been argued that while analyzing the political economy of oil in Kazakhstan it is possible to identify three major trends with regard to the impact of oil revenues on the post-Soviet environment. The first one of those post Soviet trends is the consolidation of pre-existing institutions and structures. Second one is the restructuring of pre-existing institutions and third one is the creation of new institutions that was not present during the Soviet environment.