Parliament and Political Parties in Kazakhstan
By Anthony Clive Bowyer
Published in May 2008.
Introduction
The independent Republic of Kazakhstan came into being following its declaration of independence on December 16, 1991, from the Soviet Union, leaving it and the other fourteen new countries that joined it the unenviable task of quickly developing the institutions of government. The legacy of Soviet governance meant that each of the 15 newly independent states technically had a version of the executive, legislative and judicial branches in place, albeit in the form of the First Secretary of the Kazakhstan SSR Communist Party (as well as its first president - Nursultan Nazarbayev), the Supreme Soviet (legislature) and the Supreme Court. Far from being a bastion of multi-party democratic debate and discussion, the Kazakhstan SSR Supreme Soviet entered independence having undergone an election in 1990 that saw over 2000 candidates (of whom 90 represented “republican public organizations”) vie for 360 seats.
The focus of the present research is to examine the evolution of parliamentarism and multi-party democracy in Kazakhstan, using history and comparative analysis as a guide. Kazakhstan is the first of the newly independent states of the former Soviet Union to be vested with the responsibility of Chairing the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, in 2010. As it prepares to assume this great responsibility, one may consider whether there is such a thing as a unique “Kazakhstani model” of democratic development, and if so, does it influence other states in the region, and does it meet the strict requirements mandated by the OSCE itself?
In 2007 the Parliament of Kazakhstan underwent its most radical transformation over a decade when seats were added to both the Senate and Majlis, with the latter body elected exclusively through a system of proportional representation, with nine members elected from within the 400- member Assembly of Peoples. This was the first time in the brief history of post-Soviet Kazakhstani parliaments that deputies were not directly elected to at least one house of the legislature (a breach of its OSCE commitments).
What can explain this phenomenon, and how can we view this with respect to the trajectory of democratic development in Kazakhstan and within the Central Asian region as a whole? Forecasting political development is never a simple task, even in Central Asia. Given Kazakhstan’s importance as a key exporter of energy resources, its strategic position among neighboring world powers Russia and China, and its own hegemonic status vis-à-vis the other Central Asian states, we best become more familiar with this important country’s political trends and tendencies, to both continue to engage it as a key partner as well as understand the broader implications for democracy development in the regional and other transitional democracies around the world.
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