Why Class Matters In Kyrgyzstan: Everyday Experiences, Class and Moral Sentiments

Contemporary Central Asian literature on society and politics face two significant problems: first, an absence of class analysis of everyday practices; and second, reductionist accounts of human agency that are devoid of moral emotions and deliberations. Drawing upon Bourdieusian class analysis and Andrew Sayer’s ideas on social class and lay normativity, this paper examines class and moral sentiments among poor rural migrants and working and middle classes in southern Kyrgyzstan. The paper will focus on how different groups (such as rural Kyrgyz migrants and the so-called ‘revolutionary’ women) view each other and negotiate claims for economic resources and recognition. I will also discuss the ethnicized violence between ethnic Kyrgyz and Uzbeks in June 2010 in Osh in terms of class and recognition. I will argue that subjectivities and identities in Central Asia are class-based and cannot be reduced to ethnicity, clans, and localities. Furthermore, moral sentiments and evaluations are examined as an important part of human subjectivities that cannot be reduced to power or social conventions. The paper draws upon fieldwork data that includes 65 interviews with ethnic Kyrgyz rural migrants and urban middle class ethnic Uzbek and Kyrgyz residents during summer 2011 and spring 2013.