My poster for the NU Research Week 2014

A Peripheral Viewpoint on the Land Reform in the Uzbek SSR (1924‐1929) Beatrice Penati, bpenati@nu.edu.kz Acknowledgements Research presented in this poster stems out of a larger research project on the land‐ and‐water reform, social mobilisation, and agrarian change in the Uzbek SSR through the 1920s. This project has been funded by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (2009‐2011) and, partly, by the British Academy (2012‐2013). It has also benefitted from the support of the Institut Français d’Etudes sur l’Asie Centrale (2009). I also thank A. Bitabarova, P. Sartori, S. Keller, and SHSS’s “History reading circle” for help and input. ABSTRACT TITLE: A Peripheral Viewpoint on the Land Reform in the Uzbek SSR (1924‐1929) BACKGROUND: The land‐and‐water reform in the Uzbek SSR was the most important mobilization initiative that the Bolshevik regime carried out in the 1920s. Its impact in terms of land redistribution was small, but it generated consensus in the countryside and produced a first cohort of rural Uzbek communists. This research (and the two articles it results in) stems out of a more general reappraisal of the reform. For the first time, the latter is studied from a bottom‐up perspective, focusing on a single district (Aim, Andijan province, eastern Fergana). In addition, I show the connection between the land reform, national delimitation and boundary‐ making, and the anti‐Islamic hujum campaign, which are usually studied in isolation. SOURCES: This study is based on documents from archives in Uzbekistan (TsGARUz) and Russia (GARF, RGASPI). I use the traditional tools of historical craftsmanship to produce two papers that are quite ‘dense’ in their empirical content. By recognizing the importance of texts in the Soviet system, emphasis is put on source criticism and on the study of drafting processes, which requires a quasi‐philological exam of the materials available. RESULTS: This study demonstrates the entanglement of agrarian, nationality, and anti‐religious policy at the local level. Pace most of the extant historiography, which highlights the importance of ethno‐cultural arguments, I show how local competition for access to investments, cooperative networks, provision of consumer goods, agrarian policies etc. shaped the outcomes of the revision of Central Asian republican borders in 1924‐1924, as local actors learnt to ply the language of nationality to their very material goals. The second paper demonstrated that how decisive measures of Soviet anti‐Islamic policy in 1927, namely the attack to ‘religious’ waqf, originated in the periphery, rather than being imposed by policy‐makers at the all‐Union, regional, or republican level. CONCLUSION: The importance of this study transcends the reconstruction of “what happened” (which remains the historian’s most important task), for instance by producing a precise chronology of Soviet policies on pious endowments in the late 1920s. It highlights the urgent need for regional historians to produce empirically dense (and possibly local) narratives to replace Soviet ones, before developing overarching, thesis‐driven interpretations. 2 • The appropriation of ‘national’ language in petitions on borders is interpreted (Hirsch 2005, In 1924, Central Asia underwent a process of “national‐territorial delimitation”, which led to the establishment of republics and autonomous provinces which more or less corresponded to the present independent Central Asian States. The Uzbek SSR was one of them. However, in practice boundaries were defined and demarcation happened ‘on the spot’ only some time later: between 1924 and 1927, several commissions examined local petitions for the ascription of districts or villages to one or the other entity. These petitions demonstrate how low‐rank Party members, but also (and overwhelmingly) non‐Party members in rural localities, especially in Fergana, were ready to grasp and use the Bolshevik language of nationality. In 1927, in particular, a bilateral commission chaired by Kul’besherov decided on the ascription of controversial localities between the Uzbek SSR and Kirgizia (Table 1 & Fig. 2). Ozhukeeva 1993) as the proof of the fact that villagers asked for revisions in the name of ethno‐cultural traits. These interpretations tend to consider the petitions in isolation from Soviet agrarian policies. • By projecting boundary‐making on the background of the land‐and‐water reform and Soviet investments, we show that petitions to revise the border were driven by material economic interests. • The interests voiced in the petitions for the benefit of party and Soviet officers, however, did not coincide with the ‘real’ goals of the chief petitioners: more than investments in cotton and tractors, they wanted control on trade networks. In short: A. Local élites (incl. traders) ‘picked up’ Soviet developmentalist rhetoric and learnt how to Fig. 2 – Map of the Fergana valley, with the controversial districts in 1924‐1927 (blue) and Aim (green) District Before the Kul’besherov commission Zarkent; Barzyk, Uch‐ Kurgan station Uzbek SSR Buadil, Chimion Uzbek SSR Uch‐ Kurgan village (Avval district) Arguments The Kyrgyz are pushed towards the mountains and deprived of good land. Zarkent hosts an animal bazaar; in general, these areas are economic centres for the Kyrgyz: Kyrgyz added value would result in an advantage for Uzbeks. Road connections and transhumance trails. After the Kul’besherov commission ‘RELIGIOUS’ WAQF Uzbek SSR The Kyrgyz are deprived of good land. These localities hosts bazaars serving the Kyrgyz population Uzbek SSR Uzbek SSR ‐ Economic ties with the surrounding Kyrgyz population Kyrgyz ASSR Isfara Uzbek SSR ‐ Economic ties with the surrounding Kyrgyz population (cereals) ‐ 82% Tajiks Uzbek SSR (Kyrgyz ASSR renounces) Sokh Uzbek SSR Kyrgyz ASSR Economic ties with the Kokand cotton areas (cereals) Irrigation? ‐ 96% Tajiks Linked to Osh -Irrigation -(Uzbek lies about) ethnic composition Kyrgyz ASSR but with Uzbek water administration; Uzbek SSR controls the oil fields. Kyrgyz ASSR Sulyukta Uzbek SSR -Surrounded by Kyrgyz villages -Workers are essentially Kyrgyz Kyrgyz SSR [but in 1928 still linked to Samarkand!]; the mine is managed by the Uzbek Ferugol’, but the Kyrgyz Kzyl‐Kiya participate in the latter. Aim Kyrgyz ASSR [see detail] Uzbek SSR (6 villages) The land reform consisted in the expropriation of all the land and agricultural implements of large landowners (bay), of ‘cultural’ waqf, and (in Zeravshan) of former emiral officials. In other cases, land exceeding a ‘standard’ (norma) was expropriated. This land, as well as pre‐existing “State land properties” was then redistributed to ‘toiling households’, together with credit, tools, and livestock (Fig. 1). This result they achieved in 1927, when the Andijan province acquired six new rural communities. Unlike the rest of the province, these six communities had not yet undergone the land reform… • The drafting process of the decree on the land reform in the Aim canton was a hard task. It The Soviet regime introduced a distinction between “cultural” and “religious” waqf – the former referring (ideally) to endowments to schools, the latter to mosques and shrines. While all waqf were under attack in Central Asia immediately after the Bolshevik revolution, a far softer approach prevailed from 1922, when the Soviet system and the party appropriated some of the reformist instances of local Muslim intellectuals in the field of education and waqf management, largely based on late Ottoman policies. “Cultural” waqf income, then, was handled by the authorities in charge of education, where many of those intellectuals (teachers, etc.) still managed to work (Keller 2001, Sartori‐Pianciola 2007). • Most of those who, in Andijan, participated in the drafting were ‘new’ Uzbek communists, In 1925‐1926, the first and second ‘waves’ of land reform in the ‘core’ provinces and Zeravshan. Yet, “religious” waqf was left untouched by the land reform decrees. (d) Attack on ‘religious’ waqf largely took place at the provincial level (Andijan), rather than at the republican level (Samarkand, then capital of the Uzbek SSR). rather than Europeans. Yet, the decree was first drafted in Russian. • The provincial party committee worked in close collaboration with the office of the People’s Commissariat for Agriculture (obzem), which by this time was chaired by an Uzbek. In 1925, obzems were controlled by former Tsarist technical staff (land surveyors). This shows the quick development of an Uzbek cohort of low‐rank experts in agriculture. • The decree for the Aim canton was not written from scratch, but was a copy‐and‐paste (with (a) Reform procedures & ‘real’ results adaptations) from the one for the Zeravshan province (December 1926). • The most controversial point (that was NOT in the Zeravshan decree) was the expropriation of “religious” (dīnī) waqf land (rather than only “cultural” waqf). A close quasi‐philological study of the drafting process shows at least six subsequent modifications of this point by different hands on the draft, and one in the translation into Uzbek. • The expropriation of “religious” waqf was a major legislative innovation and a clear symptom of the acceleration of Soviet anti‐Islamic policies in Central Asia (the so‐called hujum campaign). • Yet, this decision took place in Andijan: both the republican government and party in Samarkand and the all‐Union party’s office for Central Asia (the SredAzBiuro, in Tashkent) got cold feet on this issue. Andijan forced this acceleration on them, not vice versa. • In doing so, the Andijan party committee was “showing off” vis à vis the SredAzBiuro against local communists in neighbouring Namangan, who were competing for jobs, power positions (e.g. directorship of cotton plants). Hence, Andijan communists were trying to overhaul Namangan on the terrain of anti‐Islamic measures. In short: A. The decision to expropriate ‘religious’ waqf originated locally (neither in Moscow or at the republican or regional level). B. Anti‐Islamic ardour was used as a tool to gain recognition and economic power. • Political negotiation and manipulation of supposedly ‘technical’ choices (e.g. the definition C. The modification of the border in Aim created an opportunity to experiment and  When six new rural communities from the Aim canton were included in the Andijan province of the Uzbek SSR in 1927, they needed a “special” land reform decree “just for them”.  This being a ‘special case’, archival documentary coverage is exceptionally good (esp. TsGARUz in Tashkent).  These materials allow an otherwise impossible glimpse in Soviet decision‐making at the local level, in particular about two aspects: • Chart 1 – Rural communities in the Aim canton according to the 1917 census. 100% 90% 80% 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% The word waqf designates Islamic pious endowments of agricultural land, real estates (e.g. bazaar stalls, mills), and occasionally cash. The income that derived from them was transferred to mosques, schools (madrasa, maktab), shrines, etc. MAIN FINDINGS The 1924 delimitation assigned the Aim (Uz. Oim) canton (volost’) to the Kara‐Kirgiz autonomous province (then: Kirgiz ASSR). Its population, however, was mixed: it consisted of Uzbeks, Kyrgyz, and Kipchak (which both Kyrgyz and Uzbeks claimed to be ‘theirs’). Some villages, however, were predominantly Uzbek or Kyrgyz (Chart 1). The nearest market to Aim was Andijan, in the Uzbek SSR. The co‐operative system depended on Andijan, too. Groups of Uzbek villagers, in all likelihood led by Uzbek merchants who had managed to ‘infiltrate’ the co‐operative system and to occupy strategic roles in the local Soviet institutions, started petitioning for the transfers of six rural communities to the Uzbek SSR. After more or less one year during which ‘spontaneous’ seizures of unoccupied land were condemned, but de facto tolerated, by republican Party organs, the land‐and‐water reform in the Uzbek SSR started in the three “central” provinces of Tashkent, Samarkand, and Fergana in December 1925. These provinces had been part of Russian Turkestan, so that there existed relatively better data about crop mix, population, and basic geographical features. One year later, a further decree on the land reform in the Zeravshan province (Bukhara) was passed. The other provinces (Qashqa‐Daria, Surkhan‐Daria, and Khorezm) underwent “land organisation” in 1927‐1928 (Penati 2012). (c) Drafting process & ‘nativisation’ Essential references:  Hirsch, F. (2005). Empire of Nations: Ethnographic Knowledge and the Making of the Soviet Union. Ithaca, Cornell UP.  Keller, S. (2001). To Moscow, not Mecca: The Soviet Campaign Against Islam in Central Asia, 1917‐1941, Westport, CT, Praeger.  Ozhukeeva, T.O. (1993). XX vek: vozrozhdenie natsional’noi gosudarstvennosti v Kyrgyzstan., Bishkek, KGU.  Penati, B. (2012). “Adapting Russian Technologies of Power: Land‐and‐Water Reform in the Uzbek SSR (1924‐1928)”, Revolutionary Russia, 25(2): 187‐217.  Pianciola, N. – P. Sartori (2007). “Waqf in Turkestan: the colonial legacy and the fate of an Islamic institution in early Soviet Central Asia, 1917‐1924”, Central Asian Survey, 26(4): 475‐98.  Smit, D. (2002). "Natsional’noe stroitel’stvo i natsional’nyi konflikt v SSSR v 1920‐e gody”, in: G.N. Sevost’ianov (pod red.), Rossiia v XX veke: Reformy i Revoliutsii, t. 2. Moskva, Nauka: 128‐69. THE AIM CANTON LAND-AND-WATER REFORM use it as quickly as they appropriated Soviet ‘national’ language. B. This explains why some ‘national’ claims were received better than others (cf. Smit 2002) C. For some, border‐making created opportunities for enrichment and prestige, rather than just troubles. It helped the emergence of a cohort of ‘Soviet notables’. Table 1 – Decisions of the Kul’besherov commission (see TsGARUz, f. r‐86, op. 1, d. 4330, ll. 31‐46) Aravan 1 (b) Economic interests & new border BOUNDARY-MAKING • • Kipchak % • Uzbek % Kyrgyz % • of “land standards”). ‘Colonisation’ of the local Soviet and party system by merchant elements, through the bias of their influence on co‐operatives (in a context of penury of consumer goods). Development of a “land reform” know‐how since 1925: initial estimates and projections are more accurate in 1927 than in 1925. The land which was redistributed was not enough to establish sustainable peasant households. This was NOT due to the insufficiency of the available land stock, but to the decision of not redistributing all of it (and maybe to the inclusion of unproductive, marginal land in the stock of nationalised estates). In the final statistical reports on the reform, the ‘optical effect’ of a growth of the category of “middling peasants” (the goal of the reform) was achieved by re‐defining the minimum landownership threshold to be considered as “middling”, rather than “poor peasant”. In other words, peasants ceased to be poor because the notion of “poor peasant” was revised! accelerate (and secure careers). DISSEMINATION Conference presentation:  B. Penati, “Life on the Edge: the Sovietisation of the Oim district (eastern Fergana)”, research workshop Representations and Politics of Borders and Borderlands in Eurasia: Past and Present, University of Manchester, 11 December 2013. Published article:  B. Penati, “Life on the Edge: Border‐Making and Agrarian Policies in the Aim district (eastern Fergana), 1924‐1929”, Ab Imperio, 2, 2014, pp. 193‐230. Under review:  B. Penati, “Ready or Not? On the local origins of the Soviet attack on ‘religious’ waqf (1927)”.