Crossroads Asia | Politics | Central Asia

Prioritizing Social Stability Over Democratic Reforms: Uzbekistan Announces New Development Programs 

Uzbekistan’s new national development programs prioritize socio-economic developments over democratic reforms.

As Uzbekistan celebrated its 35th independence anniversary this week, President Shavkat Mirziyoyev announced seven national programs for the years ahead. The programs focus on socio-economic development and conspicuously omit any reform related to political pluralism, press freedom, freedom of conscience, or other democratic elements. 

Mirziyoyev has prioritized areas viewed as critical to retaining popular support for his government. The first is improving public education, with a special focus on extending compulsory education to age six, supporting private kindergartens, and having at least ten universities ranked in the top 1,000 higher education institutions in the world. Uzbekistan has one of the highest numbers of schoolchildren in the region, with 6.8 million students and 600,000 teachers in public mandatory schools alone. 

The next few national programs announced by Mirziyoyev also concern socio-economic well-being: improving public health and increasing longevity; transitioning to a high technology economy, and ensuring high labor productivity as well as changing public attitudes toward the environment and addressing environmental challenges. 

The fifth national program is set to ensure judicial independence and the rule of law. The Diplomat recently reported that one of the country’s new laws allows the president’s daughter, who heads the presidential administration, to be directly involved in shaping the judicial system while having lifetime legal immunity for her actions with no accountability. A few areas – cybercrime, drug trafficking, and human trafficking – are singled out for additional attention but concrete steps in this regard have not been outlined.

The sixth program Mirziyoyev announced identified mahallas as the “‘main customer (or commissioner)’ of development.” This program basically aims to further empower mahallas along with slightly altering the district budgeting system. Mahallas are unique self-governing institutions established at the neighborhood level. Each household is part of a mahalla. As of 2021, there were 9,251 mahallas across the country. 

“The mood of our people, the well-being of families, the dreams and aspirations of young people, and the initiative of entrepreneurs are first and foremost reflected in the neighborhood,” Mirziyoyev said in his speech. “Mood” is an odd word to pick – not financial stability, safety, employment or other aspects of socio-economic life. It reflects mahallas’ role as an observer of citizens’ sentiment (and hopefully their needs too). 

Historically, mahalla institutions have played a distributing role rather than a commissioning one, carrying government policies down and out to the people rather........

© The Diplomat