ASTANA, Kazakhstan – While Iraq’s Kurds yearn to one day have their own independent Kurdistan, Kazakhstan’s President Nursultan Nazarbayev would have the Kurds think twice -- not about nationhood, just the name.
Nazarbayev recently proposed changing his own country’s name, dropping the “stan” in order to distinguish it from less illustrious and more dysfunctional neighbors.
He had in mind those other Central Asian states that emerged from the breakup of the Soviet Union - Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan – and maybe even Afghanistan and Pakistan as well.
A more suitable designation might be Kazakh Eli – The Land of Kazakhs – the officially-styled Leader of the Nation, president since independence in 1991, suggested during a provincial tour in February.
It was an echo of frustration among 17 million Kazakhs that their country, larger than Western Europe and booming with oil wealth, does not have as high an international profile as they believe it deserves.
“In our country’s name, there is this ‘stan’ ending which other Central Asian nations have as well,” officials quoted Mr. Nazarbayev as saying. “But, for instance, foreigners show interest in Mongolia, whose population is just two million people, but whose name lacks the ‘stan’ ending.”
Superficially, there might appear to be few parallels between Kazakhstan and yet another ‘stan’ – Kurdistan – aside from their shared Persian suffix.
Kazakhstan is a multi-ethnic state in which the 63 percent of Turkic Kazakhs predominate. The Russian population has dropped from 40 percent to around 24 percent in the past 20 years as a result of Russian emigration and a lower birth rate.
Others include Uzbeks, Ukrainians, Germans, Tatars and even Kurds, their presence reflecting the legacy of the Stalinist era when minorities were transported to the Kazakh steppes. Some of the prison camps of the notorious gulag archipelago were sited there.
Kazakhstan has been an independent state since it metamorphosed from the Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic in which Mr. Nazarbayev served as Communist Party First Secretary.
Kurdistan is still politically tied to majority non-Kurdish states, albeit with a wide degree of autonomy in the case of Iraqi Kurdistan.
Yet both nations are emerging from an era of domination and exploitation by their previous overlords. Kazakhstan declared its independence in the same year that no-fly zones were established in northern Iraq, ushering in the start of the modern phase of Southern (Iraqi) Kurdistan’s development.
Both are using their hydrocarbon wealth to fuel booming development. That is reflected in the rapid expansion of their respective capitals – Astana and Erbil.
Astana, which means “capital” in the Kazakh language, replaced Almaty as the seat of government in 1997. Established at the site of an isolated former Russian garrison and railway junction town, it has the doubtful distinction of being the world’s second-coldest capital; winter temperatures drop to minus 40 degrees Celsius.
In little over a decade, a futuristic metropolis has risen in the midst of the otherwise sparsely populated steppe. There is a mega-mall designed by architect Norman Foster in the shape of a giant tent. The building includes an artificial beach and seaside at the summit to serve residents of the world’s largest landlocked state.
Among the office skyscrapers and international hotels, the latest addition to the skyline is a neo-classical opera and ballet house, which last week hosted a premiere of Swan Lake.
Small wonder that President Nazarbayev frets that, despite all this transformation, his country is not better known abroad. Although Kazakhstan is positively viewed as the state that voluntarily abandoned its nuclear arsenal in the post-Soviet era, it also suffers from negative reports of its limited political and press freedoms.
So, can a name change fix that? One expert who thinks not is Simon Anholt, a British specialist in branding who addressed this month’s Eurasian Media Forum in Astana in a debate on the value of national image.
Mr. Anholt said states tempted to invest millions in improving their international image, as Kazakhstan has done, were wasting their money. Expensive public relations campaigns had zero impact on international opinion.
As for a name change, it risked alienating other countries who would be faced with the bureaucratic nightmare of coping with the re-designation in treaties and other official documents.
Recommending a policy of action rather than words, he said the only way for countries to improve their image was to do positive and interesting things.
Sound advice, no doubt, for any other “Stans” that might be considering a rebranding.
Harvey Morris was in Astana as guest of the Eurasia Media Forum 2014
