History of Kyrgyzstan - The Soviet Era: 1917-1991

The Soviet Era: 1917-1991

Soviet power was initially established in the region in 1918, and in 1924, the Kara-Kyrgyz Autonomous Oblast was created within the Russian SFSR. (The term Kara-Kyrgyz was used until the mid-1920s by the Russians to distinguish them from the Kazakhs, who were also referred to as Kyrgyz.) In 1926, it became the Kirghiz Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic. On December 5, 1936, the Kirghiz Soviet Socialist Republic (SSR) was established as a full Union Republic of the U.S.S.R.

During the 1920s, Kyrgyzstan saw considerable cultural, educational, and social change. Economic and social development also was notable. Literacy increased, and a standard literary language was introduced. The Kyrgyz language belongs to the Western Turkic group of languages. In 1924, an Arabic-based Kyrgyz alphabet was introduced, which was replaced by Latin script in 1928. In 1941 Cyrillic script was adopted. Many aspects of the Kyrgyz national culture were retained despite suppression of nationalist activity under Joseph Stalin, who controlled the Soviet Union from the late 1920s until 1953.

Modern Kyrgyz religious affiliation is eclectically Muslim for a majority of the population. Typical Kyrgyz families vary in their devotion to Islam. Urbanized areas of Kyrgyzstan are similar to the United States in terms of religious identity; while most Americans claim to be Christian, the majority are rather eclectic in practice. The same is true for Kyrgyzstan, in that the more rural the individual, the more devoted to Islam they tend to be and vice-versa.

Russian and Kyrgyz cultures differ in respect to family, religious identity, and social structure. Kyrgyzstan is a country in transition. The current social dilemma is one that has emerged from the controlling body mainly relying on classic Russian ethnicities, to Kyrgyz or Turkic ethnic groups shaping and forming the infrastructure of Kyrgyzstan. This has resulted in a measurable degree of instability and chaos associated with a social transition.

The ancestral Kyrgyz social structure was dominated by nomadic traditions, governing political philosophies, and socialization. As classical Russian ethnic groups were injected into the Soviet Republic of Kyrgyzstan, the urbanization process began and was mainly authored by the Russian communities placed within the Soviet Republic, mostly by policies created by the communist party. It is unclear why these policies were created and it is only clear that these policies forced Russians of certain descent to populate the Republic.