The literature on Soviet politics teaches us that the lack of established, democratic procedures for leadership transitions exposed the USSR to succession crises. One might expect, then, that the authoritarian regimes dominating post-communist Central Asia would be prone to disruptive leadership transitions, and yet that has not been the case. In fact, if one leaves aside the tumultuous early years of Tajikistan’s independence, it is only in Kyrgyzstan—which boasts the region’s most competitive political environment—that one finds deeply disruptive succession crises, the latest of which is on full display this year. After a review of the transitions of power in Central Asia (including Azerbaijan) over the last quarter-century, Huskey uses, inter alia, the works of Barbara Geddes on personalism and Henry Hale on patronalism to seek to explain the political transitions paradox.
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