THE KAZAKH FAMINE:

This is important for many reasons. I would point to the famine as perhaps the central formative event in Kazakhstan’s history. First, this is because of the death toll reported. I would argue that the exact number still requires deeper study, but we can say that at a minimum 1.5 million people died during the asharshylyq. If we break this down by ethnicity, the losses were devastating: it is likely that at least a third of all ethnic Kazakhs perished along with about a quarter of the republic’s total population. These figures also reflect Kazakhstan’s multiethnic makeup at the time, as the famine affected not only Kazakhs but also other communities living in the republic.

Another reason why the asharshylyq is so important is that, in its aftermath, Kazakh society underwent a profound transformation—from a nomadic to a settled way of life. Before the famine, nomadism had formed a crucial part of Kazakh identity. In fact, for a long time, the very term ‘Kazakh’ was almost synonymous with being a nomad, and so, this represents an incredibly dramatic change. Along with the loss of roughly every third Kazakh, the famine touched nearly every family—through death, displacement, or the flight of relatives abroad.

Once people began to build back their lives after the famine, nomadism disappeared as an economic practice. They no longer herded animals in the same way. However, as a cultural tradition, it did not vanish completely. Elements of nomadic life, especially clan ties and certain aspects of nomadic culture, continued to influence Kazakh society.

In my book, The Hungry Steppe (2018), I wanted to challenge the idea that the famine entirely destroyed Kazakh society. The famine was, of course, deeply traumatic, but it did not completely flatten Kazakh culture. What is interesting is that, despite Moscow’s attempts to eliminate certain features of Kazakh life, it was unable to do so.

To provide a more precise answer, we need a clearer accounting of the death toll. For example, in the case of Ukraine, demographers have undertaken extensive research to calculate mortality rates, right down to the district level. They can say, for instance, how many people died in each specific area. This kind of detailed study has not yet been done for Kazakhstan. It would be an extremely complex endeavor, partly because we would need to account for the large number of people who fled—whether they died elsewhere, stayed where they went, or eventually returned. We would also have to analyze population data from neighboring republics to trace these movements accurately.

With the very detailed information they have available, Ukrainian demographers have been able to track how specific policies corresponded to rising mortality in certain districts. Based on my own research, I can suggest which policies in Kazakhstan may have pushed the situation over the edge. As in Ukraine, some settlements in Kazakhstan were blacklisted. This was an extremely harsh measure that effectively cut them off from food supplies and outside assistance, leaving them completely isolated. Other policies also contributed, such as the closure of the republic’s borders at various points. These restrictions prevented people from moving back and forth, trapping many in areas where famine conditions were worsening.

I would also point to the baiiA bai was a wealthy landowner, livestock owner, trader, or moneylender. confiscation campaign of 1928, which targeted those designated as ‘wealthy’ people. But if we look at nomadic life, much of the livestock was actually held collectively. Many family members depended on the herds owned by these wealthy bai. And, of course, collectivization itself, along with the policy of sedentarization carried out on the basis of full collectivization. The authorities pursued both policies at once: settling the Kazakhs and collectivizing them.

This is a difficult question. It seems clear that some elements of these policies were intentional. Officials were warned and knew that settling the Kazakhs would lead to massive loss of life. They may not have anticipated the full scale of it, but they were aware of the risks.

They also deliberately sought to eliminate nomadism, which was an explicit goal of the program—there is clear evidence for this intention. At the same time, however, many outcomes caught Soviet officials by surprise. One example is the massive death of livestock in the republic: about 90 per cent of all animals perished during the famine. This outcome ran counter to Soviet economic goals and was not something they desired. It resulted partly from poor planning and a failure to foresee consequences. They did not foresee, for example, that keeping animals crowded together would lead to the spread of disease, or that desperate herders might slaughter their livestock in advance rather than surrender them to the state.

Another consequence they did not anticipate was the massive refugee movement that swept across the nation, a direct but unexpected result of Soviet policies. Disease also became a major factor: as people grew weak from hunger, illnesses spread rapidly throughout the republic. Eventually, this led to a labor shortage as there were not enough people left to work on collective farms. At several points, it became clear that many of the outcomes of these policies took officials by surprise.

Returning to the broader question of intent, we can say with confidence that there was intent to destroy Kazakh culture and nomadism, and there is substantial evidence to prove it. There was also an awareness that these policies involved tradeoffs and that they would inevitably lead to loss of life. What remains the most debated issue, however, is whether there was intent to physically destroy Kazakhs as an ethnic group. That is the central and most contested question.

I think there is evidence supporting both interpretations. One challenge is that we do not have access to all the available sources, and another is that leaders such as Stalin often did not record their intentions in writing. For historians, this makes the task of reconstructing events especially challenging as we must piece together fragments of what they said and did.

There are many moments that reveal when these collisions took place; this is largely because officials were deeply unfamiliar with the steppe environment. They did not understand its highly variable rainfall: how one year could bring good precipitation and the next very little. They also misunderstood the variation in soil quality and how it could change over time. Most of all, they failed to grasp the nature of nomadism itself. It did not fit into the Marxist-Leninist categories they relied on, and they struggled to comprehend how a mobile pastoral system could function as an organized and sustainable way of life.

They tried to organize a census to count Kazakh nomads for the first time, applying the same methods they had used in European Russia for settled populations. But, of course, these methods did not work. At meetings, mapmakers would present maps, and participants would comment, ‘I thought people lived in that region,’ only to find no population marked there because they had not figured out how to count nomads. These records show how officials wrestled to adapt both Marxist-Leninist ideology and their scientific frameworks to a very different physical environment and way of life.

Yes, my position is that the Ukrainian and Kazakh famines were, in fact, strikingly similar. When you look at both closely, the parallels are remarkable. One of the most interesting findings in my research was that many Ukrainian scholars have argued that policies such as blacklisting were applied only in Ukraine and have used that argument to support the claim that the famine there constituted genocide. But these same policies were also implemented in Kazakhstan. Villages were blacklisted there as well.

There is, in fact, a great deal in common between these two tragedies. I believe that how we categorize them must be consistent. Either we regard both as acts of genocide, or we classify both as not. In any case, they were both terrible crimes against humanity, and we should view them in the same light.