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At the beginning of 2011, Kazakhstan's foreign policy entered a new stage. The country passed a serious political test—chairing the OSCE and hosting the Organization's summit meeting in Astana. This year, it faces two new tests: chairing the Organization of the Islamic Conference and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and hosting the Council of Foreign Ministers of the Organization of the Islamic Conference and the SCO summit. The OSCE summit in December 2010 amply showed that such events are far from formalities requiring no more than paying official tribute to political obligations, this time Astana's. Such functions are often closely related to a specific problem in international relations. In this context, the present turning point in Kazakhstan's foreign policy is a clear sign of the demands of the times. Recent experience is good way to gage the transformation in Kazakhstan's foreign policy and its international status. The year 2010 will be remembered in the history of Kazakhstan and its foreign policy for its many important events. The most vibrant of them was without a doubt the OSCE summit in Astana. However, in terms of strategic consequences, establishment of the Customs Union among Kazakhstan, Russia, and Belarus should be considered the most important.

As soon as the Soviet Union fell apart, Central Asia, together with the rest of the post-Soviet expanse, became part of so-called political Europe, that is, it was drawn into the EU's sphere of interests on the strength of the OSCE membership of all the post-Soviet states. The European Union's strategy and policy in Central Asia are not directly related to the region's military-strategic security, although they can indirectly affect it through (1) European institutions such as the OSCE, the European Commission, the European Parliament, etc.; (2) the policy of the European powers (the U.K., Germany, and France in particular); and (3) NATO, the military-political institution that unites most of the EU countries. The EU is guided in its Central Asian policy by two very important considerations. First, as distinct from the U.S., China, and even Russia (which have no conceptual documents related to the region), the European Union is the only geopolitical actor that has a strategy outlined in detail in a document entitled The EU's Central Asia Strategy adopted in 2007, even though it has not yet shown its efficiency or produced any impressive results. Second, the European Union demonstrates its preference for "soft power" at the conceptual and practical levels as opposed to the use of force as a traditional geopolitical instrument. This is true of Brussels' foreign policy in Central Asia and elsewhere. The European political community is convinced that sustainable democratic and secular regimes in Central Asia and the Southern Caucasus will create a security belt of sorts to protect Europe from the unstable regions of the Muslim world. On the whole, however, European political analysts have not yet decided whether the EU needs Central Asia and to what extent. The EU members, however, never hesitate to support their companies functioning in Central Asia (particularly in the energy sector) to ensure a steady flow of oil and gas from this fuel-rich region.

For ten years now, Iran, Afghanistan, and Tajikistan have been establishing a Persian-speaking community in Central Asia. The Turkic republics of Central Asia, Azerbaijan, and Turkey started moving toward a Turkic-speaking community as soon as the Soviet Union ceased to exist. The Persian-speaking countries acquired their chance in the early 2000s when the Taliban, an inveterate opponent of the IRI, was overthrown and Tajikistan ended its civil war. In fact, the entire region is more or less involved: Tajikistan is a Central Asian state, while the other two are its close neighbors with a long history of belonging to the region at one time or another. Today, Central Asia, Iran, and Afghanistan have economic interests, security concerns, and geopolitical imperatives in common. Iran, which badly needs a wider Pax Iranica, is the natural driving force behind integration of the Persian-speaking countries, a far from easy mission in the present geopolitical and international context. In Afghanistan, the Persian-speaking communities are dominated by the Pashtoons, the state-forming nation, who are dead set against all attempts to split the country into ethnic units. The U.S.-led occupation authorities, likewise, are firmly opposed to Iran's stronger influence on the Tajik and Hazara minorities. Tajikistan is a homogenous part of Central Asia; its ties with the region and the post-Soviet expanse are too strong to allow it to completely integrate with the Iranian world. To strengthen its position in both countries, Tehran is contributing to their large-scale economic, energy, transport, and humanitarian projects. It should be said that, in the past, the Iranian culture extended to Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Turkey, Iraq, and vast areas in the Middle East, which gives the IRI the opportunity to push its influence westward. With no chance of exploiting the ethnic and linguistic affinity there, Tehran relies on the Shi'a minority, which is rapidly developing into an important political factor in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, and the Gulf countries.

In April 2010, the political crisis that has been simmering in Kyrgyzstan over the past few years developed into an armed confrontation between the government and the people, as well as among the various clan and regional groups at the very top of the republic's political pyramid. President Bakiev, deprived of his power (at first in part), legitimacy, and control over the country, tried to regain what he had lost by tapping the political resource of the country's South. The events that occurred in May made it abundantly clear that a large-scale political conflict, a civil war, and a split in the republic were only a step away. The 2005 events, which toppled Akaev's regime, demonstrated that for its continued political development, the republic must acquire a strong vertical of power and move toward a strong presidential government, which alone could pull the country out of the crisis and set it on the path of sustainable development. The compromise reached (which, albeit, proved incomplete) gave rise to the hope that the new president would be able to cope with this historic mission. The objective factors and subjective circumstances, however, complicated the republic's political, social, and economic context still more. Most of the political actors (the main parties, the parliament, the business community, and the regional leaders) were dead set against any real reforms of the country's political system. President Bakiev's political and economic blunders (legitimized corruption and the never-ending property redistribution in favor of his close relatives and supporters) added a subjective dimension to the objective factor. More than that: some of the regional, mainly northern, clans refused to accept Kurmanbek Bakiev as the head of state (the position he gained and fortified in 2005-2006); this and widespread disaffection with his economic policies impaired his legitimacy. Disagreements among the main political forces made the crisis a permanent feature of the republic's political landscape exacerbated by a crisis in the social and economic spheres. Bakiev's downfall was brought about by his political rivals who disagreed with his policies; the discontent of the wide masses; the acute social and economic crisis; the president's failed attempt to strengthen his power; corruption and nepotism; regionalism and the clan nature of power; the low level of political culture of the ruling elite and the ruled masses; criminalization of political life; and the acute shortage of economic resources. Some of the external players, into the bargain, did not like Bakiev's foreign policies.

There can be no doubt that during the eighteen months it has been in power, the Obama Administration has in due course defined the main vectors and priorities of U.S. foreign policy, determined the country's key geopolitical interests, drawn up and adopted a National Security Strategy, and compiled a Nuclear Policy Review. The following factors are having an impact on U.S. policy in the post-Soviet expanse, which includes Central Asia (CA): relations with Russia, the PRC, the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI), Turkey, Pakistan, and India; the military operation in Afghanistan; NATO's enlargement; the energy factor; the coordination strategy between the West and the European Union (EU); and the problem of radical Islam. Since the beginning of his presidency, Barack Obama has designated intensification of the U.S.'s influence in the Asia Pacific Region (APR) and further development of relations with China as the priority vectors of his foreign policy. In order to help the American economy recover from its severe crisis, the U.S. tried to create a geopolitical alliance with the PRC (a duumvirate of world administration), but Beijing rejected this proposal. Another main issue (apart from recovery from the crisis) for the Obama Administration is bringing the war on so-called international terrorism (meaning the military operation in Afghanistan in particular) to its successful conclusion. This means that the foreign policy strategy of the present-day American Democrats hinges on the geopolitical situation in Central Asia, while also keeping in mind Russia's interests. The current U.S. administration is keeping a close strategic eye on the Central Asian region, particularly after the events in Kyrgyzstan. This is posing both new threats and new opportunities for the CA countries in the context of reinforcing the geopolitical balance in the region. A decision was adopted recently to reduce the level of the U.S.'s military presence in Afghanistan with subsequent withdrawal from this country (presumably between 2011 and 2014). If this happens, the security situation in CA, Afghanistan, and Pakistan could drastically change for the worse. It appears that the U.S. is no longer making democratization the fundamental principle of its foreign policy. The Obama Administration realizes that establishing democracy does not boil down to perfunctorily introducing election procedures into a country, but depends on the conditions within the country itself being ripe for such changes and on creating a socioeconomic and political infrastructure, which requires many years of effort. The U.S. intends to make use of "intelligent" power (which presumes a combination of "hard" and "soft" power). Today preference is being given not to combat action, but to political and economic methods, as well as to diplomacy and cultural ties. On the whole, experts characterize the foreign policy of the Obama Administration as contradictory and inconsistent. The main reasons for this, in their opinion, are the current president's lack of experience in international affairs and, more importantly, the very unfavorable situation in the U.S. with respect to the national and global economy.

This is the second part of the historiography on literature about Central Asia which appeared earlier this year in Central Asia and the Caucasus. It is intended to fill the gap about the books on Central Asia which have appeared in the last two years that were not covered in the previous article.

Russia's policy in Central Asia has arrived at a new stage in its development. This is confirmed both by the transformation of the situation in the region and by the changes in Russia's international position. At the previous stage in its Central Asian policy, Moscow was busy trying to implement the so-called Putin Doctrine. This basically consisted of attempts to integrate the post-Soviet expanse (encompassing as much territory as possible) by primarily economic means. However, political means were also implied along with the economic levers. This policy was manifested in the various integration formations that sprang up in the CIS, such as the EurAsEC-Customs Union, the SES, the CSTO, and the Belarus-Russia Union State, as well as the multitude of bilateral and multilateral agreements with Russia's participation in economic trade cooperation, the energy industry, and transportation and communications. This approach was most intensively implemented between 2003 and 2006, when Moscow was able to greatly fortify its position in Central Asia, enter long-term contracts in the production and transportation of energy resources, take partial or complete control over the strategic branches of several regional countries, and achieve advantageous conditions for building pipelines. In addition, the economic penetration of Russian companies into the region was accompanied by intensification of military-technical and military-strategic cooperation between the Russian Federation and the regional states, the setting up of Russian military bases, and the ousting of rivals (with the exception of China). However, after 2006 Russia's international position began to change, which could not help but have an effect on its Central Asian policy. Another spiral of the confrontation with the West began, pulling Moscow along with it and turning the region into an area where their interests clash. There can be no doubt that the Color Revolutions in the post-Soviet expanse were one of the main reasons for the crisis in Russian-Western relations. And Central Asia was no exception-Russia (along with Kazakhstan) did not permit escalation of this kind of revolution in Kyrgyzstan and also supported Uzbekistan in its determination not to allow a full-fledged civil war in the country as a result of the rebellion in Andijan, which was inspired from the outside.

The year 2007 was a time of geopolitical changes for the region, some of which remained latent but completely analyzable. The geoeconomic factors and the worldwide financial crisis (a crisis of liquidity and defaults as well as instability in the international financial markets), the rising prices for basic commodities such as energy resources and foodstuffs, the economic growth in Russia, China, and India, and the rising importance of the energy security issue, etc. inevitably affected the situation in Central Asia. The 2007-2008 crisis began in the mortgage system of the United States and spread like wildfire to the global banking and financial systems. It caused an economic decline in the United States and, by the end of 2007, reached the euro zone. Depreciation of the world's main currency has hit the global economy; the value of dollar savings is steadily decreasing while export incomes converted into national currencies are losing their value. Transborder investment projects are at risk. Strange as it may seem the states with currencies that could run the risk of gaining value have the largest dollar reserves. This fully applies to the tenge of Kazakhstan. Today, there is the danger of an uncontrollable and highly uncertain situation developing in the global economy that could continue for a long time to come. Countries and regions are exposed to considerable cumulative effects in the political or even military-political spheres. What is going on in the world today may hit the Kazakhstani economy either in the financial or the real sector: a financial shock spreads faster than a shock in the consumer sphere, which politicians should also take into account. The United States is steadily losing control over its own national currency; it is no longer able to keep down inflation without raising the interest rate. The latter invites liquidity but interferes with economic growth. Translated into terms of the global financial order, this means that the dollar is on the verge of losing its anchor currency status. This may happen much earlier than expected. The rest of the world will be hit: the universal currency served all and helped maintain international stability. Deprived of a peg currency, the global financial system might slide into a crisis. It is commonly believed that the euro may serve as an adequate alternative to the dollar, but its survival is not guaranteed: even the lowest global inflation might cause serious problems. This has already created geopolitical tension, which, along with U.S. protectionism, might undermine the world economy and provoke a global recession.