The Uzbekistani state declared mahalla kengash as a local self-government in order to achieve decentralization in its administrative system. This thesis is a critical study of whether decentralization can be an explanatory concept in the examination of new institution-building in Uzbekistan. This thesis claims that dialectic relationship between the center and local state becomes conflictual when there is inconsistency between (a) (national) ruling class and its hegemony, and (b) (local) ruling class and its hegemony. The hegemony of both national and local ruling classes is shaped according to their capacity for conformity/dissention with the Soviet regime, and neo-liberal structural hegemony. This study based on a case study of Tashkent mahallashas demonstrated that decentralization process has been reversed as a result of the strategies of the Uzbekistani state when the different responses of the mahalla kengash do not conform to mahalla imagined by the state. Shortly, the urban mahalla kengashes of mahalla types which were shaped according to identity politics during the Soviet era could be easily adapted the new regime shifting from class to identity politics / whereas other mahalla types shaped according to class politics of the Soviet regime has fall in difficult situation. Finally, the decentralization policy and hegemonic projects of the regime have been shaped by the dialectic relationship between the state and mahalla kengash. Thus this relationship can be both spatio-temporally and socio-spatially differentiated.Consequently, it has argued that standard theoretical paradigms for understanding transition in post-Soviet local politics are less globally generalizable than previously thought.

Traditional architectural and urban artefacts are showed over the centuries as a powerful imprint of human actions and practices and are being developed on the basis of concrete socio-cultural factors and environmental rationalities. Spatial and morphological patterns of traditional environments have exceedingly evolved to fulfill and accomplish the social and cultural needs of the populace in their dialectical interplay with the surrounding environment. This relationship conceptualises the man-made environment, as the repository of meaning, in users‟ reciprocal relation with the surrounding environment. In the context of history, the human tends to dwell when experiencing the built environment as meaningful. Traditional contexts are highlighted as physical and spatial interpretations of human activities, skills, thoughts and resources creating identifiable and meaningful realms related to space/place, time and society. The study uncovers the process of the formation of the house and mahalla in order to shed light on how the built environment responds to inhabitants‟ socio-cultural determinants and everyday lives. It unfolds how changes in the nature of Iraqi society and its priorities affect the architecture of home and mahalla by reference to the impact of modernity with all its alien socio-cultural principles. This thesis focuses on the architecture of home and mahalla within the traditional core of Kadhimiya city and similar Iraqi socio-cultural contexts. At the macro analytical level, the research investigates the spatial and physical formation of the mahalla as a whole through detecting the socio-spatial aspects of its realms, and how its spontaneous form has responded to the socio-cultural aspects of the community in an integral pattern. At the micro level, the research will go deeper in the perception of the basic aspects of the individual and the family. It investigates how the traditional house reflects and satisfies the personal values of the individual, and achieves his socio-cultural beliefs and everyday life on the basis of inherent norms and conventions. In this vein, public, semi-public/private and private domains are investigated to highlight the mutual interplay between these spheres as key factors in understanding the architecture of the house and mahalla. The research discusses indigenous aspects and principles contained or embedded in the structure of the traditional environment, such as privacy, social solidarity and stability, neighbourliness and so on. It reveals insight into the male-female relationship in the social life of the traditional context, and how the position of women and their idle qualities impact the structure of the house and the hierarchical sequence and organisation of spaces. Identity, tradition, sustainability and everyday life are the main fields discussed with a specific end goal to outline and uncover the role of social factors, cultural beliefs and daily practices in the creation of this particular form. Building on these values, the research adopts an interpretive historical method in revealing the characters of the traditional environment referring to residents‟ habits, customs, rituals and traditions. Several approaches to the built and home environment are discussed for paving or detecting reliable one in the methodological inquiry within which many tools and methods have been utilised and used i.e. archival records, interviews, historical narratives, personal observation and photographic surveys. Data generated consists of photos, maps, interviewees‟ comments, analytical diagrams and historical and travellers‟ descriptions. Research findings indicate many of the inherent and underlying principles upon which the architecture of Iraqi traditional house depends. Within this context, the study has tried to unfold how the formation of the traditional house and the mahalla responded to the socio-cultural aspects of the community and the daily life of its members. Findings, concerning the design principles of the traditional mahalla, were realised as indigenous norms and standards embedded in the structure of society, which can be useful for architects, designers and planners to reconcile traditional and contemporary urban forms through the application of former rules and conventions in City‟s conservation or redevelopment plans. The study reveals that the traditional environment had less socio-cultural contradictions, active day-to-day practices and clear, identifiable and meaningful identity compared with contemporary built environments. Research findings, thus, lead to a set of relevant recommendations addressed to many of the community categories, architects, planners, stakeholders and those interested in this field. They aim to promote the impressive role of socio-cultural factors and strengthen users‟ competence in their physical and spatial settings for home. Moreover, research recommendations discuss how social factors, cultural values, beliefs, practices and rituals can be re-employed in our approach to achieving a more sustainable living environment. Recommendations relating to identity and tradition aim to draw attention and shed light on the significance of traditional built environments in the development of special identity, which played a big role in the sustainability of these contexts for centuries.

This thesis analyses local forms of civil society practised in contemporary Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan and provides a common thread on which to base a Central Asian understanding of civil society. I look to find out factors and constituents, which on the surface might be different from a classical liberal concept of civil society. The thesis applies a wider anthropological framework, which sees civil society as a broad network of social relationships, including traditional forms of associational life that can be relatively independent of the state. The study draws upon a multi-locale ethnography in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan including in-depth and focus group interviews, participant observations, case studies, and archival research. I have investigated associations whose activities are concerned with reciprocal relations within society based on community solidarity, self-help, and mutual trust. These include professional associations, trade unions, ethno-cultural associations, religious organisations, courtyard clubs, the traditional Uzbek neighbourhood institution of mahalla, and informal practices of gap and khashar. While arguing that the meaning of civil society depends on context, the study has found that traditional elements of the preserved social fabric in Central Asian societies are reflected in today's networks of individuals. The thesis has generated knowledge on how local forms of associational life define the civil sphere by shaping social organisation, solidarity and mobilisation. Through empirical understanding of the public space, formal and informal networks that bond people together, we can locate wider ethnographic differences between not only the original and Central Asian concepts of civil society but also between two local cultures of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan.

L’objectif de ce mémoire est de comprendre les facteurs qui ont contribué à la non-prolifération des groupes islamistes en Asie centrale. Bien que la menace islamiste radicale soit encore très présente dans la région, nous partons du constat qu’une telle menace ne s’est pas concrétisée. Sur la base de la littérature secondaire, nous examinons le cas de l’Ouzbékistan, sa construction nationale (nation-buiding) et identitaire (identity-building), et le traitement de l’islam avant, pendant et après la période soviétique. Comme le démontrent nos recherches, plusieurs facteurs qui expliquent la non-prolifération de l’islamisme sont fortement liés à la période soviétique et aux politiques mises en place au début du XXe siècle. Ayant construit la nouvelle nation sur des notions soviétiques, l’Ouzbékistan a choisi la voie de la restriction et du contrôle du clergé islamique officiel tout en promouvant le « bon » islam. En s’interrogeant sur le mécanisme particulier qu’utilise l’État pour contrôler l’expression religieuse et empêcher l’infiltration des mouvements islamistes ainsi que tout islam « non officiel », nous identifions et étudions le rôle de la mahalla comme moyen coercitif de contrôle et comme vecteur de continuité avec le passé présoviétique et le régime soviétique plutôt qu’un outil de changement. / The goal of this thesis is to understand the factors that have contributed to the non-proliferation of Islamist groups in Central Asia. Although the radical Islamist threat is still very present in the region, we come from the assumption that such a threat has not materialized. Based on the secondary literature, we analyze the case of Uzbekistan, its nation-building and identity-building, and the treatment of Islam before, during and after the Soviet period. As our research shows, several factors that explain the non-proliferation of Islamism are strongly linked to the Soviet period and policies put in place in the early 20th century. Having built the new nation on Soviet notions, Uzbekistan has chosen the path of restricting and controlling the official Islamic clergy all the while promoting the “good” Islam. By inquiring into the mechanism that the state uses to control religious expression and to prevent the infiltration of Islamist movements, we identify and study the role of mahalla as the coercive medium of control and as the vector of continuity with the pre-Soviet past and the Soviet regime rather than a tool for change.

This dissertation tells the tale of al-Mahalla al-Kubra during the transition from handloom crafts to the mechanized textile industry and from a local community to a battleground for the nationalist cause in the first half of the twentieth century. By exploring the relationships between culture, politics, and modern industrialization and how subaltern groups shaped their local experiences of modernity in a setting remote from the central government and the cosmopolitan culture of Cairo and Alexandria, it unpacks the social history of men and women, artisans and workers, notables and fitiwwat who were situated between national capitalism and foreign domination. The goal is to write the history of the society from the bottom up and to write a history that is an alternative to the already established histories of nationalism and colonialism. It provides a historical reconstruction and analysis of the process of assimilation undergone by the recruited peasants into urban industrial life and explores the various ways in which they and the Mahallawiyya negotiated living together and dealt with their mutual hostility on an everyday basis. Identity is the core question in this process of assimilation. Did modern, horizontal class relations actually replace traditional, vertical communal and patronage relations? To what extent did the traditional social institutions help or hinder the process of adapting to forms of social life associated with modern industry? I argue that both vertical class and horizontal communal relations co-existed and sometimes competed. In that fluid dynamic, individuals and groups acted and interacted depending on their socio-economic status, communal commitments, conjuncture or the way that a given situation developed, and a shared, often contested, discourse. / text