This dissertation is about social mobilizations in rural Kyrgyzstan from 2010-2015. Following a constructivist approach, I aim to answer a puzzling question in regard to multiple but rarely sustainable protests in this global periphery: Under what conditions can provisional episodes of mobilization be transformed into sustained mobilization? In particularly, I consider Eric Hirsch’s insight that the commitment of participants of mobilization to the cause is formed within collective instances, i.e. ‘group processes’, and I employ it in the Kyrgyzstani context of generalized distrust and discredited corrupt politics. I explore the conditions in which participants of episodes of mobilization create trust in organizers and into the cause of mobilization. I investigate these conditions in two case studies: one concerns a fragmented labour force at a state-owned gas and oil company in which, in the course of four years, workers succeeded to empower themselves as a collective actor within the group processes of collective learning and collective decision-making. The second tells a story about a fragmented rural community that goes against mining operations but sees the decline of an initially successful mobilization within group processes of monitoring. These findings point to the presence of a specific ‘pre-condition’ for any lasting mobilization: trust between organizers and participants of episodes of mobilization must be established in the process of monitoring the commitment to collective interests. With this insight I contribute to the literature on social movements and mobilizations that tends to take commitment and trust as pre-established resources. Furthermore, this work intervenes in the ongoing discussion on social change in the former Soviet Union. First, my observations of the difficult formation of protest groups lead, surprisingly, to the conclusion that the weak state produces a weak society. Second, due to the fragmented and localized nature of these mobilizations, social and political change in Kyrgyzstan is most likely to occur at the local level.

Cette thèse se propose d’explorer les modalités de constitution d’un domaine de production de savoirs dits académiques dépendant du pouvoir politique. La première partie examine la convergence de trajectoires individuelles vers une activité relativement nouvelle, située au carrefour de champ professionnels et centrée sur l’analyse de la politique étrangère turque menée depuis 2003 par le gouvernement du parti AKP. Partant de là, la seconde partie s’attache plus particulièrement aux liens des acteurs de l’espace identifié avec les responsables gouvernementaux. Il apparaît que ce domaine constitue un champ d’activité dont la structure concentrique découle de la proximité d’une communauté épistémique en son sein avec le champ politique. Par voie d’institutionnalisation et de cooptation du reste du champ, les membres de cette communauté parviennent à imposer une conception utilitaire des sciences sociales permettant de produire des savoirs convergent avec les priorités politiques du moment. La troisième partie examine donc le contenu de ces savoirs de sorte à démontrer le rôle de médiateur joué par le champ expert. Il se confirme alors que sa vocation est de convaincre diverses parties-prenantes, en Turquie et à l’étranger, de la légitimité et l’opportunité du projet hégémonique du gouvernement turc en direction du Moyen-Orient arabe. En définitive, par l’étude de cette configuration experte, a été aussi posé la question de la profondeur de la rupture créée par l’AKP dans le mode de gouvernement et les orientations géopolitique de la Turquie. L’analyse conclut à une rupture dans la continuité / This Ph. D. research offers an opportunity to explore the form of dependency to political power maintained by a self-labelled academic knowledge production domain. This study is based on the case study of Turkish Middle Eastern policy expertise. The first part examines the convergence of individual trajectories towards a relatively new activity in Turkey, located at the intersection of various professional fields and centered on the analysis of the AKP government foreign policy since 2003. The second part then focuses on the links that exist between the previously identified actors and statesmanship. It soon appears that this knowledge production forms a field of activity which concentric structure derives from the proximity of the epistemic community at its very center with the political arena. Through institutionalization and cooptation with the State’s material support, the epistemic community members manage to impose its utilitarian conception of social sciences to the whole expertise field, thereby bringing its actors to design knowledge convergent with the time’s policy priorities. The last part of this work consists of a study of this expertise’s content in order to demonstrate the go-between function played by experts. It appears ultimately that their mission is to convince foreign policy stakeholders in Turkey and abroad of the legitimacy and opportunity of Turkey’s hegemonic project towards the Arab Middle East (2003-2013). Finally, through the study of this expert configuration, it is the question of policy change and geopolitical shift that has been examined. The thesis concludes on the hypothesis of change within continuity