Association, Toronto

In Central Asia the theories and prescriptions of the transitions literature have not borne fruit. The region today is more autocratic than it was eighteen years ago at the time of the Soviet collapse. The goal of this paper is to understand why—why Transitions 1.0 failed—and to investigate the potential for a Transitions 2.0. The answer to Central Asia's autocratic persistence, this study suggests, lies in the elite incentive structures of the region's institutional continuity. Despite this tenacity of Soviet-era patronage politics, I illustrate democratic openings may yet come. Survey research reveals that the use of new ICTs, most notably Internet use, holds the potential to transform Central Asian political culture and, with it, Central Asian politics