Blogging over at Steve LeVine’s Oil and Glory, Sasha Meyer has an interesting article about the 1989 revolutions which never caught on in Central Asia, drawing interesting comparisons with Gabon and Egypt.  A huge factor depends on what kinds of dissidents took over when the USSR collapsed – insiders (nomenklatura) or outsiders.

The stumbling block is probably the prevailing mindset among officials in the region. Russian researcher Olga Kryshtanovskaka has found that up to 83% of government positions in Russia are held by former members of the Soviet nomenklatura. The figure for Central Asia is probably higher as its bureaucracy survived the Soviet collapse intact.