Abstract
This contribution studies the layered coexistence and mutual shaping of three forms of differentiation (functional, segmentary, hierarchical) in rural Uzbekistan, a region of world society that, since 1991, is undergoing tremendous processes of socio-economic transformation and change. More precisely, we analyses the evolving governance of land, water and agricultural support services (knowledge & advice) in the Uzbek province of Khorezm, where currently three types of farms utilize various social practices to navigate a complex and partly opaque environment marked by various forms of differentiation, each posing different opportunities, threats and coordination mechanisms (institutions). In doing so, the chapter builds on Rudolf Stichweh’s considerations of world society’s structural patterns, its ‘Eigenstructures’ as well as Niklas Luhmann’s conceptualization of world society’s autopoietically closed function systems. Based on ethnographic research, we argue that the mobilization of patron-client relationships, a complex system of coercive reciprocity and a trilogy of formal, strategic and discursive practices are widely employed to cope with the coexistence of an undermined layer of functional differentiation and reaffirmed/reinvented segmentary and hierarchical identities. We argue that the skillful navigation by local actors between these different differentiation forms and their demands, embodies a short-term adaptation strategy that is likely to hamper a (re-) crystallization of autonomous functional domains. Hampering functional differentiation jeopardizes long-term change adaptation. Yet, at the same time, it illustrates the degree to which agricultural resources governance is evolutionary in nature, thus, marked by dependency.
This chapter is a further development of a text published earlier under: Hornidge, Anna-Katharina, Kristof van Assche, Anastasiya Shtaltovna (2014, forthcoming): “Uzbekistan – A Region of World Society (?) Variants of Differentiation in Agricultural Resources Governance” Soziale Systeme (Special Issue edited by Rudolf Stichweh).
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Notes
- 1.
- 2.
Lange mentions the German Wissenschaftsrat as an example of a consolidated channel of structural coupling between the political and the scientific subsystem in Germany (Lange and Braun 2000, 60).
- 3.
- 4.
The notion of ‘coercive reciprocity’ depicts a system of mutuality that takes on the character of a socio-culturally enforced norm; therefore a reciprocal give and take relationship in which giving and helping each other out is a compulsory/socially enforced, rather than voluntary, act amongst actors.
- 5.
Hokim (Uzbek) depicts the district governor or a body of the state administration in general.
- 6.
‘Above’ here refers to any state organization on the district and regional level (Author’s clarification).
- 7.
Rice can be sold directly on the local market so that sales revenues stay directly with the seller. In contrast, state crops are sold via bank accounts where revenues cannot be withdrawn for private consumption.
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Hornidge, AK., van Assche, K., Shtaltovna, A. (2015). Agricultural Resources Governance in Uzbekistan: A System Theory-Inspired Perspective on Evolutionary Governance. In: Beunen, R., Van Assche, K., Duineveld, M. (eds) Evolutionary Governance Theory. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-12274-8_6
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