Retreat of democracy in central asia: Diverse perspectives

A baffling research problem that has engaged wide attention of democratic theorists is that why despite twenty eight years of independence from Soviet Union democracy perished in Central Asian Republics. A range of scholars have developed different explanatory variables to address the failure of democratic transition in the region. Until recently, the dominant mode of analysis of political developments in the region has been drawn from the work of democratic theorists sharing the assumption that a transition to democracy is a desired (if not inevitable) step. Democratic theorists either borrowed from modernization theory to link the success of democracy with economic development or structural theory to develop a correlation between socio-political institutions and democratic vibrancy. The growing interest in the study of authoritarianism around the world has resulted in an important shift from characterizing the Central Asian regimes through the lens of democratization theory to portraying them as authoritarian governments with their own internal logics. In addition, an international dimension has been introduced to the study of regimes in Central Asia, centred on the idea that various international actors - the United States, the European Union, Russia, China and others play an active and, at times, decisive role in the success of democratic reforms or derailment of democratization.