22 Ideas to Fix the World: Conversations with the World's Foremost Thinkers

8. OLZHAS SULEIMENOV: “We are all interdependent on this earth”

136 ◆ ◆ ◆ 8 “We are all interdependent on this earth” OLZHAS SULEIMENOV in conversation with Rustem Zhangozha Olzhas Suleimenov is a Kazakh poet, writer, politician, and diplomat. He serves as a Kazakhstan representative to UNESCO (Paris). In this interview with one of Kazakhstan’s most renowned poets and public figures, Olzhas Suleimenov, Professor Rustem Zhangozha seeks insight from inside the Central Asian region into its recent social and political history. This conversation paints a dynamic picture of political and cultural contestation under Soviet rule and after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Spanning a wide range of topics, including perestroika, the European Union, antinuclear activism, and the potential for Central Asian unification, this conversation not only provides insight into this dynamic region but provides us with ideas on how lessons learned from its politics might be applied at a global level. RZh: What is your perception of the overall position of the Central Asian region on the geopolitical map of the world? This is a region rich Photo courtesy of Olzhas Suleimenov. Olzhas Suleimenov ◆ ◆ ◆ 137 in mineral resources and agricultural lands. It is located in an exceedingly important zone where the geostrategic interests of the world’s leaders and major transnational corporations come together. At the same time, this is a transit zone for the world economy’s major sectoral centers: the countries of the Asia-Pacific region, the Russian Federation, and the European Union. OS: The peoples of the region are worthy of their rich cultural heritage. This is equally true of the considerable portion of the civilian population that has lived in the region for a relatively short period of time, spanning several generations, after having resettled from the central regions of Russia, Ukraine, and the Caucasus and having become fullfledged citizens of Central Asia. This factor has significantly affected the ethnosocial and demographic makeup of the Central Asian population , forging what is today a strong, multicultural unit, a homogeneous political nation. This is thanks to universal cultural values, whose integration into the region’s social and demographic body of citizens was implemented through many centuries of tolerant coexistence. This is why Central Asia represents a futuristic model of the social order to come, a social order made up of people of different religious faiths. RZh: It’s hard not to agree that the shared way of life of ethnic groups— largely the common traditions of their nations, linguistic affinity, a common religious faith, the nature of dryland farming, transboundary water resources, and other factors—creates a favorable resource for intraregional integration. Nonetheless the reality is that there are intensifying centrifugal forces at play in the relationship between the newly established countries of the region. Are there objective arguments and mechanisms for reorienting the developmental vectors from the direction of centrifugal force to that of centripetal force? ОS: Definitely. What I said earlier is not to be taken as a given today in the region. For this very reason, robust, comprehensive measures must be taken to implement a model of regional unity. The community of 138 ◆ ◆ ◆ Recognize Everyone is Responsible for the Environment historians and cultural experts and, last but not least, the political elites must work to harmonize interethnic and interfaith relations. I see this as a task for a new generation capable of employing the entire arsenal of tools developed by contemporary humanities and honed through their application in practice. In this situation, it is critical to resolve relational issues between the Central Asian countries. Either they become a guarantee of the internal economic and political stability of each of the countries, as they are “communicating vessels” with respect to one another, or they become a negative, deconstructive practice, the primary cause of intraregional tension, which could then escalate into harsh confrontation. For the time being, as one political expert puts it, “The peoples of Central Asia sleep in one bed, but dream different dreams.” However, reality has its own rational logic, unlike dreams. RZh: What do you consider to be the unique cultural and social values that have evolved throughout the history of the peoples of the Central Asian region? Might these values become integrated into the axiological system of human civilization as it evolves in the third millennium? What do you consider essential for the harmony of both intraregional relations among the states of the region and the successful integration of Kazakhstan and the other countries of the Central Asian region into the...