The bukharan emirate and turkestan under russian rule in the revolutionary era: 1917-1924

3.5.2. The Struggle of Classes 
In terms of Central Asian Muslims and Bukharans, there was not a real case 
such as proletariat brotherhood of all nations living in Russia. Central Asian Muslims 
did not see the right of self-determination as a consolidating right for the Russia’s 
unity. They immediately saw it as the right for seceding. In their perspective, the case 
was the struggle between the colonist and the native not the struggle between the 
proletariat and capitalist bourgeoisie. Indeed, the struggle concept between capitalist 
226
Carrere D’Encausse, Hèlene, trans
.,Islam and the Russian Empire Reform and Revolution in 
Central Asia
, (London: I.B.Tauris-Co Ltd, 1966),162.
 
227
Ibid, 150. 
228
Becker, Seymour, 
Russia’s Protectorates in Central Asia: Bukhara and Khiva, 1865–1924
, 
(London &New York: Routledge Curzon, 2005),203. 

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bourgeoisie and proletariat was valid for Russians and Ukrainians because these 
nations were skilled labor force such as industrial workers or railway men 
everywhere in Russia. However, the indigenous people of Central Asia and Turkistan 
were either peasants or poor nomads in majority. And, the only increasing class was, 
for instance, the Russian educated secular intelligentsia in Steppe and Turkistan, and 
the Jadids or Young Bukharans and Young Khivans in Bukhara and Khiva. Of 
course, these small elite carried the characteristics of bourgeoisie nationalist instead 
of socialist and proletariat revolutionist character. According to Safarov
,
It was inevitable that the Russian revolution in Turkestan should have been colonist. The Turkestani working class 
was numerically small and had no leader, program, party or revolutionary tradition. It thus could not rise up against colonial 
exploitation. Under Tsarist colonialism, it was a privilege of the Russians to belong to the industrial proletariat. Because of this, 
the dictatorship of the proletariat here took on a typically colonialist character. 
229
According to Caroe, there was not a conception of class struggle regarding 
the conflict between the Bolsheviks and Central Asians. The question got a shape of 
a struggle between natives and colonists rather than revolutionary concept or class 
struggle case.
230
The main struggle of those bourgeoisie nationalists was firstly 
against the feudal aristocracy and clerical classes in Bukhara and Khiva. The 
situation in Khiva for Khivan Jadids, mostly known as Young Khivans, was a bit 
different because of their necessity to struggle against tribal powers such as Junaid 
Khan, leader of Turcoman tribes’ resistance. But, the situation in Bukhara was 
certainly against the authoritarian rule of feudal aristocracy. In order to destroy this 
class, Young Bukharans needed to find a more powerful partner. This partner had to 
be an outside power like the Bolsheviks. The basic reason that made young 
Bukharans and the Bolsheviks approach and cooperates with each other was the 
similarity of their enemies. For example, the feudal aristocracy of Bukhara, the 
229
Carrere D’Encausse, Hèlene, trans.,
Islam and the Russian Empire Reform and Revolution in 
Central Asia,
(London: I.B.Tauris-Co Ltd, 1966),148. 
230
Caroe, Olaf, 
Soviet Empire:
The Turks of Central Asia and Stalinism,
(New York: St. Martin’s 
Press, 1967), 112. 

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87 
enemy of Young Bukharan Jadids was the long term partner of the capitalist 
bourgeoisie of Russian Empire, the enemy of the Bolshevik revolutionists of Russia. 
This common point enforced the two groups into cooperation. The Bolshevik forces 
struggling against the Capitalist bourgeoisie represented by the White forces during 
the civil war, could never accept the obedience of offer of Bukharan feudal 
aristocracy just as they did in the era of Tsardom and Kerensky’s government’s 
period. Lenin’s hard and decisive attitude was derived from this theoretical 
framework. According to Seymour Becker, 
The initial triumph and consolidation of Soviet power in Turkestan during the winter of 1917-1918 was accompanied 
by the establishment in Bukhara and Khiva of regimes openly hostile to the Bolsheviks and enjoying a degree of independence 
not known in either khanate since the 1860’s. The right of self-determination, even to the point of breaking long established ties 
to Russia, was exercised by governments that in Leninist terms represented not the proletariat nor the poor peasantry, nor even 
the bourgeoisie, but the feudal aristocracy. Such a development was clearly the product not of Bolshevik design but of Russian 
weakness. The future of the khanates was inevitably bound up in the larger question of the future of Soviet power in Central 
Asia.
231
In addition, it was impossible for Jadids to cooperate with Bolsheviks forever, 
because their programs and plans were certainly different from the Bolsheviks. The 
Jadids favored a regime of constitutional monarchy as the model of the Young Turks 
of Turkey, thus they hoped to maintain social justice and make Bukhara a leading 
model for the Muslims of Central Asia. Indeed, the Jadids did never see the case as a 
matter of class struggle or victory of the proletariat. Their cooperation with the 
Bolsheviks was not a deliberate preference, but the conditions such as the failure of 
Provisional Government’s rule enforced. 
232
 
Their cultural- national libertarian stands 
forbade the possible clash in the short run between the two partners. For example, the 
Soviets did not create a socialist government in Bukhara and also in Khiva like it was 
in Turkistan and the Steppe (Kirghizstan-Kazakhstan). According to the Soviet view, 
the traditional and feudal character of Bukhara was preventive for the creation of 
231
Becker, Seymour, 
Russia’s Protectorates in Central Asia: Bukhara and Khiva, 1865–1924
, 
(London &New York: Routledge Curzon, 2005), 211. 
232
Carrere D’Encausse, Hèlene, trans.,
Islam and the Russian Empire Reform and Revolution in 
Central Asia
, (London: I.B.Tauris-Co Ltd, 1966),149. 

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socialist republics in Bukhara, so the creation of People’s Republic was promoted. 
The creations of People’s Soviet Republics at the first stage instead of socialist 
republics were aimed to destroy feudal remnants and substitute bourgeois 
governments.
233
Because the era of People's Republic was planned by the Bolsheviks 
as the transition period and the Young Bukharans as the transistor in that era, the 
Bukharan Communists, for example, was not applied much and expelled from the 
ruling government. It was obvious that the Soviets needed Young Bukharans, which 
were more acceptable to the traditions and customs of the population, in order to 
prepare the convenient atmosphere at the first stage on the way of transformation to 
the socialist republic. 
233
Coates, Zelda K. and W.P.,
 Soviets in Central Asia,
(New York: Greenwood Press, Publishers, 
1951),77. 

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