Place (and Politics) Matter

“What do you expect, he’s Lezhgii,” was offered by an older gentleman in explanation for what he perceived as a slow response to his request for directions in Khachmas. This was then followed by a futher clarification that the best peppers, cucumbers, and tomatoes would be found in the Guba region while fruits and anything sweet would come from Lankaran.

“Well, she was capricious, but on the other hand what would you expect from someone whose family comes from Naxchivan?”

“The best joke tellers come from ‘Sheki’”

In speaking to residents of Baku, who self-identify as “true Bakintsi,” it is not uncommon to hear descriptions of “others” as attributed to the place from where their family may have long ago, or more recently, originated.

The beach at Nardaran, outside Baku on the Absheron Peninsula, has been undergoing many changes. Under the Soviet Union, while Bagirov was Azerbaijan’s highest ranking government official, Transport Union Workers were provided government housing in an apartment building about 200 meters from the shoreline. The building is now a skeleton, and as indicated by the largely submerged lamppost another 50 meters off shore, the Caspian’s water level has been dynamic. As long time residents explain, the Caspian’s changing water level is not the only coastline shaper as the flow of visitors to this section of beach has also been increasing over the last few years. As recently as 2005this part of the coast was rarely crowded, with only an occasional Zhiguli driving down the beach.
Residents of this traditional region blame the accumulation of trash, SUVs, and the increasing number of sunbathers on “new comers,” people they identify as not originally from Baku.

Each approximate 30 meters of beach is sectioned off into individual blocks, each managed by a small team overseeing the collection of parking and table fees.

“Pay?! I have been coming to this beach since 1951. This is ‘my beach.’ I remember when this whole area was just exposed rock, views all the way to Nobel’s Lighthouse. These newcomers don’t care; they come and leave their trash. You think they understand? There was a time when Baku and this whole area was clean and more cultured, before so many newcomers began coming to Baku.” “Earlier was better,” is a refrain invoked in many places, whether in Azerbaijan, the UK and US, or elsewhere.

Notwithstanding America’s “Kennedys,” “Clintons,” or “Bushs,” place, identity, and associated networks form a powerful enabling structure for politics in Azerbaijan. The political party system remains nascent. Political parties are rarely associated with particular ideologies or policies, but with personalities, places, and connections. For example, someone might offer, “My family comes from the Sheki region,” by way of explanation for how he/she is politically unconnected and would be unlikely to go far in politics. Those in the critical and rarefied niches of power have little incentive to devolve control beyond the tight knit and layered system of familial and regional associations. As energy revenues continue to flow, the likelihood of power sharing, as described by a variety of commentators within Azerbaijan, seems less likely as the avenues for diversity of opinion and expression apparently become concurrently more constricted….