Turkmenistan
Turkmenistanexhibits low-range performance in all four categories of theGlobal State of Democracy framework, falling among the bottom 25 per cent of the world’s countries with regard to all factors of democratic performance except Basic Welfare and Electoral Participation. The country is a stable autocracy and has not seen significant declines or advances in any measure over the last five years. The economy is nearly entirely dependent on natural gas exports. The government has been known to falsify official economic data, in part to obscure the severity ofa years-long economic and food scarcity crisis. Independent media and analysts say unemployment could be as high as 60 per cent and the population is likely far less than the official figure of 6.3 million.
Modern-day Turkmenistan first came under Russian control in the 19th century, but nomadic Turkmen society persisted until the 1920s and 1930s, when Soviet indigenization and collectivization projects reorganized Turkmen society along Soviet lines. The country’s communist-era political elite did not significantly change upon independence in 1991, with First Secretary of the Turkmen Communist Party, Saparmurat Niyazov, becoming President and the Party becoming the Democratic Party of Turkmenistan. Niyazov also established the pattern of building a cult of personality, issuing idiosyncratic and autocratic decrees that have made it one of the most repressive nations on earth, such as his decisions to ban gold teeth and long hair, close all libraries outside the capital and rename the month of April after his mother.
Niyazov’s successor, Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov, relaxed some of the more extreme decrees and moved the country from a totalitarian to an authoritarian neopatrimonial model and recreated aspects of his predecessor’s cult of personality. He oversaw the introduction of theoretically multi-party and competitive parliamentary elections in 2008, but even the rubber-stamp parliament has frequently been subservient to an appointed Council of Elders. Although his son, Serdar has formally been president since 2022, Gurbanguly reportedly continues to hold power behind the scenes. The election that brought Serdar to power, like all previous ones, was neither free nor fair.
Reliable portrayals of everyday Turkmen socioeconomic life are difficult to produce, as independent research is risky and the Turkmen government habitually obscures and falsifies official data. Half of the population is estimated to be working abroad. Turkmenistan has a dismal human rights record, where civil and political rights are absent and public order is maintained through systematized extrajudicial violence and over 150 documented enforcement disappearances. In addition, the Turkmen government engages in transnational repression. Traditional gender roles are enforced through decrees and unwritten laws curtailing women’s personal freedom and access to reproductive care, and men are barred from growing beards or adopting behaviour that might be interpreted as too Islamic. The 1990s saw significant outmigration of ethnic minorities, and while official statistics are unreliable, Uzbeks are the largest ethnic minority group with roughly 300,000 members. Reports of discrimination and forced ‘Turkmenization’ of Uzbeks occasionally appear in independent media.
Turkmenistan’s longstanding economic crisis persists, but little prospect of reform as long as the ruling elite can depend on Chinese purchases of natural gas. The perpetualshortage of data hampers accurate modelling, but it will be important to watch Basic Welfare, since continued economic instability in Turkey and Russia, the main destination countries for Turkmen labor, could impact this factor. Finally, as a country dominated by arid deserts, even minor climatic variations in line with standard for the region could render much Turkmen agriculture unsustainable in the coming decades.
Last Updated: June 2025
https://www.idea.int/democracytracker/
August 2024
Child labour in cotton harvest banned
Turkmenistan’s Ministry of Justice added cotton-picking to the list of occupations prohibited for people under 18, according to a decree uploaded to the Ministry’s website in August. Most of Turkmenistan’s cotton is picked under a state-backed forced labour regime in which tens of thousands of teachers, doctors, state employees and private-sector workers are forced to leave their normal places of work for the cotton fields. While children have not formally been subject to forced labour mandates, they have habitually been included as “replacement pickers” or forced to do so on behalf of a relative who was unable to participate.
Sources: Havli,Ministry of Justice of Turkmenistan,The Cotton Campaign,Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
March 2023
New rubber stamp parliament elected
Turkmenistan held elections for a new unicameral legislature on 26 March that, like all elections in the country’s history, were considered neither free nor fair and marred by serious violations and fraud. The Central Election Commission claimed turnout of 91.12 per cent, but observers and journalists instead noted largely empty polling stations. Under the new constitutional framework, the rubber-stamp parliament will be largely subservient to the unelected People’s Council, headed by former president Gurbanguly Berdymukhmammedov. Women’s representation in parliament, which stood at 24 per cent in the previous parliament, has not yet been made publicly available.
Sources:Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
January 2023
Parliament reorganized once again
Turkmenistan’s upper house of parliament will be transformed into a “higher power” advisory council to be overseen by the country’s former president, Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov. Constitutional changes are frequent in Turkmenistan, and the purpose of this one is unclear, but analysts suggest the core motivation involves Berdymukhammedov’s wish to take more official power away from his son, the country’s current president.
Sources: Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (1),EurasiaNet,Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (2)
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