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Soon after independence, Kazakhstan established the state-sponsored student mobility programme 'Bolashak', which has since provided almost 12,000 young people with full scholarships for their studies abroad. Bolashak is considered here as a multidimensional tool, promoting development and channelling authoritarian rule at the same time. Through a series of qualitative interviews with alumni of the programme, this paper investigates the authoritarian and paternalistic features in Bolashak-related policies and discourses, looking at how they contribute to the three 'pillars' of authoritarian stability: repression, co-optation and legitimation. The findings of this paper question the assumption that globalization is bringing only challenges to autocracies. Kazakhstan is an example of how contemporary authoritarian regimes may open up to the world in order to seek development as well as political stability.

This chapter surveys the legitimation strategies enacted by the political leadership of the contemporary post-Soviet republic. While showing that Kazakhstan bases its legitimation primarily on international recognition and the country's economic performance, it also focuses on an institutional dimension of legitimation. The leadership of Kazakhstan has chiefly been relying on Nur Otan, the party of power, for this. The party has contributed to legitimation by enforcing rules in the 1990s; by channeling popular support for the regime's economic performance in the 2000s; and finally by becoming more responsive to citizens' requests, thus shifting the regime toward input-related legitimation in the aftermath of the 2008 global financial crisis. IntroductionThe goal of the present volume is to shed light on the importance of legitimation for authoritarian-regime stability, focusing in particular on institutional legitimacy in post-Soviet Eurasia. i The case of Kazakhstan is extremely relevant for this purpose: Governed by a soft authoritarian regime, the country is endowed with significant natural resources and yet deploys advanced forms of institutional legitimation, especially through its party of power.Moreover, the analysis of this case shows that modes of legitimation can vary over time, with shifts largely depending on the historical, economic and political conditions of the moment.This chapter begins with a review of the main legitimating frames considered and in some cases adopted by Kazakhstan's leadership. A reliance on international recognition and strong economic performance, two of the most successful strategies, are examined in particular. In the same section, the need for an institutional dimension for legitimation is explored.Institutions, it is argued, are needed to buttress, channel and at times provide a substitute for 1 This chapter is going to be published in an edited volume published thanks to the efforts and the support of the KomPost research network. The reference is Del Sordi, A. (2016) "Legitimation and the Party of Power in Kazakhstan" in J. Ahrens, M. Brusis and M. Schulze Wessel (eds) Politics and Legitimacy in Post-Soviet Eurasia (London: Palgrave Macmillan).

In this chapter, we deal with authoritarian field research in relation to ethics procedures (or lack thereof!), visas, and permits, and what we do in advance to prepare for an optimal, and optimally safe, fieldwork period. We acknowledge that fieldwork in authoritarian contexts is mostly not very dangerous for researchers, but it can be. We discuss the particular nature of authoritarian fieldwork risks, the concrete risks we ourselves and others have faced, and what we can do to assess and mitigate those risks. We conclude that while we should be aware of risk and try to minimize it, we need to accept that risk cannot be eliminated if we want to engage in authoritarian fieldwork. Keywords Authoritarianism • Field research • Risk • Fieldwork ethics • Safety • AccessIn this chapter, we discuss our preparations for entering the field and our handling of the risks associated with authoritarian fieldwork. In terms of preparations, we deal with experiences with the ethics procedures (or lack thereof!) of universities and funders, the vagaries of visa requirements, and what we do in advance to prepare for an optimal, and optimally safe, fieldwork period. We discuss the particular nature of authoritarian fieldwork risks, the concrete risks we ourselves and others have faced, and what we