PurposeIn the Soviet Union, the official command structure for economic production and distribution gave rise to, and depended upon, what has been described as a “shadow” economy. In the post‐socialist context, the unregulated, often extra‐legal activities of production and exchange, encompassing the survival strategies of the poor, the emergence of post‐socialist “Mafias”, and much entrepreneurial activity, has been described using the concept of the “informal economy”.Design/methodology/approachThe paper is based on long‐term participatory research over a period of three years.FindingsThe paper argues that what we might think of as informal economic activity in Uzbekistan cannot be understood in relation to a formal economy, but is rather an expression of a more general informalisation of lifeworlds following the end of the Soviet Union. Unlike the situation in the Soviet Union, the informal does not emerge from and exist in relation to formal political and economic structures. The state itself is experienced in personalised terms, as a “Mafia”, and the informal is all that there is.Originality/valueThis article provides an original perspective on the informal economy and informalised lifeworlds in Uzbekistan.

Since Uzbekistan gained its independence following the collapse of the Soviet Union, Islam has re-entered the public sphere and people there have joined the rest of the Muslim world in contemplating reflexively what it means to be Muslim. This article explores this process in the context of healing practices involving spirit agency. It argues that this form of healing, as an imaginal encounter with spirit agents, constitutes a particular mode of access to divine knowledge and power through which people validate their own particular concepts of Muslim selfhood. It explores how the content of these encounters and the cosmology invoked by healers are changing in response to the increasing influence of scripturalist interpretations of Islam, and how healing practice is interpreted through social interaction within the healers' communities.

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and monitoring religious practice. These have been 'nationalised', with each republic forming its own independent board and religious training institutions. While all are formally non-governmental institutions, as they were in the Soviet Union, the extent to which they remain under the control of state authorities depends on how tightly religious practice is regulated in a particular republic. Thus, the Muslim Board of Uzbekistan is much more closely tied to central government than its counterparts in, for example, Dagestan or Tatarstan.Up to now, analysis of Islam in the former Soviet Union has been principally dominated by a concern about religious extremism. A large body of literature has been produced by journalists, policy think tanks, and international conflict resolution organisations speculating upon the challenge Islam poses to secular governments and regional stability. Much of this analysis places Islamic extremism within a volatile mix of poverty, water scarcity, inter-ethnic tensions, and repressive local regimes which threatens to explode at any moment 1 . Unfortunately academic studies have not been immune to this view. Even if analysis by social scientists tends to be more measured, the question of Islam is too often framed in terms of an Islamic 'resurgence', evidenced by such phenomena as the dramatic increase in the number of mosques, the formation of Islamic political parties, and the activities of missionaries from other Muslim countries 2 .Many have discussed whether 'extremist' or 'fundamentalist' movements have gained a foothold in post-Soviet states and whether local populations are likely to be attracted to these trends or to remain loyal to 'traditional', locally rooted forms of 'moderate' Islam 3 . These studies confine themselves to the macro-level of government policy and religious movements. When the practice of ordinary Muslims is touched upon, it is generally glossed over as 'traditional' or 'parallel' Islam and left largely unexamined. The study of Islam in both the Soviet Union and in post-Soviet societies has suffered from being placed within an overly limiting analytical framework. Before the 'tradition' to reveal the dynamic interactions between the actors in central governments, officials within the quasi-state religious administrations, religious groups not sponsored by local governments, and the diversity of Muslim believers, all of whom are motivated by their individual agendas, interests and beliefs. Most importantly, we need to adopt an analytical frame which can accommodate the study Islam in the region on its own terms and at the same time place Islam in post-Soviet space within a comparative perspective of Islam as practiced in the wider Muslim world. The study of Islam in the Soviet UnionSome of the richest ethnographic accounts of the practice of Islam in the Soviet period and earlier are provided by Soviet ethnographers. However, the analytical slant of this literature was shaped by the necessity of writing in accordance with Soviet state policy and Marxist-Lenini...