**4. Transnational and global heritage and the Republic of Kazakhstan**

In 2014, 33 sites along the Silk Routes of the Network of the Chang'an-Tianshan Corridor were inscribed as UNESCO World Heritage sites; 8 of these sites are located in the Zhetysu Corridor of the Republic of Kazakhstan and 3 are located in the Tian Shan Mountains in the Republic of Kyrgyzstan [12]. The entire Silk Routes of the Networks of the Chang'an-Tianshan Corridor consist of a 5000 km section from Chang'an/Louyang capital of the Han and Tang Dynasties in China to the Zhetysu Corridor of Central Asia along the Tian Shan Mountain Corridor into the desert oases of Central Asia and dating from about the second century BCE to the first century CE and then lasting until the sixteenth century CE. In particular the Ili, Chuy, and Talas Valleys of Central Asia and these archaeological sites were important for the transfer of Zoroastrian and Manichaeism religions. As previously mentioned, Talgar, a medieval site, was adversely impacted by potential bridge building and the salvage archaeology associated with that proposed construction in 2016 [7]. This, therefore, is an excellent case by which local and regional conflicts between rapid infrastructural development and national and international interests underscored by the UNESCO inscription of archaeological sites along a corridor become visible to the general public and citizenry of the Republic of Kazakhstan. Should a new nation exercise its ability to undertake large infrastructural development at the expense of its rich cultural and historical heritage? Do local stakeholders have any say? Or are the larger issues of national pride and international relations able to override a local, municipal government's desire to introduce modernization in the form of roadways and bridges to its territory? Here the answers lie in the nature of political process whereby cultural and historic heritage sometimes comes at the cost of infrastructure development. The stakeholders may not have even concerned themselves with the larger macroscale processes of transnational cooperation in the form of the designation of a Silk Route Corridor. When the right hand does not know what the left hand is doing, this suggests a failure on the part of all stakeholders to participate in the process of negotiating between the heritage community, the public, and the national and international arenas [13, 14].

This transnational set of historic linkages between the nations of China, Kazakhstan, and Kyrgyzstan also mirrors the geopolitical push made by China in the "One Belt, One Road" initiative which has the objectives of increasing unimpeded trade; infrastructure connections such as railways, pipelines, and road; and financial integration [1]. The Chang'an-Tianshan Corridor is the example of "soft diplomacy" coupled with hard economic integration and colonization of periphery areas to the Chinese core. As Winters [1] puts it so eloquently:

*Education, Human Rights and Peace in Sustainable Development*

preservation of archaeological sites once found on collective lands.

the proposed bridge corridor on November 21, 2016 [7].

**3. Kazakh nationalism and historical tradition**

between Saka Indo-Europeans and Kazakh nomadic culture.

25 km to the east of the city of Almaty, much of the land we surveyed were open agricultural fields held by state collective farms. It was possible to walk in uncultivated agricultural fields in order to find inventory archaeological sites, usually apparent from scatters of animal bone, ancient ceramic fragments, and grinding stones. By the early 2000s, much of the collective lands were now held by private owners and therefore became fenced, enclosed, and closed to archaeologists and others who wished to conduct scientific research. Private owners of the land once designated as collective lands that previously had been surveyed and even excavated by archaeologists under the proper official channels were now subject to judicial actions and potential lawsuits. Therefore, it became a point of contention as to whether private owners had the right to control and use their land in any way they desired versus the protection and

This kind of acrimony and conflict between stakeholders would continue in the Talgar area from 2008 through 2016 when a private archaeological firm was investigated for destroying cultural properties within the designated borders of medieval Talgar, a 9 h town, occupied from the ninth to the eleventh centuries AD and inscribed as one of the eight sites in the Republic of Kazakhstan found along the Chang'an-Tianshan Corridor of the Silk Route in 2014. The resolution of the dispute between the private archaeological firm, the construction work that built a bridge across the Talgar River, A. Kh. Margulan Institute of Archaeology, and the Republic of Kazakhstan's Ministry of Culture led to a unilateral government mandate that halted all construction work on the bridge and salvage archaeology along

Kazakhstan became independent from the USSR in 1991, at the point where the republic's population had <50% ethnic Kazakhs; the other predominant ethnic group was Russians along with many other ethnic groups. The move toward erasing ethnic Russians as the "elder brothers" to colonizers was achieved by removing Russians from the public sector, business, banking, and the law [8]. In fact President Nazarbayev made moves to create a Kazakh homeland by moving the capital to Astana in 1998–1999. He also declared 1998 "the year of national unity and national history." During this year, specifically in 1998 major archaeological campaigns were carried out at the medieval city of Otrar, and the Saka period frozen tomb burials in Berel, in the Altai region, were excavated by a French-Kazakh team, and many other state-funded archaeological projects were conducted.

Elsewhere I have written about the role of nationalism in archaeological investigations in the Republic of Kazakhstan [9]. The desire to establish the origins of the Kazakh Khanate in the sixteenth century CE also aided in the creation of a Kazakh homeland. Ancient Saka warriors of the Iron Age (ca. 800–200 BCE) such as the Golden Warrior, a 17-year-old youth discovered in the Issyk burial kurgan 40 km east of Almaty (the main city) in 1969, already established an historical connection

A relatively young nation independently requires a historic tradition, in this case, one that extolls the nomadic past of the major component of the Republic of Kazakhstan's populace, the Kazakhs. As a breakaway from the Russian Imperial rule in the eighteenth century and Soviet rule in the twentieth century, the Kazakh ethnic identity must be promoted as root of the nation while still including the hundred other nationalities or ethnic groups. The adoption of the Kazakh language as the state language where all official documents must be in Kazakh language appears to be a major step toward Kazakhization of the nation and proclaiming one state language [10].

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*"For many in the region, the Silk Road is a story of peaceful trade, and a rich history of religious and harmonious cultural exchange. The Belt and Road seeks to directly build on this legacy. It rest up a historical narrative that connectivity—both cultural and economic—reduces suspicion and promotes common prosperity…." [1]*

For developing nations such as Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, the invitation to join the Chang'an-Tianshan Corridor Silk Route initiative gives these nations status, recognition, and also a stake in the "One Belt, One Road" economic initiatives of the core state of China. World Heritage status of archaeological sites often brings cultural, scientific, and financial backers into a nation. For example, the UNESCO-backed restoration of the medieval city of Otrar, a main city along the southern Silk Route, was for the most part financed by Japan. Petroglyph research and the training of local archaeologists and museum personnel at Tamgaly, the major archaeological rock art and landscape reserve in southern Kazakhstan near the Karatau Mountains, were supported in part by Norway. For local archaeologists in Kazakhstan, these World Heritage nominations attract more tourism and boost employment and research opportunities. Government grants through the Kazakh National Institute of Science and Technology have been awarded to archaeologists pursuing the excavation, survey, and research into significant archaeological sites; both are included in World Heritage site nominations and on the tentative list of cultural properties to be protected.

#### **5. Conclusions**

In the Republic of Kazakhstan, cultural and historic heritage of archaeological sites and monuments arises out of the previous Soviet system for the protection and restoration of important archaeological sites and historic monuments. This tradition of heritage management continues to this day but has been influenced now by rapid infrastructural development and national and global mandates under the UNESCO system of inscribing World Heritage sites and natural landscapes. This new level of transnational and global heritage has both positive and negative impacts on the stakeholders of Kazakh history and culture and the citizens themselves. Nationalism, especially with regard to the early evolution of prehistory on the territory of the Republic of Kazakhstan, as mentioned by former President Nazarbayev in 1997–1998, builds among its citizenry a sense of pride and belonging to a greater Eurasian past. The linkage between the contemporary Kazakh culture, whose historic roots can be traced to the sixteenth century AD, and earlier nomadic steppe traditions such as the ancient Saka (eastern variants of the Scythians), although perhaps historically inaccurate, does instill a national pride in the dominant ethnic group, the Kazakhs. Under Soviet rule, indigenous nomadic peoples were often seen as the "little brothers" to the dominant Russian cultural and historic traditions. Former President Nazarbayev since independence in 1991 has been able to weave a national identity that is both multiethnic and multireligious within the territory of the nation-state while asserting the political dominance of the Kazakhs through language reform and the Kazakhization of the national culture [8, 10, 11]. In spite of rapid infrastructural development from vast oil and gas reserves, it is also of great importance to the politicians and diplomats as well as the professional archaeologists and historians to promote the role of cultural and historical heritage in the Republic of Kazakhstan. There will still, however, be tensions in these competing national and global narratives as long as sustainable development appears to be separate from the management of heritage policies.

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**Author details**

Claudia Chang

Sweet Briar College, Sweet Briar, VA, USA

provided the original work is properly cited.

\*Address all correspondence to: cchang@sbc.edu

© 2019 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium,

*Archaeological Sites, Cultural Heritage, and Sustainable Development in the Republic…*

I wish to thank Yuri Peshkov, former cultural officer of the Almaty cluster office of the UNESCO. Boris A. Zheleznyakov provided reports and other information about the World Heritage listing of Tamgaly Reserve Park for which I am grateful.

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86916*

**Acknowledgements**

*Archaeological Sites, Cultural Heritage, and Sustainable Development in the Republic… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86916*
