Social and monetary reforms in the first decade of Kazakhstan statehood

Abstract

Following the collapse of the Soviet Union all former socialist countries, including Kazakhstan, en- tered a phase of major institutional reforms that should become antecedent of desirable social trans- formations. The needs for broad-based economic, social and institutional reforms were dictated by a sudden disintegration of the systems that bonded the Soviet Republics together. This paper examines the monetary institutional reform carried out by Kazakhstan upon gaining independence, the social- economic impact of the reforms on the lives of the people are also discussed. The author believes that the successful monetary institutional, and other structural reforms performed by Kazakhstan in the first decades of independence became the foundation for Kazakhstan to move from a lower-middle-income country to upper-middle-income in less than two decades. The paper investigates the challenges of social-economic characters that were surmounted and the assessment of the results achieved. It closes with a description of the proposal for a more robust monetary reform that will give Kazakhstan more op- portunities to further improve the social-economic conditions of life for the population, and to meet the goals of joining the elite club of the 30 industrialized countries of the world.

Key words: social, institutional, reforms, national bank.