Sophie Hohmann

The changing sex ratios at birth during the civil war in Tajikistan : 1992-1997

Sex ratios at birth are known to change during wars or shortly after. This study investigated changes in sex ratios during the civil war that occurred in Tajikistan after the dismantling of the Soviet Union. This civil war was particularly bloody and long lasting, and had many demographic consequences. According to vital registration data, some 27,000 persons died in excess of previous trends during the civil war period (1992-1997), and total mortality was sometimes estimated to be three times higher by independent observers. Birth rates dropped markedly during the war, and sex ratios at birth increased significantly from 104.6 before the war to 106.9 during the war, to return to baseline values afterwards. The change in sex ratio is investigated according to demographic evidence (migration, delayed marriage, spouse separation), substantiated with qualitative evidence (difficulties with food supply), and compared with patterns found in Europe during World War II, as well as with recent wars in the Middle East.

A framework for analyzing sex-selective abortion: the example of changing sex ratios in Southern Caucasus.

The paper proposes a socioeconomic framework of supply, demand, and regulation to explain the development of sex-selective abortion in several parts of the world. The framework is then applied to three countries of southern Caucasus (Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia) where sex-selective abortion has developed since the collapse of the Soviet Union. The authors argue that sex-selective abortion cannot be explained simply by patriarchal social systems, sex discrimination, or son preference. The emphasis is put on the long-term acceptability of abortion in the region, on acceptability of sex-screening by both the medical establishment and by the population, on newly imported techniques of sex-screening, and on the changing demand for children associated with the major economic and social changes that followed the dismantlement of the Soviet Union.

Post-Soviet Transformations of Health Systems in the South Caucasus

This article analyzes post-Soviet changes to the health systems in the three South Caucasus countries of Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia. After a severe economic and social crisis and deindustrialization in the 1990s, divergent trends emerged in the 2000s. Azerbaijan saw a spectacular recovery in growth, fuelled by an oil boom, while the impact of the 2009 global crisis restrained Georgia and Armenias capacity to allocate budgets to health care. Many similarities can be identified between the three countries, particularly in the 1990s, attributed to a common Soviet past and to the same trends in international aid. Differences and country-specific features increasingly manifested themselves in the 2000s, and resulting from diverging policy choices.

L’infection par le VIH-SIDA en Ouzbékistan : réactions à l’inconnu des mutations postsoviétiques ?

Les dynamiques d’infection par le VIH-sida propres aux Republiques d’Asie centrale sont etudiees ici a travers l’exemple de l’Ouzbekistan. En quoi celles, assez similaires, observees dans l’ex-URSS se distinguent-elles des dynamiques a l’œuvre dans d’autres regions du monde, notamment en Afrique australe ? Nous expliciterons les principales differences afin d’examiner comment les pays abordent et gerent l’infection (politiques de prevention, traitements, aide psychologique, ONG, associations, etc.). Notre analyse se concentre en filigrane sur la maniere dont le pouvoir politique s’approprie une rhetorique qui reproduit inexorablement la norme sovietique en stigmatisant et en disqualifiant l’individu infecte, classe dans une categorie dite « deviante » et pense socialement comme non productif. Ce travail se base sur des sources ecrites diversifiees (statistiques officielles, rapports officiels et internes, enquetes de prevalence des Centres for Disease Control en Ouzbekistan) et sur des sources orales (entretiens realises en 1997-1998 et en 2004 en Ouzbekistan).

Socio-Economic Migrations and Health Issues Resulting from the Tajik Civil War

Tajikistan, the poorest of the former Soviet Union’s republics, is situated in an enclave between Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Afghanistan, and China. Beginning in the 1970s, the period 1989-2000 saw a trend of de-urbanization. A silent process of decolonization also got underway in the 1970s with the beginnings of a reversal in the migratory flow ledger between Russia and Central Asia. This chapter discusses the complexity of these socio-political and demographic phenomena and their repercussions on society in Tajikistan. It shows that contemporary migrations—with a particular focus on the civil war legacy—are part of a long history of population displacements, and examines the health consequences resulting from the growth of these mobility flows. It reviews the study based on available written data, namely the results of censuses, Tajik scholarly literature, reports from International Organization for Migration (IOM) in the capital Dushanbe, as well as interviews with doctors from two hospitals in Dushanbe. Keywords:health issues; International Organization for Migration (IOM); socio-economic migrations; Soviet union; Tajik civil war; Tajikistan; Uzbekistan

Vulnérabilités Et Infection

Cet article met en lumiere les vulnerabilites liees a la sante chez les travail-leurs migrants tadjikistanais en Russie. Il s’appuie en partie sur un travail d’enquete realisee au Tadjikistan realisee par Sharq en 2010 aupres d’un echantillon exemplaire de travailleurs migrants. Les resultats de cette enquete apportent des informations precieuses sur les connaissances, les comportements et les representations des migrants et de leurs familles en ce qui concerne l’infection par VIH/SIDA et les MST dans le pays d’origine (le Tadjikistan) et dans le pays d’accueil (la Russie). Ils mettent egalement en lumiere les constructions ideologiques de l’infection par VIH, les bouleversements de l’intimite des personnes infectees et les contraintes qui emanent des processus de reformes engagees dans les systemes de sante depuis la fin de l’URSS il y a vingt ans.