国家主導性と経済性の相克 ── ウズベキスタンにおける国家語と共通通商語に焦点を当てて ──
A Conflict of State-led Initiative and Economic Rationality: Focusing on the State Language and Lingua Franca in Uzbekistan

Summary/Abstract: Predicated on language economics/economic linguistics, as well as language studies in the fields of international management, business, and economics, this paper is an attempt to construct a theoretical framework of understanding a dilemma between state-led initiative and economic rationality regarding language choices. In so doing, I incorporate linguistic factors into transaction cost theory of new institutional economics and concepts of institutional connectivity and complementarity emanating from comparative institutional analysis. I conceptualize three types of institutional settings in post-Soviet countries: 1) language planning relying on the Russian language; 2) language planning departing from the Russian language; and 3) inevitable coexistence with the Russian language. I then explore conflicts between the titular languages and the Russian language: while the languages of nation states are an integral part of their nationalities and ethnic identities, the Russian language remains a powerful common business language working as the lingua franca in the post-Soviet economic space. Taking Uzbekistan as a case belonging to the third type of institutional setting, I show specific circumstances of the language use by analyzing questionnaires and semi-structured interviews collected from dozens of informants. To conclude, I compare the development of Uzbekistan with that of other Central Asian countries challenged by the similar indispensability of the Russian language and thereby offer an outlook for these Central Asian institutional arrangements from the viewpoint of institutional complementarity.

• Details
• Contents