Bakhytzhan has previously worked as an Assistant Professor at the International School of Economics at KazGUU; and early on in his teaching career as a Graduate Teaching Assistant at the Graduate School of Public Policy at Nazarbayev University. He has additionally worked in various roles for international organizations such as the United Nations Development Programme and the Asian Development Bank.
Bakhytzhan holds Ph.D. in Public Policy from Nazarbayev University. He received his Master's degree in public administration from the Australian National University in Canberra and his BA in public policy and management from York University in Toronto.
Bakhytzhan's research interests include open government, citizen activism, authoritarian politics, public sector reforms, economic development, and the political economy of the post-soviet countries.
Publications
- Variegated digital state repression in Central Asia
- Kurmanov, B. (2024). Between ‘info-killers’ and ‘spies’: three strategies for interviewing government officials across Central Asia. Central Asian Survey, 1–9.
- Abishev, G., Kurmanov, B., & Sabitov, Z. (2024). Authoritarian succession, rules, and conflicts: Tokayev’s gambit and Kazakhstan’s bloody January of 2022 (Qandy Qantar). Post-Soviet Affairs, 1–23
- Kurmanov, B., & Knox, C. (2024). Digital activism and authoritarian legitimation in post-Soviet Central Asia. The Information Society, 1–18.
- Saule Kemelbayeva, Bakhytzhan Kurmanov. Elite schools and educational inequality: Evidence from a private university in Kazakhstan. International Journal of Educational Research, Volume 127, 2024, 102413
- Kurmanov, Bakhytzhan. 2024. ‘Digital Citizen Activism in Central Asia: Beyond Contestation and Cooperation’. In Polarization, Shifting Borders and Liquid Governance, edited by Anja Mihr and Chiara Pierobon, 155–75. Cham: Springer Nature Switzerland.
- Rodríguez-Pose, Andrés, Federico Bartalucci, Bakhytzhan Kurmanov, Genadiy Rau, and Kaisar Nigmetov. 2024. ‘Assessing Regional Inequalities in Kazakhstan through Well-Being’. Asian Development Review, February, 1–34.
- Kurmanov, Bakhytzhan, Urazgali Selteyev, and Anuar Almaganbetov. 2023. “‘Listening State? ’ : Exploring Citizens’ Perceptions of Open Government in Tokayev’s Kazakhstan.” Central Asian Survey, October, 1–22.
- Kurmanov, Bakhytzhan, and Colin Knox. 2022. “Open Government and Citizen Empowerment in Authoritarian States.” Journal of Eurasian Studies 13 (2): 156–71.
- Kurmanov, Bakhytzhan, Yolanda Pena-Boquete, Aizhan Samambayeva, and Galym Makhmejanov. 2021. “Determinants of Overweight and Underweight among Children under 5 in Kazakhstan.” The Open Public Health Journal 14 (1): 501–8.
- Kurmanov, Bakhytzhan. 2020. Improving Public Services in the Post-Soviet Settings: The Potential for Optimization of Public Services in Kazakhstan, 283-299. NispaCEE press: Bratislava, Slovakia.
- Rau, Genadiy, and Bakhytzhan Kurmanov. 2015. The fall of the tenge: A critical analysis of the official narrative on the Kazakhstani currency devaluation. (With Genadiy Rau). (2015). Central Asia Program. Central Asia Economic Papers #17.