ASTANA, Kazakhstan — On the eve of a presidential election in this oil-rich Central Asian nation, students and faculty at the Kazakh University of the Arts filed into an auditorium for a meeting that was, according to fliers posted in the hallways, “strictly mandatory!!!”

The rector’s topic, it became clear, was Nursultan A. Nazarbayev, the country’s 70-year-old president. She praised Mr. Nazarbayev’s “strategic thinking” and his “deep feeling for art” and noted that “many people thought the university did not need a pipe organ, but thanks to the president, we got one.” By the time the hour was up, Indira Akhmetova, an aspiring film critic with black nail polish and an eyebrow piercing, was feeling gushy.

“I would like him to live to 100,” said Ms. Akhmetova, who, at 20, has never known another leader. If that proves impossible, she added, “He should stay for 10 years, so that he can prepare someone else.”

And who might that be? “Someone just like him,” she said.

During a season of collapsing authoritarian governments, Mr. Nazarbayev stands as testament to the forces protecting the strongmen of the former Soviet states. There is no restless young elite that wants to take over the government. Where Egypt had independent military leaders, Kazakhstan has the K.N.B., successor to the Soviet K.G.B., which is bound closely to the government. Per capita GDP has increased twelvefold since 1994, and post-Soviet turmoil has left behind a craving for stability.