I have published peer-reviewed research on Central Asian politics and have done some academic work in this area on the PhD level.

Soviet policy towards nomadic people in Central Asia changed over the life of the Soviet Union. During the civil war and the initial consolidation of Soviet rule over Central Asia, Soviet attempts at "denomadifaction" were spotty and generally limited. Nomads that allied with the Soviets early on were often not pressed to settle down at first, while nomadic groups that fought against the Soviet Union were subjugated to often brutal treatment that affected their ability to live a nomadic lifestyle, such as the confiscation of their livestock (and in some cases, their women's jewelry - often highly prized and a critical part of one's social status in a tribe or clan).

Nomadic people were at first encouraged to collectivize and form collective associations, with limited and mixed success. Soviet policy from the start focused on more indirect ways to undermine nomadic culture. The traditional tribal and clan-like structure was attacked. Starting from the end of the civil war, Soviet ethnographers fanned out across Central Asia to categorize the many tribes and clans into distinct nations that could be then subjected to territorial and institutional structures based on those national groupings. This was based on Marxist historical-materialist theory that in order for the nomadic peoples to culturally and economically develop, they would need to be encouraged to identify with a nation rather than a tribe based on kinship. This process was often difficult and frustrating, as many tribes initially refused to identify with the "nation" they were assigned to.

In this light, policies encouraging the empowerment of women were also pushed. It was thought that formal female empowerment would help with the economic development of nomadic peoples and encourage their settlement. The success of this, especially at the start, was limited and rather paradoxical results. A good example of this was the Soviet introduction of easy no-fuss divorce wherein a woman could divorce her husband simply by mailing him the proper document. This initially backfired because Central Asian men would often use this simplified divorce process to punish and isolate women who sought to go against the tribe or clan.

These initial attempts at collectivization and denomadification were not enough, and starting in the late 1920s increasingly forceful attempts were introduced, cultivating in the forced collectivization of the 1930s.

Its important to realize that nomadic life is fundamentally built around livestock. Controlling nomadic peoples' livestock meant controlling nomadic lifestyle. The Soviet government's main priority in Central Asia was cotton and wheat production, so at first the most intense collectivization was focused on the peasants. But forced nomadic settling was well underway by the late 1920s, and by the late 1930s nomadic herders were also completely subjected to the system of forced collectivization. Nomadic peoples, who previously organized their communities in small groups called "auls", were forced to become organized into labour units built around collective farms ("kolkhoz") and state farms ("sovkhoz"). The animals that nomadic life depended on became controlled by the collective and state farms, and those nomads that refused to be collectivized were subjected to deportation or execution. Generally each family in the Kolkhoz was given responsibility over a few animals to herd - often at this point just one or two. It was forbidden to slaughter the animals, even if your family was starving - they were state property. Like elsewhere in the Soviet Union, many people refused to hand over their animals, often killing them. In fact, so many people refused to hand over their animals, that between 80% to 90% of herding animals were killed, depending on the type of animal.

The predictable result was mass starvation and fleeing. At least 2 million people fled Central Asia and made their way to Afghanistan, China, Iran, etc. Another 2 or so million people starved to death. Nomad starvation was particularly bad amongst Kazakh tribes - maybe 50% of Kazakh nomads starved to death during this period. Entire areas of Kazakhstan were depopulated - and in their place settled people were forcibly deported from other areas of the Soviet Union, particularly Germans, Tatars, Koreans, and Chechens.

The surviving nomads were forcibly settled down - workers would still follow their livestock along grazing routes, but these were localized as much as possible, and the nomadic people were forced to keep their permanent residence at a specific location.

References:

Mukhamet Shayakhmetov, The Silent Steppe: The Story of the Kazakh Nomads Under Stalin (London: Overlook Rookery, 2006)

Niccolo Pianciola, Famine in the Steppe: The Collectivization of Agriculture and the Kazak Herdsmen, 1928-1934 (Cahiers Du Monde Russe, 45(1-2).

Nazira Nurtazina, Great Famine of 1931 - 1933 in Kazakhstan: A Contemporary's Reminiscences Acta Slavica Iaponica, Tomus 32 (2011)

Geiss, Paul Georg “Turkmen Tribalism,” Central Asian Survey 18 (3) (1999), 347-357

Hiro, Dilip. Inside Central Asia: A Political and Cultural History of Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkey, and Iran (New York: Overlook Press, 2009)

Bruce, Parrott, and Dawish, Karen Conflict, Cleavage, and Change in Central Asia and the Caucasus (New York: University Press, 1997)