Paul Goble
Vienna, March 13 – Voters in the Aga-Buryat Autonomous District and Chita oblast on Sunday gave overwhelming approval to the amalgamation of the small non-Russian region and the larger and predominantly Russian one into a new Transbaikal kray.
Local officials, at Moscow’s behest, used a variety of what Russians call “administrative measures” to ensure that the Kremlin would gain its fifth straight victory since December 2005 in votes to reduce the number of federal units by folding non-Russian regions into Russian ones.
But in addition to casting doubt on the democratic legitimacy of the outcome – for details on how officials managed the election, see the report in the Transbaikal News Agency at http://www.zabinfo.ru/print.php?sid=30066 -- the referendum process in this case has entailed two consequences the Kremlin clearly does not want.
On the one hand, in the run-up to the voting, Buryat opponents of the move succeeded in staging four small demonstrations – ranging in size from a handful to more than 100 activists in Ulan-Ude, Moscow, St. Petersburg, and Ulan-Bator – despite official pressure against their efforts (http://pressa.irk.ru/number1/2007/10/001008.html).
Organizers were harassed and their leaflets confiscated in ways that recall Soviet moves against human rights activists a generation ago, but more important is the fact that members of the far-flung Buryat diaspora showed the ability to unite, something that has not been the case in the past, and even to reach out to the closely related Mongolians.
And on the other hand, by calling into question existing territorial divisions within the Russian Federation, Moscow has opened the way for discussions about the possibility of changes that could threaten the central government’s interests and even its control of the periphery of the country.
The New Region news agency reports that the leaders of the Buryat Republic, having watched as two Buryat regions outside its borders were absorbed by ethnic Russian ones, is pressing for the creation of a new and much larger Baikal Region (http://www.nr2.ru/policy/108459.html).
Such a territory would include Buryatiya itself and the newly expanded Irkutsk and Chita oblasts. Because of its location and size -- it would sit astride transportation links between Siberia and the Russian Far East and might be expected to develop key ties with China and Mongolia – this kray almost certainly would be enormously powerful
Not surprisingly, as the news agency reports, Moscow and many local officials view this idea as “premature” at best.
But the Buryats are not the only people in that region thinking about combining territories into larger units that could have greater influence within the Russian Federation or even challenge Moscow’s control of a strategically important part of its periphery.
Last week, a journal in Irkutsk organized a roundtable discussion on “Federalism and the Baikal Region (http://babr.ru/news/print.php?IDE=36432). Two of the participants – political scientist Yuriy Pronin and historian Sergei Shmidt – viewed Sunday’s referendum as a normal and even rational step forward in Russian governance.
But the third participant, Mikhail Kulekhov who heads the Irkutsk regionalist [‘oblastnik’] organization suggested that this vote and all the changes in the Russian political system under Vladimir Putin were leading the country toward a dead end from which escape could be extremely difficult.
Although there is no basis for concluding that Kulekhov speaks for a significant portion of the population in the Transbaikal, his ideas are intriguing and deserve a hearing because they suggest that at least some in the Russian Federation are considering more radical changes in the federal system.
First, he suggests that the federal districts could represent a “preliminary” delimitation of the borders of entities that could emerge as independent actors. Indeed, he reports, Tomsk Governor Viktor Kress told a Kremlin representative “it is time for the Siberian Federal District to be structured as a subject of the federation.”
Such a devolution, Kulekhov continues, would resemble the division of the Soviet Union. “Anyone who think that nationalists destroyed the USSR is deeply mistaken. The USSR was divided for the preservation in one set of hands of all resources and in order to ‘throw overboard’” those republics that were costing Moscow too much money.
Second, Kulekhov argues falling oil and gas prices could cost Moscow its control of the country. When the center either under Yeltsin or in the future under someone else has enough money, it can control the situation. If there is no money, he continues, then the center will have to say as Yeltsin did “take as much independence as you like.”
And third, he says that while “the separation of Siberia” is “inevitable, there are two very different ways in which it might occur. If Siberia becomes a unified whole as the result of careful organization, it could remain within the framework of some kind of federation.
But “if it takes place in an uncontrolled manner, then an uncontrolled division will begin.” Russians may display “a certain inertness in such matters, but it important to recall that once things begin to move in an “uncontrolled” way, then the country may shift in ways no one predicts.
“In the spring of 1991,” Kulekhov notes, 76 percent [of Soviet voters] called for the preservation of the Union, but in December everything fell apart. Now separatism is latent,” he continues. “In polls, 20-30 percent are for the separation [of Siberia], 60 percent for autonomy [but] only ten percent are for maintaining the current situation.”
Given that, further Kremlin pressure to combine regions could be the occasion for pushing the country into a more uncontrolled and uncertain direction, especially if the referenda themselves continue to be, as was the case in the Transbaikal two days ago, so obviously controlled and scripted from above.
Tuesday, March 13, 2007
WindowonEurasia: Majority of RF’s Non-Russians Now Identify as ‘Russkiye’
Paul Goble
Vienna, March 12 – More than half of the Russian Federation’s non-Russians by nationality now use the historically ethnic term “russkiye” to describe themselves, but both they and a large percentage of ethnic Russians say that they prefer to be addressed as “Rossiyane,” the noun deriving from the historically political term “rossiiskiy.”
The first of these shifts is certain to be greeted by Russian nationalists who hope to absorb into the Russian nation the more than one RF resident in five who is not ethnically Russian, and the second will be welcomed by those who argue that the Russian Federation must promote a form of civic nationalism if it is to become a modern society.
But the findings of a poll on which these conclusions are drawn are in fact far more troubling because they suggest that there has been a blurring of this linguistic distinction among RF residents, a trend that calls into question both the possibility of creating a genuine civic nationalism and the meaning of “Russianness” for Russians.
The poll conducted at the end of February asked 1500 RF adults across the country whether they considered themselves to be ethnically Russian, what being an ethnic Russian means to them, and which form of appeal to citizens of Russia pleases them more (http://www.bashkirova-partners.ru/res.php?id=5&show=865).
In response to the first question, 92.6 percent of the sample indicated that they did consider themselves to be “russkiye” people, with only 5.5 percent saying they did not and 1.9 percent indicating that they found it hard to answer.
Because non-Russians in ethnic terms make up more than 20 percent of the population of the Russian Federation, these findings indicate that a significant share and probably more than half of the members of this group are prepared to accept the ethnic Russian designator.
In response to the second question, however, the meaning of such self-identifications is shown to be more problematic: 61.4 percent of the sample said that to be “russkiye” meant to be citizens of the Russian Federation, 49.5 percent said that it meant to live in Russia.
At the same time, 43.1 percent of this sample said it meant to belong to the Russian nation “by blood,” 42.6 percent said that it meant to know Russian culture, and 33.7 percent said that it meant to be Orthodox by religion. (Because respondents could give more than one answer, the sum of the answers is greater than 100 percent.)
And in response to the third question, how they preferred that citizens of Russia be addressed, 62.9 percent of the sample said as [non-ethnic] “Rossiyane” while 30.2 percent as [ethnic] “Russkiye.” The remainder gave other answers or said they found it difficult to answer.
Commenting on the results, Aleksandr Muzafarov, who heads the research unit at the Moscow Agency of Political News, suggested that they pointed to the convergence of the two terms, the ethnic “russkiye” and the political “rossiskiy,” that historically have been considered different things (http://www.apn.ru/news/print11620.htm).
But he argued that the emergence of a “political nation” in the Russian Federation would take some time because, “we are dealing with the consequences of the nationality policy of bolshevism which in many regards had an anti-Russian character and was directed at the wiping out of Russian self-identification in a single ‘Soviet’ people.”
Two other Moscow commentaries on the relationship between the two Russian terms for “Russian” – typically translated into English without this distinction being marked -- some additional arguments about what this convergence of the ethnic and the political may mean for the future of the Russian Federation.
In one posted earlier this month on the “Peoples of Russia” website, Aleksandr Gorshkolepov and Dmitriy Matyash argue that “the question of the national self-identification of Russia” has become “a question of survival for our state” (http://www.narodnu.ru/article7421.html).
Indeed, “without a successful answer to this question,” they insist, the Russian Federation will have no chance for “political stability, the flowering of the country, or the well-being of its citizens.”
Unfortunately, the two analysts note, the citizens of the Russian Federation remain deeply split on just what their country should be, with some seeking a return to the “golden age” of the USSR, others desirous of a “rebirth” of the Russian empire,” and still others seeking the development of purely ethnic Russian state.
But the advocates of each of these positions, Gorshkolepov and Matyash say, almost in every case forget that “with the ‘rebirth’ of the past will be reborn the problems of the past.”
Consequently, they argue, the Russian Federation must move toward the development of a supra-national political identity, common for all citizens, and shift from the current formula of “a multi-national people of the Russian Federation” to “a single Russian civil political nation.”
Unfortunately, they point out, the current Russian government has not taken the admittedly difficult steps necessary to push this idea forward, preferring instead to root “the ‘blood principle’ in social-economic, societal-political and cadre policy” throughout the country.
An even more thoroughgoing analysis of the implications of the identity shifts between “russkiy” and “rossiiskiy” and the actions of the Kremlin was provided last week by Sergei Markedonov, one of the most thoughtful commentators on ethnic issues in the Russian Federation (http://www.polit.ru/author/2007/03/07/rusproj.html).
Like Gorshkolepov and Matyash, Markedonov argues that the question of “national self-identification” is “without exaggeration a question of survival for the state,” even though he notes that the Kremlin and its supporters often fail to recognize that fact.
“Today’s Russia,” he continues, “is a country with a “conglomerate identity,” in which coexist Soviet internationalism and double-dyed ethno-nationalism, imperialism, radical Orthodoxy and other ideas of religious extremism.”
Given that complexity and the problems that such diversity entails, he says, it should come as no surprise that the pro-Kremlin United Russia party has launched its “Russian Project,” one apparently intended to bridge the divide between the political and ethnic that continues to bedevil the Russian Federation.
But given the unserious way in which it has been conducted at least so far, Markedonov suggests, the Russian Project seems certain to anger both significant numbers of the non-Russian fifth of the Russian Federation and to call into question what it means for ethnic Russians to be Russians.
“By proclaiming [ethnic] Russians all the citizens of Russia (and at the same time by requiring from them to share its language and culture), the inventors of the ‘Russian Project’ are striking first of all on the ethnic identification of the [ethnic] Russians themselves,” Markedonov points out.
“For if there are ‘[ethnic] Russian Yakuts,’ ‘[ethnic] Russian Bashkirs’ and ‘[ethnic] Russian Tatars,’ then how will things stand with the genuinely [ethnic] Russians? Will they become ‘[ethnic] Russian Russians or [ethnic] Russians of the first category?” Markedonov asks.
And he suggests that the Kremlin’s current push via United Russia party for an “[ethnic] Russian civic nationalism,” however successful it may appear, represents a commitment to what is in fact a contradiction in terms: “[ethnic] Russian civic nationalism is just as impossible as “sausage tea or wooden iron or electrical gas.”
Consequently any attempt such as the one Moscow is now making to promote it will ultimately generate a reaction among non-Russians even if for the moment at least some of them are prepared to go along and give the proper answers to pollsters.
But Markedonov concludes, it is easy to see why the Kremlin and its minions are doing what they are, promoting the very divisions they claim to be overcoming because “it is much easier to rule people divided along ethnic, social and religious lines” than it is to govern a more homogeneous citizenry.
Vienna, March 12 – More than half of the Russian Federation’s non-Russians by nationality now use the historically ethnic term “russkiye” to describe themselves, but both they and a large percentage of ethnic Russians say that they prefer to be addressed as “Rossiyane,” the noun deriving from the historically political term “rossiiskiy.”
The first of these shifts is certain to be greeted by Russian nationalists who hope to absorb into the Russian nation the more than one RF resident in five who is not ethnically Russian, and the second will be welcomed by those who argue that the Russian Federation must promote a form of civic nationalism if it is to become a modern society.
But the findings of a poll on which these conclusions are drawn are in fact far more troubling because they suggest that there has been a blurring of this linguistic distinction among RF residents, a trend that calls into question both the possibility of creating a genuine civic nationalism and the meaning of “Russianness” for Russians.
The poll conducted at the end of February asked 1500 RF adults across the country whether they considered themselves to be ethnically Russian, what being an ethnic Russian means to them, and which form of appeal to citizens of Russia pleases them more (http://www.bashkirova-partners.ru/res.php?id=5&show=865).
In response to the first question, 92.6 percent of the sample indicated that they did consider themselves to be “russkiye” people, with only 5.5 percent saying they did not and 1.9 percent indicating that they found it hard to answer.
Because non-Russians in ethnic terms make up more than 20 percent of the population of the Russian Federation, these findings indicate that a significant share and probably more than half of the members of this group are prepared to accept the ethnic Russian designator.
In response to the second question, however, the meaning of such self-identifications is shown to be more problematic: 61.4 percent of the sample said that to be “russkiye” meant to be citizens of the Russian Federation, 49.5 percent said that it meant to live in Russia.
At the same time, 43.1 percent of this sample said it meant to belong to the Russian nation “by blood,” 42.6 percent said that it meant to know Russian culture, and 33.7 percent said that it meant to be Orthodox by religion. (Because respondents could give more than one answer, the sum of the answers is greater than 100 percent.)
And in response to the third question, how they preferred that citizens of Russia be addressed, 62.9 percent of the sample said as [non-ethnic] “Rossiyane” while 30.2 percent as [ethnic] “Russkiye.” The remainder gave other answers or said they found it difficult to answer.
Commenting on the results, Aleksandr Muzafarov, who heads the research unit at the Moscow Agency of Political News, suggested that they pointed to the convergence of the two terms, the ethnic “russkiye” and the political “rossiskiy,” that historically have been considered different things (http://www.apn.ru/news/print11620.htm).
But he argued that the emergence of a “political nation” in the Russian Federation would take some time because, “we are dealing with the consequences of the nationality policy of bolshevism which in many regards had an anti-Russian character and was directed at the wiping out of Russian self-identification in a single ‘Soviet’ people.”
Two other Moscow commentaries on the relationship between the two Russian terms for “Russian” – typically translated into English without this distinction being marked -- some additional arguments about what this convergence of the ethnic and the political may mean for the future of the Russian Federation.
In one posted earlier this month on the “Peoples of Russia” website, Aleksandr Gorshkolepov and Dmitriy Matyash argue that “the question of the national self-identification of Russia” has become “a question of survival for our state” (http://www.narodnu.ru/article7421.html).
Indeed, “without a successful answer to this question,” they insist, the Russian Federation will have no chance for “political stability, the flowering of the country, or the well-being of its citizens.”
Unfortunately, the two analysts note, the citizens of the Russian Federation remain deeply split on just what their country should be, with some seeking a return to the “golden age” of the USSR, others desirous of a “rebirth” of the Russian empire,” and still others seeking the development of purely ethnic Russian state.
But the advocates of each of these positions, Gorshkolepov and Matyash say, almost in every case forget that “with the ‘rebirth’ of the past will be reborn the problems of the past.”
Consequently, they argue, the Russian Federation must move toward the development of a supra-national political identity, common for all citizens, and shift from the current formula of “a multi-national people of the Russian Federation” to “a single Russian civil political nation.”
Unfortunately, they point out, the current Russian government has not taken the admittedly difficult steps necessary to push this idea forward, preferring instead to root “the ‘blood principle’ in social-economic, societal-political and cadre policy” throughout the country.
An even more thoroughgoing analysis of the implications of the identity shifts between “russkiy” and “rossiiskiy” and the actions of the Kremlin was provided last week by Sergei Markedonov, one of the most thoughtful commentators on ethnic issues in the Russian Federation (http://www.polit.ru/author/2007/03/07/rusproj.html).
Like Gorshkolepov and Matyash, Markedonov argues that the question of “national self-identification” is “without exaggeration a question of survival for the state,” even though he notes that the Kremlin and its supporters often fail to recognize that fact.
“Today’s Russia,” he continues, “is a country with a “conglomerate identity,” in which coexist Soviet internationalism and double-dyed ethno-nationalism, imperialism, radical Orthodoxy and other ideas of religious extremism.”
Given that complexity and the problems that such diversity entails, he says, it should come as no surprise that the pro-Kremlin United Russia party has launched its “Russian Project,” one apparently intended to bridge the divide between the political and ethnic that continues to bedevil the Russian Federation.
But given the unserious way in which it has been conducted at least so far, Markedonov suggests, the Russian Project seems certain to anger both significant numbers of the non-Russian fifth of the Russian Federation and to call into question what it means for ethnic Russians to be Russians.
“By proclaiming [ethnic] Russians all the citizens of Russia (and at the same time by requiring from them to share its language and culture), the inventors of the ‘Russian Project’ are striking first of all on the ethnic identification of the [ethnic] Russians themselves,” Markedonov points out.
“For if there are ‘[ethnic] Russian Yakuts,’ ‘[ethnic] Russian Bashkirs’ and ‘[ethnic] Russian Tatars,’ then how will things stand with the genuinely [ethnic] Russians? Will they become ‘[ethnic] Russian Russians or [ethnic] Russians of the first category?” Markedonov asks.
And he suggests that the Kremlin’s current push via United Russia party for an “[ethnic] Russian civic nationalism,” however successful it may appear, represents a commitment to what is in fact a contradiction in terms: “[ethnic] Russian civic nationalism is just as impossible as “sausage tea or wooden iron or electrical gas.”
Consequently any attempt such as the one Moscow is now making to promote it will ultimately generate a reaction among non-Russians even if for the moment at least some of them are prepared to go along and give the proper answers to pollsters.
But Markedonov concludes, it is easy to see why the Kremlin and its minions are doing what they are, promoting the very divisions they claim to be overcoming because “it is much easier to rule people divided along ethnic, social and religious lines” than it is to govern a more homogeneous citizenry.
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