Civic and ethnic identities in subjective experiences of national integration in the borderland of Russia (original) (raw)
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This paper is on the development of a theoretically based civic and ethnic identity measure. The article presents the analysis of the parameters of civic and ethnic identity of the inhabitants of six subjects of Russian Federation situated near the state borders: Altai region, Zabaikalye region, Kemerovo region, Omsk region, Orenburg region and Republic of Altai there empirical studies with 2400 participants were carried out. The conclusion is made about the specificity of identity and the inter-ethnic relations of the regions. The boundary regions of Russia have a high national differentiation, thus, peaceful development of all cultures becomes a priority task. This policy would promote the growth of national consciousness, and further the sustainable development of the region. The results of survey show that following factors predetermine self-identification: the origin of man, the history of the region, patriotism, religious beliefs. Despite the cultural differences in regions of...
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Changing Societies & Personalities, 2017
This article examines the relationship between ethnicity and nationality in forming the national identity of the Russian people, emphasizing the danger of relying on the "ethnic" model of the nation developed in Soviet social science. Analyzing the fundamental documents of the Soviet State from the 1917 Declaration of the Rights of Peoples of Russia to the last Soviet Constitution of 1977, the author points out: (1) the significant contradiction between the proclaimed right of nations to self-determination and the principle of territorial integrity and, (2) evidence that a national policy based on the ethnic nationalist model created a peculiar "hierarchy of peoples" (so-called "titular" and "not-titular" nationalities). The challenges to the Soviet Union's national policy that took place during the 1990th and its consequences-the disappearance of the Soviet Union from the world map and subsequent movements toward breaking apart the Russian Federation (the sovereignty claims of Chechnya and some of the Volga republics)indicate that the tasks of a multi-ethnic state, such as solving national problems and harmonizing interethnic relations, require rejecting the ideology of ethnic nationalism, and moving toward the "de-ethnicisation" of nationality and the formation of a unified civil nation. Understanding that the transition to the paradigm of Russian national identity derived from civic nationhood is a complex and lengthy process, the author develops a multi-level model of the formation of Russian national identity comprised of (1) the basic level of cultural diversity, (2) the middle level of solidarity in the overcoming of cultural differences on the basis *The version of this article in Russian under the title "Formirovanie nacional'noj identichnosti v sovremennoj Rossii [Formation of national identity in contemporary Russia] (2016) has appeared in the journal Gumanitarii Yuga Rossii [Humanitarian of the South of Russia], 4, 53-60. Thanks to the editors for their permission to publish the translation of the article.
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Opción: Revista de Ciencias Humanas y Sociales, 2018
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Civil and Ethnic Identity of Population Bordering Regions of Russia
Emirates Research Publishing Nov. 25-26, 2015 Paris (France), 2015
Characteristics of actual condition of civil and ethnic identity of Russian population are given in the article. It is marked out, that the tendency to the actualization of ethnic identity among residents of bordering territories occurs. The given process is caused by wide spectrum of factors of global, country and regional level. Authors conclude that contemporary global processes, peculiarities of social-economic condition and political elite actions promote to the strengthening of ethnic aspects on Russian's identity. All these creates threats to national and social security. It is pointed out, that the formation of the "all-Russian" civil identity, providing consolidation of population basing on common values and priorities, is the necessary condition of preserving sovereignty and totality of the country. At the same time, a low level of institutional trust and social-economic problems led to the strengthening of ethnic identification as the most effective instrument of social adaptation.
Ethnicities, Nationalism and the Politics of Identity: Shaping the Nation in Russia
Europe-Asia Studies, 2015
THE POST-SOVIET PERIOD IN RUSSIA HAS REACHED THE quarter of a century milestone. The identity crisis widely acknowledged in post-Soviet research in its first two decades opened the way for policies aimed at the consolidation of an encompassing all-Russian (rossiiskaya) national identity 1 as a source of nation-building. Contention over political separatism and various regional scenarios of the politics of identity 2 are being superseded by the 'Russian (russkii) question'. Meanwhile strengthening ethnic identities look up to religious, language and cultural landmarks as reference points. The nation-building agenda is thus having to take in different repertoires of contention, and bridging cleavages within Russian society is not only and not primarily a question of elite-tailored politics of identity. It is about the formation and assertion of inclusive identities innate both to the Russian cultural tradition and to the needs of a community confronting the challenges of modernisation. In a multi-ethnic society like Russia, promoting inclusive identities is a core question for social modernisation. This agenda includes consolidating the nation as a political community sharing fundamental citizenship values. The 1993 Constitution sees the country as a 'multinational people'-a notion that finds differing interpretations in political and academic circles. There is, however, no consensus over the contents of such basic concepts as nationality and ethnicity, or on the use in public discourse of terms such as 'nation-state', 'national republics' (for which the official name is 'national-territorial formations of the
Forging the nation: National identity and nation building in post‐communist Russia
Europe-Asia Studies, 1998
AFTER THE DOWNFALL OF THE USSR all the newly independent states had to embark on the road of nation building (defining 'who are we the people' and fostering the people's national identity, i.e. their sense of belonging to one distinct community) and state building (defining state boundaries which can be accepted by all major political players and creating new political institutions which can inspire the loyalty of the people). By now they have achieved varying degrees of success, depending on the demographic and ethnic composition of a country, its political culture, and its economic situation. In the case of the Russian Federation (RF) this set of issues is further complicated by the fact that Russia has traditionally been the centre of an empire, and therefore confusion over the 'just borders' of the new state is greater among politicians, intellectuals and even ordinary people than is the case in the non-Russian newly independent states. Thus more ideas about what is the Russian nation and what should be the geography of the new Russian state are currently to be found in the RF than is the case in the other 14 former Soviet republics. However, in both Russia and other newly independent states, the main problem of nation building is the same-namely, how to reconcile civic identities based on inclusive citizenship and exclusive ethnic identities based on such common characteristics as culture, religion, language and a common ancestor of a dominant nationality, on the one hand, and of ethnic minorities, on the other.
Ethnic and political identities and territorialities in the post-Soviet space
1999
There are a lot of theoretical models explaining the outburst of nationalism in the post-Soviet space since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Some authors stress that nationalism in East Europe is in principle different from relatively liberal and «inclusive» nationalist traditions of West Europe, where the membership of an individual in a nation became a function of his civil behavior, and of countries of immigration, where tolerance towards an ethnic «other» has been a natural feature of state-building. It was argued that ethnic nationalism in East Europe was based on traditions of the local life in communities which meant that the membership in them was grounded on the feelings of kinship, collectivism and solidarity, which prevented the formation of a civil nationalism (Greenfeld, 1993). This hypothesis is not confirmed with empirical studies, in particular, in Russia, showing that a large part of citizens identify themselves with both their ethnic group, the state and the region even during the period of painful transition and that self-identification changes are rapidly enough and to an increasing extent concern the values of civil rights and of political freedom (Chernysh, 1995; Drobizheva et al., 1996). Anyway, there is evident that the frequency and the acuity of ethnic conflicts or their probability do not depend strictly on the ethnic, social and demographic structure of population and that the assessment of ethnpolitical risks cannot be based on the only one group of factors. For instance, the ethnic composition of Latvia, Kirghizstan and Kazakhstan is similar, but the processes of nation-and state-building and the fate of national minorities in these newly independent countries differ strongly. Areas with the most worrying ethnic situation do not coincide with the border zones between civilizations, i.e. between the ethnic groups separated by a longer cultural distance, as it was predicted by S.Huntington. They do not coincide as well with the spaces shared by different peoples-notably, because ethnic borders in the post-Soviet are seldom linear («fronts», in terms of Huntington), but represent rather vast transitive strips. Obviously, this issue depends on the complex interplay of ethnic, religious, political, regional and other identities. The role of the territorial factor is clearly salient. The objective of this paper is to examine specific and typical features of nation-and state building in the post-Soviet space as a whole and, in particular, 1) peculiarities of territorial identities; 2) the role of different means used by political elites in these processes. I. Specific ethnic and political identities 1. Mixed, blurred and «hierarchical» identities. It is already well shown that the relationship between identity and territory becomes more complex (Paasi, 1996; Newman and Paasi, 1998) and that the «deterritorialization» of the state leaded to the creation of multi-layered and mixed identities, and this is especially peculiar to Central and East European countries (Kolossov and O'Loughlin, 1998). National identity, though still occupying the central place in the hierarchy of human territorialities, is gradually losing its hegemony. In the contemporary interrelated and interdependent world, more and more individuals have a mixed ethnic background, move between regions and countries as a result of urbanization and globalization, or are forced to live their homes because of civil wars, ethnic conflicts or environmental disasters. In the post-Soviet space, like in many East European countries outside the borders of the
2014
The article is dedicated to analyzing the peculiarities of ethnic identity, polarization and politicization of Russians in the post-Soviet space and as one of the factors of geopolitical positioning of some countries of the region. The author determined what was the essence of the policy of identity and polarization of Russians in the post-Soviet space (in particular, in the period of 1991-2000) and found out why in some countries it led to catastrophic consequences, while in others it did not prevent the change of geopolitical priorities and «separation» from the post-Soviet space. It was proved that ethnic identity, polarization and politicization of Russians in different post-Soviet countries were formed gradually and multi-vectored and were determined both by political and socioeconomic factors and psychological effects.
The contours of civic and ethnic national identification in Ukraine
Europe-Asia Studies, 2004
IN ALL NATION-STATES national identity has both a quantitative and a qualitative component. Quantitatively, one may speak of the strength of national identification. This refers to the degree to which people in a nation-state identify themselves as members of the national community and feel positively toward it. Qualitatively, one can analyse the reasons why people in a nation-state feel they form a community. In this sense the content of national identity refers to the traits that simultaneously unify people into a nation and distinguish them from other nations. On the basis of these traits, boundaries between the national in-group and out-groups are defined, thereby creating criteria for national membership. Scholars of ethnic politics and nationalism have long identified two basic forms of this qualitative component of national identity-civic and ethnic. With civic nationalism, people in a nation-state think that what can, does or should unite and distinguish all or most members of the nation are such features as living on a common territory, belief in common political principles, possession of state citizenship, representation by a common set of political institutions and desire or consent to be part of the nation. With ethnic nationalism, the people think that what can, does or should unite and distinguish them are such features as common ancestry, culture, language, religion, traditions and race. All scholars recognise that national identities will be based on some combination of civic and ethnic elements, but they assert that the relative strength of the civic and ethnic components can vary from nation to nation. One widespread argument is that ethnic nationalism is dominant in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union, while civic nationalism is dominant in Western Europe and the United States. More than a decade after acquiring statehood, Ukraine is still struggling to define the qualitative content of its national identity. To what extent is the Ukrainian nation to be conceived in political and territorial terms? To what extent is the Ukrainian nation to be grounded in ethnicity and culture? These are central topics of debate in contemporary Ukraine. A related issue is obscured by the civic/ethnic dichotomy, which directs attention toward the contest between civic and ethnic identities, and away from the conflict over which type of civic or ethnic identity the nation should pursue. Indeed, in the Ukrainian case the question of which, or rather, whose, ethnicity and culture should be at the core of the Ukrainian nation is more salient than the one over the relative priority of civic and ethnic identity. This article proposes that two versions of ethnic