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social tension, or not at all, and on the other, to create conditions for people to live and feel comfortably at home, the opportunity which many of them do not have now. There are no, and cannot be, simple solutions in nationalities problem. Its elements are scattered in all spheres of life of the state and society - economy, social service, education, political system and foreign policy. We should build such a model of the state and civilizational community which would be harmonious and attractive to all who consider Russia their Motherland.
We see the directions of the work ahead of us. We realize that we have historical experience, which other states do not. We have a powerful foundation in our mentality, culture and identity, which other nations do not have. We shall strengthen our "historical state," which we inherited from our ancestors, the state-civilization capable to solve organically the task of integration of various ethnoses and confessions. We have lived together for many centuries, we scored victory in the most terrible war together. And we will continue to live together. And I will say to those who would like or attempt to separate us: "You will not succeed."
www.premier.gov.ru January 23, 2012.
Leokadia Drobizheva, D. Sc. (Hist.) (Institute of Archeology RAS) RUSSIAN IDENTITY AND TOLERANCE OF INTERETHNIC RELATIONS: EXPERIENCE OF TWENTY YEARS OF REFORMS
The formation of the joint identity of citizens in all countries is considered the necessary condition for the preservation of the integrity of a state and maintenance of accord in society. This article examines the change of the essence of identities in Russia and tolerance of
interethnic relations of the Russians and people of other nationalities during the twenty years of reforms.
All common processes going on in Russia and other countries notwithstanding, we had special conditions for the past twenty years. The older and middle generations have lost the country they lived in; its area, structure, the system of relations, customs and habits and the way of life, as well as the ethic composition of the population have changed. The Russian citizens live in a state, whose image was quite different for most of them twenty years ago.
In the first years of new Russia many people took themselves for "citizens of the U.S.S.R." In 1992, when we carried out surveillance polls in our capital Moscow, only a quarter of respondents identified themselves as Russian citizens. This was quite understandable. In contrast to peoples of the Union republics, who considered themselves Soviet people, but at the same time associated themselves with their republic - Armenia, Georgia, Azerbaijan, and all the more so Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, etc., who lived in the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR) seldom identified themselves as Russian citizens. It was under Boris Yeltsin, largely due to his political confrontation with Mikhail Gorbachev, that the formation of the Russian nation began. It proceeded in the same vein as in other Soviet republics and was based on contraposition. Russia has appeared as a state which nobody wanted and expected. The authors of the Byelovezhsky project thought it would be the CIS. Politicians overseas were also worried over the appearance of a new independent state - the Russian Federation. It was not for nothing that George Bush went to Ukraine for talks with Leonid Kravchuk, fearing that the U.S.S.R., which had nuclear weapon, might repeat the fate of Yugoslavia. The painful emergence of the Russian Federation as a result of the disintegration of the U.S.S.R. influenced not only the establishment of
Russian identity, but also its character, ideas about it, and the attitude of Russians toward others, or "aliens." Naturally, when the former state identity was destroyed in human consciousness, ethnic, regional and confessional identity came to replace it.
Research work carried out at the Institute of Sociology RAS under the direction of Vladimir Yadov has shown that in the 1990s and in the early 2000th ethnic identity prevailed in people's minds. The same was true in similar research in the republics of North Ossetia (Alania), Tatarstan, Tyva and Sakha (Yakutia). But Russian identity was historically restored quickly enough. In 2002, 63 percent of the population revealed it. About the same figures were obtained in other surveillance polls carried out by the Institute of Sociology RAS jointly with the University of North Carolina (U.S.A.). In 2006 sixty-five percent of people identified themselves as citizens of Russia.
In 2011 about 95 percent of those polled determined their identity as "citizens of Russia."
Table 1
With whom people are connected to a greater extent
With citizens of Russia 72%
With fellow-countrymen 60%
With people having similar outlook 52%
With people of the same nationality 51%
With people of the same faith 42%
With people of similar trade or profession 40%
In 2011 Russian identity has come to the fore, and the feeling of "strong bonds" with citizens of Russia increased twofold. At present Russians are close to inhabitants of Britain or Germany in the strength of their ties with their country.
Table 2
2004 2011
Feeling strong ties with citizens of Russia 31% 72%
Feeling strong ties with people by outlook 54% 52%
Feeling strong ties with people by trade or profession 53% 42%
Feeling strong ties with people by nationality 47% 51%
Feeling strong ties with those living in the same town or village 30% 60%
Greater attention is paid to comparing Russian identity with ethnic, regional and local identity, inasmuch as they reflect the integration processes going on in the country. Identification by nationality has prevailed over state identification.
Revealing their understanding of Russian identity, respondents speak, more often than not, of their state, the place of Russia in the world, its civilization, history and achievements in science and culture. The concept of ethnicity is disclosed through the origin of the parents, the language, customs and habits and confession.
Recent research has established that the most important factor for identification is the state (it accounts for 60 to 75 percent of respondents). Among other consolidating factors, 20 to 35 percent of respondents name "responsibility for the fate of the country," "human ties," historical past, native land, the language and culture. Up to 10 percent of respondents named customs and habits and features of the national character. This is only natural, because Russians often take Russian identity as state identity. This was why it became a mass phenomenon so rapidly.
The essence of the ideas about Russian identity depends on the concrete regional situations. Some people associate themselves with the state, others with their civil duty and obligations before their fellow-
countrymen. In the first instance Russian identity is more like identity with state community, as national-state and political identity, in another instance as civil identity. There is no rigid wall between them. Civil society is only being formed in our country, and historical tradition emphasizes people's perceptions toward loyalty to the state rather than civil solidarity.
Research carried out by the Levada-Center in the 1990s gave ground to speak of negative identity of our fellow-citizens. We know about high social differentiation and political disunity. However, it is evident that there are values and requirements of people in society which cement its members. One of them is the country you were born and live in. The Motherland is the value for most people. The idea about it is usually emotionally tinted and forms the very component of identity which is called patriotism (we have in mind true patriotism, but not jingoism).
The question "What idea today could inspire people and rally them together in the name of common goals?" (respondents were offered a choice of three answers out of eleven variants), the greatest number (42 percent) was received by "the idea of unity of the peoples of Russia for the sake of its revival as a great power". The ideas of "return to socialist ideals," "unity of the Slav peoples," "solution of global problems facing mankind," "law-abiding state" collected from 13 to 38 percent of answers.
The results of the poll do not give ground to interpret the striving of Russians to "the revival of their great power" as aggressive, chauvinistic sentiments. The view of a "special historic mission of Russia" is shared by not more than nine percent of those polled. The view that "man has only one Motherland and he should not abandon it" is shared by half of respondents (52 percent).
What place should a majority take in the poly-ethnic area of the country? On the one hand, the older generation still harbor previous ideas about the standards in the country where each person is a "reliable comrade and friend," part of the younger and middle generations entertain the ideas about the humanitarian values of tolerance declared by democracy. On the other hand, part of Russians feel offended for the loss of their former status of the "elder brother."
During the past twenty years soreness has not left people's consciousness. It received additional feed in the form of feelings of other European peoples in the countries which had a considerable and rapid influx of people of different cultures. In these years Russia has become the world's third country, after the United States and Germany, in the influx of immigrants. This has been taking place against the backdrop of a considerable change in the ethnic composition of the population. In the U.S.S.R. Russians accounted for 51 percent of the population, whereas in the Russian Federation this figure is 80 percent. Besides, we are living through the consequences of the Chechen crisis (billions of rubles are spent on economic rehabilitation of Chechnya, and this is the reason for meetings under the slogan "Stop feeding the Caucasus!") Among the threats which cause the greatest fear, the respondents put to second place (after terrorism) "the drawing of Russia in the prolonged conflict in the Caucasus."
Russian identity was formed as one aimed at solidarity and lower social and political differentiation. The authorities and the most active section of society, which were liberally oriented, hoped to foster such identity. Although there has been the experience of British identity, which softened the post-colonial situation, but did not save it from the Northern Ireland conflict, and London incidents of the summer of 2001, and the experience of the French political nation, which did not help avert the unrest in poor, socially unreliable districts, still hopes did not
disappear and the enthusiasm of different political forces in the formation of the Russian political nation did not abate.
Sociological research, including that on the projects of "20 Years of Reforms" and "Civil, Regional and Ethnic Identity and Problems of Integration in Russian Society," has shown that the problems of interethnic relations still exist.
Ethnopolitical sentiments of those who consider themselves "more Russians than people of their own nationality" are not distinguished by greater loyalty. Sixty-eight percent of them responded that they feel irritation or dislike toward representatives of other nationalities. More often than not, the latter are those who have come from the North Caucasian or Central Asian republics. Sixty-one percent would approve the methods of Stalin's past or the present period of France under Nicolas Sarkozy, that is, compulsory eviction of certain nationalities from a town or village they live in.
Thus, Russian identity, while reflecting the formation of a political and civil nation in the country, includes, just like in old democratic countries, ideas and standards which do not always accord with civil ideas.
In the conditions when populist politicians added the politicization of the ethnic factor to the objective situation in the country, people's ideas about multinationality as a historical specific feature of this country changed. "Is the fact that Russia is inhabited by people of different nationalities a benefit for its development or a problem?" respondents were asked. Sixteen percent answered that it was a benefit, 41 percent said "both," and 28 percent believed that it was "rather a problem."
During the past twenty years the question as to whether Russia is a common home for all nationalities living in it has not lost its acuteness. The idea that all people inhabiting Russia should have equal
rights continues to be one of the most widespread, but it is losing support with every passing year. In the 1990s this was the view of the evident majority (64-65%), in 2001 - 61%, and in 2011 - 47% of all respondents.
The share of people who believe that "Russia is a multinational country, but the Russians as a majority should have more rights" has increased twofold from 1995 to 2011 - from 14 to 31 percent, and along with those who consider that "Russia should be a state of Russians" they comprise 45% (25% in 1995). Open support of the idea of Russian exclusiveness comes mainly from young people and poorly educated Russians. In the capital Moscow and in St. Petersburg there are many "soft nationalists" (40 percent against 30-32 percent in other towns) who maintain that Russians as the majority responsible for the state of affairs in the country should have more rights than other peoples living there.
During the past twenty years readiness for maintaining contacts with people of another nationality has not changed for the better. Negative attitudes to various forms of contacts fluctuated between 22 and 43 percent in 1994, and 29 and 47 percent in 2011.
Dislike on ethnical ground is explained by respondents by the fact that people of another culture behave as "masters of this land." This was said by 63 percent of respondents. Another argument is differences "in behavior of people and their way of life" (39%), and only one-fifth of respondents explain it by rivalry in obtaining prestigious jobs. This is quite understandable, because most migrants of another culture take up jobs which local people do not claim.
Russian identity which became confident and strong enough, cementing the Russian political nation, is definitely an important result of the past two decades, however, this identity has an imprint of painful experience of changes and negativism of phobias and rueful feelings.
Half of all respondents admitted that there were clashes in their locality on grounds of national dislike and maintained that since the year 2000 interethnic relations have deteriorated.
However, these relations should not be overdramatized. This was said by President Dmitri Medvedev at a meeting of the Presidium of the State Council on February 11, 2011. Various research centers confirm that the share of nationally prejudiced people in interethnic contacts fluctuates within the 30% limit for several years. Eighty-nine percent of those polled maintain that "violence in interethnic and interconfessional disputes is impermissible, but 44 percent state that "violence is permissible if justice is violated with regard to my people," and 41 percent agreed that "all means are good and acceptable to protect the interests of my people." These sentiments are more widespread among Russians than among other nationalities (43% and 34% respectively).
This is the new situation of the 2000s. In the 1990s such sentiments could more often be felt among non-Russians. These replies of Russians are quite in line with the actualization of ethnic-national self-consciousness among them and are largely a reaction to the rapid flow of migrants of alien culture. In this respect Russians are not different from citizens of other European countries in similar situation.
Quite a few socially deprived sections of the population come out for a radical solution of "nationality problems." Such position is characteristic of many people living in the capital Moscow and in St. Petersburg - 63 percent (as compared with 33-38% among people living in other towns).
What are the reasons for such sentiments? It can hardly be asserted that a sufficiently large group of young people or other residents of Moscow and St. Petersburg are confirmed xenophobes. For 85 percent of the 18-25-year-old people consider it impermissible to use violence in interethnic disputes. About 15 percent have negative
interethnic orientations. But the feeling of losses for the past 1520 years among them is keener than among people of older generations. This means that young people are greatly dissatisfied with the present life and react more sharply to corruption and social injustice.
It should be said that the share of people thinking and feeling that "they have lost much during the past 15 to 20 years" (70%) is twice as big as that of those who do not think and feel this among those who are irritated by and dislike representatives of alien nationalities. We mean not only losses in the living standards (35% think and feel this), but also the loss of security (35%), growing corruption in the country (32%), and, what is very important for each person, the loss of confidence in the morrow (43%).
Our main conclusion is that the growing Russian identity combined with ethnic identity integrates people, but this does not remove discontent with the existing system of the distribution of resources, self-identification of people against injustice, corruption and lawlessness. Symbolic statements about and calls for "unity of the Russian nation," tolerance in interethnic relations, love for the Motherland, etc. should not be at variance with what people see in reality. Otherwise, state and civil identity will not save us from enmity toward "others," or "aliens." Society and the powers that be should exert every effort to achieve the situation in which all citizens of Russia will feel it their common home.
"Vestnik Instituía Kennana v Rossii," Moscow, 2011, issue 20, pp. 22-32.
