Between Two Capitals: Population Migrations of Tver Oblast and Their Reflection on the Social Network Vkontakte

Abstract

The article is devoted to the use of social networks in studying population migration. A case study of Tver oblast demonstrates how the intercapital situation affects the features of population movement. There are no official statistics on this issue at the municipal district level, so the main source of information here was materials from the social network Vkontakte. At the first stage, we used aggregated materials of the site Russia’s Virtual Population; at the second stage, Vkontakte communities network following individual settlements were studied. The main centers of attraction for the Tver oblast population are Tver, Moscow, and St. Petersburg, and the capitals divide the region almost equally by their zones of influence. The northern districts gravitate towards St. Petersburg, and the southern, towards Moscow. The populations of the oblast’s cities, including Rzhev and Torzhok, gravitate towards Moscow, and the rural population, towards St. Petersburg. The conclusions obtained in this study update and supplement the results of past works on this topic.