IDENTITY OF THE POPULATION OF THE MULTIETHNIC SOUTH OF RUSSIA IN THE CONTEXT OF SOCIETAL INTEGRATION OF THE MACROREGION

Abstract

The South of Russia is characterized by a complex structure, a contradictory history of interethnic relations and active migration processes. All of the above creates difficulties for the region’s societal integration and strengthening of macroregional ties. The state’s national strategy presupposes the formation of a positive civic identity of Russia’s population while preserving its ethnocultural diversity. The self-determination processes of ethnosocial groups in the post-Soviet space have revealed a competition between the civic and ethnic components in the identity of the national republics’ population. Therefore, the structural and dynamic dimension of the identity of the multiethnic population in the South of Russia is being actualized. The article empirically characterizes the complex identity of the population in the multiethnic subregions of the Russian South in terms of the region’s societal (macrolevel) integration. Based on the sociological research conducted in early 2021 in the Rostov region, the Republic of Adygea and the Republic of Daghestan, the nature of the local residents’ identity along the following axes is analyzed: (1) civic, regional and ethnic identifications; (2) I- and we-identifications; (3) primordial and constructed forms of identity. Modern sociological measurements demonstrate that in the structure of cognitive I-identifications of the population of the Russian South, primordial (gender, marital status) and constructed civic (Russian citizen) identity components prevail. In the Rostov region, the core of the respondents’ identity comprises a macroregional component (resident of the South of Russia). Whereas in the North Caucasian republics in question, ethnic (in Adygea and Daghestan), confessional and republican (in Daghestan) identifications compete with the all-Russian identity. At the emotional we-identity level, residents of the Russian South most often indicate affinity with groups of everyday communication (people of the same generation and occupation) and supra-ethnic constructed communities (citizens of Russia). A strong orientation towards the South Russian identity is also manifested among the Rostov residents, while ethnic, religious and republican identification complexes have greater significance in the national republics of the Northern Caucasus. Comparative analysis with the results of 2010-2011 studies (conducted using identical instruments in the Rostov region and Adygea) shows a stable predominance of constructed civic and macroregional identities in the subregions dominated by the Russian population, and ethnic and North Caucasian identities—in the republican segment. The continuing discrepancy in the identity content structure in the ethnoterritorial segments of the Russian South may have disintegration potential and slow down the formation of a supra-ethnic societal integrity of a multi-component macroregion.