Russian language knowledge by the titular peoples of the republics of Russia and Neighboring countries

Abstract

Language policy in Russia and neighboring countries should be carried out taking into account the ethno-demographic processes taking place in the post-Soviet space. The purpose of the article is to assess the level of Russian language proficiency by the titular peoples of the republics of the Russian Federation and the neighboring countries in the dynamics since 1989. Scientific novelty is associated with a unified view of the indicated processes within the entire post-Soviet space. The study was based on the population censuses results, the results of sociological surveys, and expert assessments. The difficulty of comparative analysis of the population censuses results of the Soviet and post-Soviet periods in Russia and other countries of the post-Soviet space is associated with different formulations of the question of Russian language proficiency. According to the population censuses results in the countries of the near abroad, only in three of them the level of the Russian language proficiency of the titular peoples has increased. Russian is the official language of the Republic of Belarus, where Russian has been the official language since 1995, as well as Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, where Russian is the official language. The author revealed the relationship between the degree of Russian language proficiency of the titular peoples of the neighboring countries and the specific weight of the Russian-speaking population living in them. For this reason, a sharp decrease in the Russian-speaking population in the neighboring countries can be considered as a factor inhibiting integration processes in the post-Soviet space.