Types of Identification among Russians in the 'Near Abroad'

Abstract

AFTER THE DISSOLUTION OF THE SOVIET UNION a significant number of Russians, namely 25 million, happened to live in the near abroad, that is in one of the 14 non-Russian successor states.' These ethnic Russians, whose social status suddenly shifted from the position of a dominant nation in the Soviet era to that of a minority group residing in a nationalising state, have been the focus of attention of many scholars.2 These authors have coined various labels to categorise the Russians in the near abroad, such as Russian settlers or Russian diaspora. These labels, however, have clear drawbacks. The term 'Russian settler community', used by Melvin in his perceptive study Russians beyond Russia, suggests a prior movement from one country to another, while in fact Russians can be considered as indigenous in some regions, for instance eastern Ukraine.3 The label 'diaspora', used by Shlapentokh among others, implies that Russians in the near abroad have strong links with their Russian homeland, while in fact most of them lack a sense of homeland other than the USSR as a whole.4 The conglomerate identity category 'Russian-speaking population', used by Laitin, is not accurate either. Whereas the use of this label may serve as a simple means to generalise 'the other' from the titular perspective, the question remains whether different non-titular ethnic groups speaking the Russian language (e.g. Jews, Gypsies, Belarusians and Russians in Ukraine) consider themselves as one group. Moreover, the label 'Russian-speaking population' is ambiguous in those republics where a considerable number of titulars speak Russian as their first language, for instance in Belarus, Ukraine and Kazakhstan (i.e. Russophone titulars). Although many researchers have focused on the position of ethnic Russians in the near abroad and on their differences across the republics, little attention has been given to the possible variety within Russian communities.5 Given the dynamic nature of identification among ethnic minorities in newly independent republics, we may assume nonetheless that various identification types can be distinguished among Russians living in the near abroad. In this article we attempt to distinguish the most salient types of identification among these Russians. It is important to find out whether most of them consider themselves primarily as Russians or whether many of them are more or less assimilated and whether they then identify as republican representatives or even as titulars. The question is whether dual ethnic identification is an option for Russians, and whether many Russians still identify as Soviet citizens. After having determined the most salient types of