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Article Excerpt
Abstract
The term "Russian diaspora" is used to refer to the twenty-five million ethnic Russians who in 1991 found themselves politically displaced beyond the borders of the Russian Federation and resident within newly independent states. This paper firstly reviews the problematic "classification" of these communities as a "diaspora." More specifically, by drawing on narratives of "home" and "homeland" among those Russians "forced" to return to the Russian Federation since 1991, it focuses on a central pillar of diasporic identity: the relationship to "homeland." By exploring the everyday interactions with and articulated narratives of Russia on "return," the paper argues that it is upon confrontation with "the homeland" that Russian returnees develop a sense of "otherness" from local Russian residents and a connection with other "returning Russians." The question is raised as to whether, rather than "coming home," Russians returning from the other former Soviet republics become a "diaspora in diaspora"?
Resume
On utilise l'expression > en reference aux 25 millions de Russes provenant d'ethnies differentes qui, a l'echelle politique en 1991, se sont trouves deplaces audela des frontieres de la Russie et sont devenus des residants d'Etats nouvellement independants. L'article s'attarde d'abord a la problematique liee a la > de ces groupes en tant que >. A partir d'anecdotes se rapportant aux notions de > et de > parmi ces Russesforces de revenir en Russie depuis 1991, l'article se penche plus particulirrement sur le pilier de l'identite de la diaspora : la relation a la >. Grace a l'exploration des interactions quotidiennes avec la Russie et des faits racontes sur le >, l'article defend le point de vue suivant: c'est par la confrontation avec la > que les rapatries russes se sensibilisent a la notion de l' > vis-a-vis des residants russes et qu'ils tissent des liens avec d'autres >. La question qui se pose alors est de savoir jusqu'a quel point les Russes qui reviennent d'autres Republiques sovietiques ne deviennent-ils pas une > plutot que de simplement retourner chez eux.
Introduction
The term "Russian diaspora" refers to the twenty-five million ethnic Russians who became politically, although not physically, displaced in the wake of the collapse of the Soviet Union. (1) On 1 January 1992, these Russians suddenly found themselves resident in the new geopolitical space referred to as Russia's "near abroad." The question of the applicability of the term "diaspora" to the case of Russian minorities in the former Soviet republics has received considerable attention in western academic literature since the mid 1990s, (2) facilitated by a wider return to the question of "diaspora" in the light of increasing concern with transnational movement and, especially from postmodernist perspectives, its implications for identity.
This paper reviews briefly the problematic "classification" of the Russian-speaking communities in the former Soviet republics as a "diaspora." More specifically, however, it pursues a central pillar of diasporic identity: the question of the relationship to "homeland." For Russian-speaking communities in the former republics "the homeland" has not been a "faraway land" generating communal myths of, and longing for, return. It has been a tangible presence--an open door--through which individuals and families choose, and re-choose, whether or not to walk. Indeed the peculiarly immanent nature of "the homeland" in the case of the Russian diaspora provides an excellent opportunity to explore, empirically, the centrality, or otherwise, of "homeland" in diasporic identity. This is approached in the paper by examining narratives of "home" and "homeland" among returnees to Russia, that is members of the Russian-speaking communities who were resident in the former Soviet republics upon collapse of the Soviet Union but who have since returned to Russia. (3) By exploring their everyday interactions with, as well as articulated narratives of, Russia, the paper argues that it is in the very process of confrontation with "the homeland" that Russian returnees develop a sense of "otherness" from Russians resident all their lives in Russia and, post facto, a connection with "other Russians" from the former republics. The question thus is raised as to whether, rather than "coming home," Russians returning from the former republics become a "diaspora in diaspora"?
The empirical data drawn on were gathered during two distinct periods of fieldwork. During the first study, which was conducted among returnee communities between July and December 1994, data were gathered from a total of 195 Russian returnees, 144 of whom were settled in four rural settlements in the Orel region, Central Russia, the remaining fifty-one of whom were resident in the city of Ul'ianovsk in the Middle Volga region of Russia. (4) The second study was conducted during the period 1997-1999 in the regions of Saratov and Samara, in the Volga region of the Russian Federation. (5) Two pilot studies were conducted in Saratov region (August-September 1997, and April 1998) when data were gathered from seventeen respondents. The main period of fieldwork took place during the period June-November 1999, when data were gathered from twenty-six respondents in Saratov region and nineteen respondents in Samara region. In both studies, data were gathered primarily through semi-structured interviews (which were taped, and later fully transcribed and analyzed in Russian) and extensive field observations. Observations were made at a number of sites of migrant resettlement and the activities of migrant associations and regional migration services were monitored. In addition, basic demographic data were gathered from respondents who were also asked to provide details of sources and type of assistance received.
In both studies migrant communities were included from both urban centres (Saratov, Samara, and Ul'ianovsk cities) and rural settlements (Orel region and compact-type settlements in outlying rural areas of the Samara and Saratov regions). In the first study 73 per cent and in the second study 82 per cent of the respondents stated their nationality to be "Russian." (6) All but a handful of the respondents (who had been displaced upon the territory of the Russian Federation due to the conflict in Chechnia) had left the former republics, primarily Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Kazakstan, as well as Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Turkmenistan, between 1988 and 1999. The respondents were accessed through migrant associations, the migration service, and local academic contacts. In village locations and compact settlements, whole migrant communities were interviewed; in urban environments snowballing techniques were employed.
The regions chosen for study were areas popular for in-migration--the Volga region, as a whole, is one of the main regions for migrant settlement in the Russian Federation--but not regions with identified "tensions" arising from in-migration (such as Krasnodar territory in southern Russia). By 1 January 2000 the Volga region had received the second highest number of forced migrants and refugees of all Russia's economic regions--a total of 250,840. (7) These figures do not include the large numbers of forced migrants and refugees who have not been registered. In both studies regions with comparable numbers of returnees but quite different migration environments were selected. In the 1994 study, Orel region had a positive attitude to the reception of migrants (even setting "targets" for reception) while the attractive nature of Ul'ianovsk city (given its reputation at the time of study for social stability and low cost of living) meant Ul'ianovsk was considerably more protectionist in its immigration policy. Of the regions included in the 1997-99 study, Saratov region pursued a relatively liberal migration policy and was fairly open to migrant arrival and resettlement, and there was active co-operation between the regional administration, the regional migration service, and migrant associations. However, an increasingly restrictive attitude was detected over the period of study. Samara region, in comparison, put greater restrictions on in-migration, the issue was not high on the agenda of the regional administration, and there was much less co-operation and dialogue between the migration service, relevant government departments, and migrant initiated groups.
The "Russian Diaspora": Academic Models
The Russian-speaking communities in the former republics have been the object of "diasporization." The newly independent Russian government sought to exercise Russia's great-power status in the "near abroad" through a discursive reconfiguration of the borders of post-Soviet Russia according to the geographical location of the Russian ethnos, rather than the current administrative borders of the Russian state. (8) Indeed it was not only ethnic Russians who were declared to be the responsibility of the Russian government; all ethnic groups with a cultural and historical "link" to Russia were "diasporized" through a growing reference to the Russian-speaking minorities in the former republics as "compatriots" (sootechestvenniki). (9) By configuring the relationship between Russia and the Russian communities in the "near abroad" in this way, the Russian government furnished itself with the right to "defend" Russian-speakers abroad--and thus to influence in the newly independent states--without undermining the civic--as opposed to ethnic--definition of the new Russian nation; the latter was crucial to the Yeltsin government in the first part of the 1990s as it distinguished "democrats" from "communists/nationalists." (10) Although, in practice, Russian government rhetoric aimed at maintaining the Russian-speaking communities abroad as "ours" (including the passing of a law, Concerning the State Policy of the Russian Federation in Relation to its Compartriots Abroad, in March 1999) was tougher than either its real economic capabilities or its political will, (11) nonetheless "diasporization" was important...
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