Are there tensions within Russia?

Comments ( 3 )

1. Sammi says

   People ethnically identified as Russians have been politically and culturally dominant over modern Russia for five hundred years of tsarist and Soviet imperial expansion.

   However, despite repression of their cultural autonomy, scores of minority cultures have survived within the Russian Federation; including the peoples of the North Caucasus, numerous indigenous groups in Siberia, the Tatars in the Volga region, and the East Slavic Ukrainians and Belorusians. All but the youngest citizens share a Soviet cultural experience, since under Communist Party rule the state shaped and controlled daily life and social practice.

   Much of that experience is being rejected by non-Russians who are reclaiming or reinventing their ethnic or traditional pasts; many communities are asserting a specific local identity in terms of language and culture.

   In addition to being the largest, the Russian Federation is one of the world's northernmost countries. European Russia, the most densely populated, urbanized, and industrialized region, lies between the Ukraine-Belarus border and the Ural Mountains. Seventy-eight percent of the population lives in this area.
   Russians account for 81 percent of the population and were the dominant ethnic group in all but a few regions. Other major ethnic nationalities are Tatars (4 percent), Ukrainians (3 percent), Chuvash (1 percent), Bashkir (1 percent), Belarussian (1 percent), and Mordovians (1 percent). Dozens of other ethnic nationalities make up the remaining 8 percent. There has been a significant rate of intermarriage between ethnic populations.

   Russia has had a thousand-year history of growth and contraction, political consolidation and disintegration, repression and relaxation, messianism and self-definition, and varying forms of interdependence with other nations. This history has had far-reaching effects on the other populations of Eurasia as well as on every aspect of the national culture.

   For many centuries, the question of whether Russian culture is more "eastern" or "western" has been a burning issue. Situated at the crossroads of important cultures and civilizations in every direction, the Slavic groups and other peoples of Russia have profoundly influenced and been influenced by them all in terms of trade, technology, language, religion, politics, and the arts.

   Inter-ethnic relations are fraught with tensions spawned over centuries of Russian and Soviet colonial domination and activated in the aftermath of the collapse of the Soviet state. Most conflicts are multidimensional, simultaneously involving struggles for political control, rights over natural resources, migration and relocation, and the revitalization of national or ethnic cultures and their identity.

   Soviet policies—which compelled the use of the Russian language on all peoples, organized massive changes in livelihood and lifestyle for tens of millions, forcibly moved whole populations (such as Crimean Tatars and Meshketian Turks), installed ethnic Russian political elites and managers in non-Russian regions, and extracted the wealth from local production into central coffers in Moscow; have all set the stage for the conflicts of today.

   Conflicts over resources are heated in parts of Siberia and the Far East. The Sakha (Yahut) are trying to claim rights to some economic benefits from the vast diamond, oil, gold, and other mineral wealth in their republic. T
   his battle over resources is associated with a growing nationalist movement. Other Siberian peoples are engaged in similar struggles over oil and gas revenues, and rights to traditional fisheries, forest products, and reindeer-grazing lands. Environmental issues play a significant role, too, as people fight to prevent or reverse the spoiling of rivers, lakes, and soils by the oil and mining industries.

   Occupation of the North Caucasus has been a cause of conflict for three centuries. Russia waged devastating wars with Chechnya from the mid-1990s on, attempting to repress local independence movements, stem a pan-Islamic movement from taking hold there, and maintain access to the oil wealth of the Caspian sea.

   There are no signs that this conflict will be resolved peacefully, and relations are characterized by intense hatred, prejudice, and propagandizing on both sides. Roots of this conflict lie in a long history of violent repression and impoverishment in Chechnya.

   Internal migration and displacement has contributed greatly to ethnic tensions and prejudice, as several million Russians have returned from newly independent states in Central Asia, the Caucasus, and the Baltics, feeling themselves unwanted guests in those places, or in some cases (Tajikistan, Armenia, and Azerbaijan) escaping civil wars. Border regions between Russia and former Soviet republics, which often contain highly mixed and intermarried Russian and non-Russian populations, present a significant problem.

   In general, unflattering and insulting stereo-types of Siberian natives, Koreans, Central Asians, peoples of the Caucasus, Ukrainians, Jews, and other ethnic nationalities are widely shared among Russians and circulate unimpeded in print media.

   Add to this mix, virtually every denomination of Christianity, Islam and Judaism practiced widely all over Russia by various ethnic groups; and you can see Russia's melting pot of cultures, people and religions is a good basis for ethnic/cultural conflict on a national scale.

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2. Gavin R says

   Russia acquired an enormous empire over the course of a few hundred years, from about 1500-1800. That empire included Finns, Lithuanians, Latvians, Estonians, Jews, Poles, Moldavians, Wallachians, Crimean Tatars, Cossacks, Ukranians, Turks, and Siberian people of every variety. The so called White Russians have been dominant throughout this period. Until the Revolution the White Russians were Orthodox. They didn't persecute other Christians, but they persecuted the Jews terribly. During the Soviet period the government was officially atheist and atheism was taught in the schools. People are now re-embracing Orthodoxy.
   Russia has been a power player on the international scene ever since about 1700. As such her priorities have changed over time. For a long time Russia wanted to take Istanbul from the Turks (Constantinople) because they wanted unimpeded access from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean Sea. During the Cold War Russia was concerned with keeping Communist governments in power.
   Russia is now using its abundant energy resources, particularly in natural gas, to put pressure on countries wholly dependent upon that gas (like Georgia). Russia is experiencing yet another uprise of xenophobic nationalism (who knows where that will lead). Finally there is the simmering revolt in Chechnya, which is a hotbed of terrorists and separatists.

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3. Goodietushu says

   I'm not from Russia so no don't know SORRY

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