Paul
Goble
Staunton, December 18 – The rapid
spread and intensification of Siberian identity is a far greater threat to the territorial
integrity of the Russian Federation east of the Urals than is the Peoples
Republic of China is, according to both Russian census officials and residents
of that enormous and potentially wealthy region now controlled and ruled from
Moscow.
In “Russky reporter,” a
correspondent of that publication says that census officials in Siberia
acknowledge that an impressive number of residents of Tyumen, Omsk, Novosibirsk,
Kemerovo, Krasnoyarsk, Irkutsk, Barnaul and Yakutsk identified themselves as
Siberians by nationality in the 2010 census (m.expert.ru/russian_reporter/2011/07/grazhdanin-sibiri/).
Three things are
striking about that. First, the officials say, “the majority of these people
considered themselves [ethnic] Russians” only eight years earlier. Second,
there really are a lot of them and not just a few marginal as the media have
suggested. And third, there would be even more “if the census had worked as it
was supposed to.”
The 2010 census didn’t, however, as
the officials concede. Many census workers didn’t bother to visit people, they
say, but simply “filled up the forms” with information from residency records,
and wrote down “Russian” when anyone declared that he or she was a Siberian by
nationality.
That is perhaps not surprising given
the media campaign against that identity conducted by the official media in the
run up to the census in response to an Internet effort to get people to
identify as Siberians, the “Russky reporter” correspondent says. That campaign
insisted that “there are no Siberians,” only “Russians, Ukrainians, Tatars,
Jews, and further down the list.”
According to the preliminary results
of the census – the full ones have not yet been released – this campaign worked
with Ukrainians, Tatars and Jews, but it failed miserably with those the
officials had thought they could safely count as ethnic Russians. Many of those people declared they were
Siberians.
The correspondent talked to a
variety of Siberians and residents of Siberia about this identity. Aleksandr Konovalov, the Krasnoyarsk blogger
who is considered the moving force between the promotion of Siberian identity,
insisted that Siberians are “different” however difficult that sometimes is to
explain.
In his view, Konovalov aid, “we do
not know who the [ethnic] Russians are. During the time of Soviet power, we lost
Russian culture and became ‘the Soviet people.’ Today, Russia is some kind of
abstraction. Even the country we have is Russia and not Rus. A Siberian
identity is more concrete.”
He said that he does not consider
himself a separatist and that he and other Siberians chose to call themselves
that in the census to get Moscow’s attention.
“Meetings are today in fact prohibited, and the census became the only
all-national possibility to express a protest” about what is going on.
Oleg Chernomorsky, a Kansk
entrepreneur, said that his Siberian identity reflected the fact that “earlier local
people were involved in working with the forests, but today the forests belong
to Muscovites” and the local people are left with nothing.
The correspondent observed that for
Siberians, the word “’Muscovite’” refers not to the residents of Moscow so much
as to “a certain evil community the representatives of which conduct themselves
like the British administration in colonial America.” They steal, carry off
valuable resources, and do not support local infrastructure or pensions, even
while they proclaim that they and the local residents are “one people.”
According to Chernomorsky, “the
appearance of the new nationality is a reaction of the population to what is
going on ... Siberia is a colony just as it was in the 17th century.
The only difference is that now outsiders take oil, gas, and coal rather than
furs.” And they leave behind “radioactive wastes.”
The Muscovites “are taking
practically everything” from the region.
With a few exceptions, they use “colonial methods,” but these exceptions
are so rare that they only prove the rule, Chernomorsky says. Moscow’s
arrogance is not only offensive: it is infuriating, he says, and the rise of a
Siberian identity is the natural result.
Vasily Popok, a journalist in Kemerovo, said that “today
Siberians already have all the characteristics of a sub-ethnos, just as by the
way do Muscovites because being defines consciousness.” If the authorities don’t respond to this
reality, it is possible that Siberians will cease to be “a branch of the ethnic
Russians” and finally be “transformed into a separate nation.”
In Novosibirsk, the “Russky reporter”
correspondent spoke with an official in the regional department responsible for
combatting extremism. The latter, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that
Moscow doesn’t understand the situation but that it is unlikely that the rise
of Siberian identity will lead to secession.
“The danger is in something else,”
the official said. “An individual who
rejects being an ethnic Russian, also rejects the stereotypes of behavior
related to being Russian. Who is a
Russian in mass culture? Correct: an alcoholic” or some other kind of
degenerate. That is a threat.
There are some well-organized groups
in Siberia who seek to promote a new state east of the Urals. The correspondent
met with the leader of one of them, Aleksandr Budnikov, who along with eight of
his supporters, has been subject to repeated legal action for his views. He
said he favors “a confederation with Russia.”
How Siberia and Russia will reach
that goal remains to be seen, Budnikov said. But reach it they will “with a
little blood or a lot.” And that reflects a fundamental problem with the
Russians themselves. They are “neither an object nor a subject of international
law, and they don’t have their own land.”
Their country, “Rossiya,” is the
territory of non-ethnic Russians. “Is it
any surprise that many now are ashamed to call themselves [ethnic]
Russians? This is the direct result of
the policy of the authorities.”
Yury Plyusin, a philosopher, offered
a different perspective. He insisted that “Siberian separatism is the regular
reanimation of one idea about colonialism and imperialism.” It is obviously, he suggested, “a foolish and
psychopathological idea.” What would
happen if Siberia separated? There would be more rulers but not necessarily
progress.
But Plyusin is a Siberian and proud
of it. Indeed, that makes it possible for him to be so critical. Anyone who isn’t
a Siberian would offend those who are by making such remarks. “But in
criticizing Siberian separatism,” the correspondent says, “Plyusnin does not
cast doubt on its real danger. Rather just the reverse.”
According to him, “the ‘Sibiryak’
people is a sign of the degradation of education. People simply aren’t told who they are in
fact.” The issue is not simple given the large number of nationalities that the
Soviets identified. But despite that, these groups have many common
characteristics.
But Plyusnin said that this
commonality is best expressed by an adjective rather than a noun: thus in
Russia there are “Russian Tatars, Russian Chechens, and Russian Siberians.” If
that is not recognized the problem of Siberian separatism will only grow, and
that development in turn will lead Moscow to use force against it.
The correspondent concludes his article
by noting that the signs at the Novosibirsk airport refer almost exclusively to
Siberians or at most Novosibirsk residents. When he asked his companion why
there was no word about Russia, he received this response: “It’s simple: we
understand what Siberia is and what the Caucasus is.”
“Explaining just what Russia is is
far more complicated.” And one thing it apparently is not is a country of “non-ethnic
Russians” that some in Moscow want to promote. According to the reporter, while
many east of the Urals are calling themselves Siberians, almost none is saying
he or she is a non-ethnic Russian.
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