Paul Goble
Staunton,
December 7 – Today, the Kremlin Internet portal published the Strategy of State
Nationality Policy for the Period to 2025. Signed by Vladimir Putin, it calls
for all residents of the Russian Federation to have a civic national identity
but acknowledges that at the present time only 84 percent of them do.
The
24-page document (/publication.pravo.gov.ru/Document/View/0001201812070007) is
a revision of the 2012 one. The most
important changes involve requirements that the goals outlined in it be
achieved, the most important of which is the creation of a unified non-ethnic
Russian national identity.
But
the document itself insists that there is much work to be done in the coming
years because one in six residents of the Russian Federation do not share that
identity, preferring instead to identify as members of ethnic nations, both
Russian and non-Russian or of other communities as well.
Whether
getting all residents to identify in this way is possible, however, is very
much in doubt: the Russian government has not even been able to come up with
legislation defining the nature of non-ethnic Russian civic identity despite
Putin having set several deadlines for this to happen.
In a related move, Putin also
confirmed the assignments for various officials outlined at the October 26
meeting of the Presidential Council on Inter-Ethnic Relations. Again, his order laid stress on fulfilling
specific goals, including the preparation of a textbook on nationality policy
by the end of August 2019 (nazaccent.ru/content/28819-putin-utverdil-porucheniya-po-itogam-zasedaniya.html).
If
the past is any guide, that deadline is unlikely to be met either.
No comments:
Post a Comment