Paul
Goble
Staunton, July 23 – The Khabarovsk
protests have had many consequences, but one of the most important is that they
have thrown into high relief a fact that many are reluctant to acknowledge: residents
of the Russian Federation outside the ring road really don’t like Muscovites.”
Khabarovsk residents and specialists
on the regions are now speaking about this “openly,” Moskovsky komsomolets
journalist Yuliya Kalinina says, adding that such attitutdes are found in “practically
all subjects of the Federation” (mk.ru/politics/2020/07/23/moskvichi-besyat-zhiteley-regionov-dengami-i-snobizmom.html).
The Moscow journalist says she
selected for interviews people in “Russian” regions rather than non-Russian
republics so that ethnicity wouldn’t be a factor and chose those most would
consider middle class and all of whom were middle aged. A majority were women
who, Kalinina says, are more inclined to feel attitudes arising from life experiences
than politics.
That last characteristic is important
because she suggests it is important to distinguish between hostility toward
federal officials and hostility toward residents of the Russian capital,
although she concedes that she wasn’t able to “completely avoid politics” despite
her efforts to do so.
Aleksandra, a St. Petersburg
resident who often travels to Moscow, says that her hostility toward Moscow is “an
objective anger,” because the center takes all the resources and its residents
act as if this is just, something that anyone who lives beyond the ring road
can see is far from just.
Olga from Voronezh agrees: her
problems aren’t with people from the capital as such but with the capital’s control
of resources from everywhere and with the attitude of many in the center that
this is entirely natural and right. That
the regions can’t choose their own leaders but must accept Moscow assignees and
orders only makes this worse.
Mikhail from Kaluga adds that the
pandemic has made things worse because people in the regions who could travel
to the capital now can’t and so must rely on the inadequate resources,
particularly in the medical sector, in their own areas. They feel this intensively
because they cannot see any way out.
Olga from Kaliningrad Oblast says
that people where she lives “distinguish Muscovites from ‘Moskaly.’” The former
are perfectly normal people who when they come to her region are polite and interested
in local history and affairs. The latter are typically officials sent to rule
the region who behave as “occupiers.”
They fulfill without any question
all orders from the center, “they spit on local residents,” and they act as if
they alone have the right to decide for their subjects, she continues.
Anastasiya from Sarov points to a
particular problem: Educational institutions in Moscow are supposed to be open
to all Russians, but in fact, those who do not have a Moscow resident permit
can’t enter them. As a result, schools and higher educational institutions in
the capital have in fact become only for Muscovites.
Aleksey from Stavropol says that
Moscow now only attracts all the bright young people from the regions but takes
so much of the money and resources from the regions that people outside the
ring road cannot hope to compete and thus are fated to see their standard of
living fall even further. It shouldn’t surprise anyone they don’t like Moscow
or Muscovites.
Valentina from Orenburg says that Muscovites
live so much better than Russians elsewhere that the latter can only hate those
at the center, especially since this difference in the health care area means
that people outside of Moscow die far earlier than do those who live in the
capital.
And Anton from Krasnoyarsk Kray says
that his region is rich in natural resources but Moscow takes everything away
and then presumes to decide on how everything is done locally. Krasnoyarsk should be wealthy, but it is
becoming ever poorer. Not surprisingly, its residents are angry and angry at
Moscow in particular.
Kalinina says she feels compelled to
present these opinions despite the fact that she is from Moscow because the
anger behind them is truly enormous, far greater than can be conveyed in
print. And she says that the powers that
be should pay attention because, as the Krasnoyarsk protests show, this situation
is “obviously unhealthy.”
Indeed, it is more than that, it is
dangerous to the future of Russia as a whole.
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