More than Half of Immigrant Workers in Russia are in Moscow and St. Petersburg and Fewer than One in 200 are in Poorest Non-Russian Republics

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Feb. 19 – More than 40 percent of all registered immigrant workers in the Russian Federation are in Moscow city or oblast and 12.8 percent more are in St. Petersburg. But fewer than one-half of one percent are in nine of the poorest non-Russian republics of the Russian Federation, according to a new study.

            The Finexpertiza agency says that fewer than 0.5 percent of registered immigrant workers are in the Nenets AD, Kalmykia, Mari El, Tyva, Chechnya, the Jewish AO, Chuvashia, Khakasia, Chukotka and North Ossetia (nazaccent.ru/content/40029-nacionalnye-respubliki-rf-stali-liderami-spiska-samyh-neprivlekatelnyh-regionov-dlya-migrantov.html).

            This pattern reflects the opportunities the more successful capitals have and that the least successful non-Russian republics possess, but it has important consequences for the nature of xenophobia in the two places. In Moscow and St. Petersburg, hostility to other nations is likely to focus on immigrants while in the republics, it is more likely to be focused on ethnic Russians.

            These figures thus provide a corrective to conclusions drawn about anti-immigrant attitudes in the Russian Federation. They are likely to be stronger among Russians in the capitals where immigrants are more numerous and non-existent among non-Russians in non-Russian federal subjects where there are few or no immigrants.