Russian Census Report on Changes in Number of People Speaking Their Native Languages Artifact of How Enumeration was Conducted, Gabdrafikov Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Jan. 8 – Tatars were shocked to learn that the latest Russian census shows that they have declined in number by 600,000 since 2010 and that the number of them who say they speak Tatar as their native language, Ildar Gabdrafikov says. The first figure is clearly a falsification; the second may be that but it is also a product of how the census was conducted.

            The Tatar ethnographer who has specialized in ethnopolitics of the Middle Volga last year lost his job in the Ufa scientific center because his research ran afoul with the official Bashkir position (tatar-inform.ru/news/istorik-ildar-gabdrafikov-legko-byt-tatarinom-v-kazani-poprobuite-byt-tatarinom-v-uf-5861163).

            In a new interview, Gabdrafikov points out that both the figure the census reports for the number of Tatars and the figure it gives for native language are problematic. The first is so anomalous as to raise questions about outright falsification by officials; the second may involve that but also reflects the way in which the enumeration was conducted (milliard.tatar/news/konecno-est-assimilyacionnye-processy-no-oni-ne-nastolko-silny-pocemu-cislennost-tatar-snizilas-na-600-tysyac-celovek-2696).

            Language change occurs more rapidly than identity change, the ethnographer says; and there is simply no tradition of Tatars changing their identity at the rate the census claims they did over the last decade. Moreover, data on births and deaths show that Tatars had a more positive balance than many other peoples, including Russians; and there is no evidence that assimilation is taking place at the rate the reported number would suggest.

            Thus, the reported decline in their number of 600,000 should be treated with extreme skepticism and lead to intensive investigations into what happened, Gabdrafikov continues. The issue of language change is more complicated. According to the ethnographer, this dramatic shift has its roots less in Moscow’s policies than in real life and the way the census was conducted.

            On the one hand, Tatars are increasingly interested in learning Russian as the language of the country they live in and English as the international language of the Internet. Even Tatars living in villages now choose to study Russian and English rather than Russian; and that undoubtedly played a role in the decline in the number claiming Tatar as their native language.

            But on the other hand – and this is a far more important factor, Gabdrafikov says – the 2021 census dealt with language issues very differently than the 2010 enumeration. First of all, the 2021 census took place during the pandemic and many people tried not to interact with census takers.

That meant that the census was constructed on the basis of official data bases that do not list nationality or native language. Even if no other factors were at work, that would depress the number of the Tatars and of Tatars speaking Tatar as their native language. But there was a second factor at work as well.

In 2010, residents of the Russian Federation could list only one native language; but in 2021, they could list up to four. Since it is likely that for many Tatars, Russian is the language they use, they might declare it as one of the four native languages they know and then those compiling the census would count Russian rather than Tatar to come up with language figures.

            Gabdrafikov’s words are important not only for Tatars but for all other non-Russians and for those who study the ethnic and linguistic diversity in the Russian Federation. As so often happens, what has been promised by Russian officials as an explanation in fact turns out on inspection to be something that has to be explained.

‘Russia More Radical than Russians,’ Yerofeyev Says; ‘One can Deal with Russians but Not Make Agreements with Russia’

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Jan. 8 – Viktor Yerofeyev, a prominent Russian writer who fled to Germany because of his opposition to the war in Ukraine, says that everyone must remember that “Russia is more radical than the Russians; the creation is stronger than its creators; and while you can somehow still deal with Russians, you will never reach an agreement with Russia.”

            Russian leaders count on Western ones to forget this reality, Moscow commentator Vitaly Ginzburg says, because it helps them to conceal the fact that there is a deep difference in the cultural code of Russia from that of Western countries, a difference that Western leaders are unable or at least unwilling to acknowledge (kasparov.ru/material.php?id=63BABC5C2F812).

            Western leaders also display two other “serious misconceptions” about Russia, he continues. On the one hand, many of them still accept “the old Russian myth” about the existence of a single people. And on the other, they are prisoners to the idea that in dealing with the Putin regime they can act as they do with regard to other governments.

            These failures in understanding lead many both in Russia and abroad to mistakenly assert that the aggression in Ukraine is “Putin’s war, not Russia.” But that is not the case. Putin knows his people well, and “the hatred and meanness of the majority of Russians is his main weapon to this day.”

            Hundreds of educated people are involved in launching missiles and drones against Ukrainian targets. Each could make sure these weapons don’t reach their target, but “that isn’t happening.” The Russian people are willing co-conspirators with Putin; they must not be viewed simply as captives.

            Moreover, Ginzburg says, when Russia visits cold and suffering on Ukrainians, Russians “aren’t able to full comprehend it” because such cold and suffering is regularly visited upon them by their own regime. The population therefore “doesn’t perceive this as a disaster … People simply don’t know any other life” – and as a result, there can be no empathy.

            “Like any war,” the conflict in Ukraine is “a war of cultural codes, one between the code of civilization and the code of barbarism,” Ginzburg says. And just how much at odds these two are is increasingly obvious, especially since some Putin propagandists say that “the value of human life is greatly overestimated.”

            Russians may believe that, but Ukrainians don’t. And that is what this war is about.

Like the Bolsheviks in 1917, Putin has Destroyed Russia, Leaving It Much Like Hitler’s Germany in 1944, Gozman Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Jan. 8 – Vladimir Putin clearly thinks that his “mission” is to defeat America and establish a new world order in which Russia will be the leader, Leonid Gozman says. But in that he is profoundly mistaken: His real mission was “to destroy Russia and he has succeeded in doing so.” Consequently, the Kremlin leader should feel free to leave the scene.

            The Russian opposition politician argues that “a country is not just a territory; it is something more. The space it occupies isn’t going anywhere and most of its people will remain. Even today’s exodus won’t change that.” It is above all a culture and a way of life, an understanding of past, present and future (novayagazeta.eu/articles/2023/01/08/strana-404).

            Russia was destroyed once before, by the Bolsheviks in 1917, Gozman says; and it took decades of often painful effort to come back. What is happening now is “something very similar.” Before this year, Russia was associated with both good and bad things; but now it is associated in the minds of the world only with the bad just like Hitler’s Reich.

            Not only is there no Russia, there is no Russian army, and there is no Russian president either, the politician says. “Everything tht we build since the late 1980s has been destroyed. There is no Russian culture.” Instead, there is “an emptiness” that references to Russian classics of the past cannot fill.

            Moreover, there is no Russian army. It isn’t a unified and disciplined defense force but a divided indisciplined and violent rabble capable only of behaving like the criminals who make up parts of its ranks. And having revealed its own weakness in Ukraine, it has put the Russian territory at risk not from invented threats from the West but from real ones like China.

            And there is no Russian president. Not only does he lack electoral legitimacy but he has cut himself off from the people and from the international community. Orders and declarations emanate from the Kremlin, but it is far from clear whether the man who calls himself president is the one issuing them.

            As a result of all this, Gozman says, “our country now most of all resembles the Germany of 1944. The military defeat of the fuehrer was still ahead but Germany and German culture as the world had known them for centuries no longer existed.” Cannot Russia hope to come back in the same way Germany has?

            That may be overly optimistic, he suggests. Putin seems quite ready to destroy the world if it doesn’t allow his country as he defines it to behave as he wants it do. The Kremlin leader has even suggested that we don’t need a world “without Russia.” But in so doing, he has ignored the fact that that world has arisen precisely because of his efforts in 2022.

 

Systemic Opposition Parties Irrelevant in Russia Today, Rodin Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Jan. 8 – The so-called systemic opposition parties in the Russian Federation have become irrelevant in the current political system, Ivan Rodin says, with their leaders failing to provide any alternative visions for the future and increasingly inclined to talk about the past when they expected a different outcome.

            The politics editor of Nezavisimaya gazeta says that the KPRF, the LDPR, Just Russia-For Truth, and New People claim to be opposition parties but in almost all cases support the government’s policies. And even when they do oppose them, they have no success in changing outcomes (ng.ru/politics/2023-01-08/1_8628_opposition.html).

            Many of the leaders of these parties appear to recognize this fact, Rodin continues; but they don’t appear all that interested in doing anything about it, preferring instead to talk about the past when they hoped to matter more or to blaming the population for failing to respond to them.

            Until they change course, the Nezavisimaya gazeta politics editor suggests, they are likely to remain as irrelevant to Russia’s future as an appendage like the appendix is to the human body, useful only for the regime to suggest propagandistically that under Putin, Russia is a democracy with real opposition parties. 

War in Ukraine Seen Pushing Russian Birthrate Down to Its Lowest Level in Russian History by End of Year

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Jan. 8 – Because births lag nine months behind the pdecision to have children, the events of last year involving the war in Ukraine and uncertainty about mobilization and the future mean that by the end of 2023 or in early 2024, Russia will have the lowest number of births per year in its history, Igor Yefremov says.

            The Gaidar Economic Policy Institute demographer says that just throwing more money at the problem as the government now plans or even more carefully targeting aid to boost births in both rural areas and cities won’t do much. The overall situation people feel themselves to be in must be changed (ng.ru/economics/2023-01-08/1_8628_demography.html).

            The number of births in Russia has been falling for seven straight years. In the first ten months of 2022, it fell by six percent over the same period in 2021; and that decline occurred before the expanded invasion of Ukraine, partial mobilization, and the economic problems and personal uncertainties arising from the war.

            Government experts are currently trying to come up with a solution. Most of their attention is focusing on better targeting of maternal capital and other assistance to families with children. At present, the system is working relatively well in rural areas but not in cities where the birthrate continues to fall.

            Consequently, a consensus is emerging in the government that more money should go to women in cities rather than in the regions. But Yefremov warns that such an approach won’t work because regions are demographically diverse and so Moscow will not be able to achieve the results it seeks.

            Only by changing the environment in which potential parents can decide to have children or not is there any chance that Russia will have any hope of boosting birthrates.

Nine Signs Russian Economy in Deep Trouble

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Jan. 7 – The Russian government and its supporters always seek to put the best face on things, including the economic situation of the country over the last year. They cite various macro-economic figures to show that things aren’t as bad as many say. But for ordinary Russians, life is getting worse – and Vyacheslav Dvornikov of The Bell offers nine signs of this.

            Some of these are obvious but others are more indirect. However taken together they paint a picture of a Russian economy in severe difficulties since the start of Putin’s war in Ukraine, difficulties that are having profound consequences for Russians and the way they actually live (thebell.io/9-priznakov-togo-chto-v-rossiyskoy-ekonomike-vse-plokho).

            The nine are as follows:

1.    1.  Existing restaurants are closing and new ones aren’t opening, and Russians are shifting their purchases from more expensive cafes to fast food restaurants although even that sector is hurting as incomes continue to fall (kommersant.ru/doc/5733166 and kommersant.ru/doc/5747372).

2.    2.  Ever more Russians are working shorter hours as firms try to avoid laying them off. This phenomenon is especially true in major cities like Moscow.

3.   3.   Russian firms are paying fewer and smaller bonuses this year than last (press.rabota.ru/v-etom-godu-vyplachivat-novogodnie-premii-budut-v-2-raza-rezhe-chem-v-proshlom).

4.    4. Russians are again increasing their consumption of vodka, reversing the trend of the last decade and increasingly drowning their sorrows in hard liquor (brokerkf.ru/doc/ideas/Flash_note_BELU_03102022.pdf).

5.   5.  Realtors have been forced to cut back charges for their services by as much as half because of declining demand for real estate (kommersant.ru/doc/5722152).

6.    6. Ever fewer Russians are visiting shopping centers, choosing instead not to buy anything or to buy from street venders (iz.ru/1433547/2022-11-30/poseshchaemost-ttc-v-rossii-snizilas-na-15-30 and kommersant.ru/doc/5572560).

7.     7. On dating sites, women are increasingly taking the initiative.

8.   8.  Business advertising on television has collapsed. If a year ago, advertisers were prepared to buy up to 90 percent of the time allowed to sell their wares. Now, they are buying only 63 percent of that time (rbc.ru/technology_and_media/12/07/2022/62cc24769a794743ec866d31).

9.    9. Millions of Russians who tried investing in the stock market in the past have pulled their money out and view brokers in an increasingly negative way now that prices have collapsed.

Russians Increasingly Asking Fortune Tellers about Outcome of War, Escaping the Draft and Date of Putin’s Death, ‘Holod’ Editors Say

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Jan. 7 – Like people in many societies, a certain percentage of Russians have turned to fortune tellers, tarot card readers and those who case horoscopes both face-to-face and via social media to try to get inside information about their lives. Typically, they want to know about their love lives and financial possibilities.

            But since the start of the Russian war in Ukraine, two practitioners of these arts say, Russians have begun asking other questions as well, including but not limited to the course of the war, the possibilities of avoiding military service, emigration, and even the date when Vladimir Putin will die, according to Holod media (holod.media/2023/01/06/problems-of-2022/).

            The editors acknowledge that their investigation of this most unscientific of the arts is hardly scientific; but they suggest that this shift reflects a broader change in Russian attitudes, hopes and fears and thus represents one more barometer of public opinion in a country whose government severely restricts the ability of the population to express their feelings.