Window on Eurasia

Russian Federation Populace Already ‘a Single Nation,’ Tishkov Says

 

Paul Goble

Vienna, August 22, 2006 – The population of the Russian Federation is
already “a single nation” [“natsiya”], according to Valeriy
Tishkov, a Moscow ethnographer with close ties to the Kremlin. And
consequently, the authorities there should promote “by all possible
means” a common but not ethnically based Russian [”rossiiskiy”]
nationalism.

Tishkov’s argument, which appears in August issue of “Druzhba
narodov,” is likely to strike many as little more than a word game,
given that what he at least ostensibly appears to mean by nation and
nationalism is what others would call citizenship and patriotism
[http://magazines.russ.ru/druzhba/2006/8/ti17-pr.html].

But both because Tishkov’s argument represent such a significant
departure from Soviet and most post-Soviet usage and because of the
criticism he lodges against those who disagree with him, this article
could herald a major shift in official thinking in Moscow and hence a
serious move against minority groups there.

After dismissing discussions of Russia’s demographic crisis as
overblown – Tishkov writes that “crisis” is not a scientific term
let alone an accurate description of what Russia is going through –
the former nationalities minister and current member of the Social
Chamber turns his attention to the sensitive issues of nation and
nationalism.

“National identity,” Tishkov says, “is the commonly shared idea
of the citizen about his country, its nature and a feeling of his belong
to it.” As such, he continues, “it is not less but even more important
for the state than well-guarded borders, a constitution, the army, and
other institutions.”

“States are created by people and exist because each new generation
of its residences shares a common idea about the state and recognizes
it” as such. That does not mean, Tishkov insists, that everyone views the
country in exactly the same way or that there are not important
differences within its population.

But it does indicate that that the population on the territory of the
Russian state consistutes a single “nation” [“natsiya”], rather
than as was the case in the Soviet Union and has been the case in
post-Soviet Russian Federation since, of a congeries of individual
peoples each of whom has its own “national” interests.

To allow that linguistic and hence political situation to continue,
Tishkov argues, not only is dangerous – it contributes to national
fissiparousness just as it did in the Soviet case – but also reflects
a certain terminological confusion introduced by Soviet ideology and
continued by various groups in post-Soviet times.

Prior to 1917, he says, one could, drawing on the authority of Karamzin
and with little fear of contradiction, speak of the “Russian
people” [“rossiiskiy narod”] and of non-ethnic Russians [“rossiyane’]
without any confusion or fear of contradiction by almost all of those
falling under these categories.

But after the Bolshevik revolution, Tishkov says, Marxist-Leninist
ideology insisted on distinctions between “people’ [“narod’],
“nation” [“natsiya’], and “national state”
[“natsional’noye gosudarstvo”], a claim continues to cast a
shadow on thinking about ethnicity and citizenship in the Russian case.

In Soviet times, Tishkov continues, the “Russian people”
[“rossiikiy narod’] came to be called the “Soviet people,”
which Leonid Brezhnev and others called “a new historical community,”
although as the Russian ethnographer says, “there was nothing
principly new in this community relative to the state.”

But more significantly, he argues, the Soviet system encouraged
non-Russian groups to speak of themselves as nations and thus to limit
the application of the term “national interests” to their
particular community rather than viewing this as something that reflects the
entire population of the country.

Many countries are ethnically and linguistically diverse, Tishkov says,
but they are held together by “the conception of a single nation.”
Unfortunately, he continues, in Russia, the reverse is true: “real
unity” exists alongside “ethnocultural variety” but there is not
“an idea about a single people, its national interests and national
culture.”

Indeed, he argues, here is a real “paradox: for centuries people have
lived together in Russia shoulder to should with Russians, Ukrainians,
Germans, Komis and others, they have worked together, married and
raised children, and spoken among themselves in one language; but
scholars and politicians” continue to try to “convince them to view
themselves as members of worlds “other than ‘the Russian
world.’”

Up to now, Tishkov insists, the Russian government has not done enough
to counter these challenges, something it might regret if it does not
promote the idea of a single Russian “nation,” albeit one that will
be necessarily diverse, and a single set of “Russian national
interests”

In the first instance, the Moscow ethnographer insists, the Russian
government must oppose “ideologues of ethnonationalism” who argue
that this or that “nation” is “not part of the Russian cultural
arsenal but rather parts of semi-mythic and politicized ‘Turkic
world,’ “Finno-Ugric world,’ and so on.”

Among those he singles out for particular criticism are Kazan historian
Rafail Khakimov, a senior advisor to Tatarstan President Mintimir
Shaimiyev, and Estonian “politicians,” who have called on the
Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe to condemn “the
violation of the rights of Finno-Ugric peoples in Russia.”

“If those foreign opponents of Russia who sympathize with [such]
peripheral ethnonationalism would recognize [the Russian Federation] as
a [single] people and state,” Tishkov says, ‘then they would not
take up an international resolution with the title ‘The Aggression of Russia in Chechnya.’”

Such terminology, he continues, would then be as “unthinkable” as
the slogan “’Texas and America together forever’ (Let us recall
that the annexation of Texas took place in the middle of the 19th
century.)” or a document denouncing U.S. “intervention” in
California after the American military put down disorders in Los
Angeles).

Tishkov also criticizes those in Moscow who share his belief in the
desirability of a single non-ethnic Russian nation but who insist that
it does not yet exist and must be a project for the future. Such
people, he suggests, need to be shown that the non-ethnic Russian nation is not
a project but an “already accomplished fact.”

“For our country and for its population,” Tishkov sums up, “it is
becoming ever more destructive and inadequate” to continue to talk
about “the peoples of Russia” as a plural noun or to discuss the
relations of the various communities within the Russian Federation in
terms of “’the friendship of peoples.’”

“The task of responsible experts,” Tishkov writes, “is to explain
patiently and consistently (although this will not apply to
journalists) that Russianness [‘rossiiskost’’] as an identity and the Russian
[‘rossiiskiy’] people-nation is not the result of internal
unification but a natural term embracing a variety of internal
ethno-cultural distinctions.”

Any other approach, he says, not only would represent a failure of
domestic and international expertise but could in many cases give aid
and comfort to “the dogmatic and nationalist misconceptions
intentionally beging given support by the enemies of Russia abroad.”

Instead, “genuine” experts and the Russian state must recognize
that “the Russian [‘rossisskaya’] nation exists and is not simply a
dream or task for the next stage of ‘construction.’”

“To continue to deny and destroy Russianness [‘rossisskost’’]
is impermissible,” Tishkov says. And consequently, the Russian
authorities, Russian experts and the Russian people should employ
“all available means” to “affirm [non-ethnic] Russian nationalism” in
order to strengthen Russia and its national interests.

While Tishkov is careful to stress the “non-ethnic” nature of the
Russian “nation” and Russian “national” interests, many in the
Russian Federation are likely to see his words as an opening to a more
explicitly Russian national state in the full ethnic sense of the term.

Some ethnic Russians may be delighted at that prospect, but the growing
number of non-Russians are likely to view it with concern. And to the
extent that is the case, the program Tishkov urges could be hijacked by
the former and lead the latter to separate themselves still further
from the Russian “nation” he insists already exists.

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