Black Sea Forum

Black Sea Forum for Partnership and Dialogue (BSF) with Georgia, Ukraine, Azerbaijan, Moldova and Armenia (also non post-soviet countries that are NATO members, HP Compaq HSTNN-IB16 Battery

interested in their maintaining political stability and avoiding conflicts in the region: Romania, Bulgaria and Turkey, whose first two are also now EU and CEI members, using EU rules for their political development); however this organization does not focus on helping countries to join the EU, HP Compaq HSTNN-IB18 Battery

but reaching common standards and good governance and internal stability and democracy like in the CEI.

(None of these organizations are incompatible with the policy required for accessing EU membership in the domain of political cooperation and development). HP Compaq HSTNN-IB28 Battery

Merging the CEI and BSF is desired by Central European countries, that are members of both (often in addition to EU with stronger objectives) that would like to simplify the development process, and also members of the Council of Europe that federates (but at very slow pace) HP Compaq HSTNN-IB51 Battery

all European efforts of political cooperation and development through the various regional organizations).Commonwealth of Unrecognized States Community for Democracy and Human Rights

Regarding political freedom in the former Soviet republics, Freedom House's 2006 report listed the following: HP Compaq HSTNN-IB52 Battery

Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Ukraine as "free" countries

In Freedom House's listing for 2005, Ukraine was listed as "partly free."

Armenia, Georgia, Kyrgyzstan, and Moldova were listed as "partly free"HP Compaq HSTNN-IB55 Battery

Russia, Belarus, Azerbaijan and four Central Asian nations (Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, and Kazakhstan) were listed as "not free"—while Turkmenistan in particular received the worst freedom ratings possible and was listed as one of the eight most repressive regimes in the year. HP Compaq HSTNN-IB62 Battery

Similarly, the Worldwide Press Freedom Index published by Reporters Without Borders, recorded the following as regards press freedom:

A good situation in Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania

Noticeable problems in Armenia, Georgia, Moldova and TajikistanHP Compaq HSTNN-LB05 Battery

A difficult situation in Azerbaijan, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Ukraine and Uzbekistan

A very serious situation in Turkmenistan

It has been remarked that several post-Soviet states have not changed leadership since their independence, such as Nursultan Nazarbayev in Kazakhstan and Islam Karimov in Uzbekistan. HP Compaq HSTNN-LB08 Battery

All of these had originally more limited terms but through decrees or referendums prolonged their stay in office (a practice also followed by Presidents Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus and Emomalii Rahmon of Tajikistan). HP Compaq HSTNN-LB0E Battery

Askar Akayev of Kyrgyzstan had likewise served as President since its independence until he was forced to resign as a result of the Kyrgyz revolution of 2005. Saparmurat Niyazov in Turkmenistan ruled from independence until his death in 2006, creating a personality cult around himself. HP Compaq HSTNN-LB11 Battery

The issue of dynastical succession has been another element affecting the politics of some post-Soviet States, with Ilham Aliyev becoming President of Azerbaijan after the death of his father Heydar Aliyev, and theories about the children of other leaders in Central Asia also being groomed for succession. HP Compaq HSTNN-LB51 Battery

The participation of Akayev's son and daughter in the 2005 Kyrgyz parliamentary elections boosted fears of dynastic succession being used in Kyrgyzstan as well, and may have contributed to the anti-Akayev climate that led to his overthrow.

Economic, political, national, military, and social problems have all been factors in separatism in the Post-Soviet space. HP Compaq HSTNN-LB52 Battery

In many cases, problems due to factors such as ethnic divisions existed before the fall of the Soviet Union, and upon the fall of the union were brought into the open.^[17] Such territories and resulting military conflicts have so far been:

Abkhazia, which is de facto independent from Georgia. HP Compaq HSTNN-MB05 Battery

Tensions in the area broke out when Georgia sent in troops in 1992 to control groups who wanted separation. The troops and most of the Georgian-speaking population were forced out in 1993, and the region declared independence in 1999. HP Compaq HSTNN-OB06 Battery

The 2008 South Ossetia war between Georgian forces and the separatist and Russian forces led to Russia's recognition of Abkhazia's independence.^[18]

Adjara was run independently by Aslan Abashidze, an autocrat with strong ties to Russia, from the breakup on the Soviet Union until May 2004. HP Compaq HSTNN-OB52 Battery

After claiming Georgian forces were going to invade, Abashidze blew up bridges connecting Adjara to the rest of Georgia, leading to a popular revolt against him. Upon his leaving, his post was abolished and the region was integrated with Georgia.^[19]

Chechnya, where Dzhokhar Dudayev declared independence from Russia in 1991, HP Compaq HSTNN-OB62 Battery

leading to a violent war between local separatist forces and the Russian army. Russia first invaded in 1994, withdrawing after a deal for increased autonomy was granted in 1996. Tensions have continued in the years since then, and the conflict has spilled over into neighbouring regions such as Dagestan. HP Compaq HSTNN-UB05 Battery

Russia claims that the situation in Chechnya has normalised.^[20]

Transnistria, which is de facto independent from Moldova. It declared independence in 1990, due to its majority Russian-speaking population fearing union with Romania. A ceasefire between Transnistrian forces and Moldovan forces has been in place since 1992, enforced by the presence of Russian forces in Transnistria. HP Compaq HSTNN-UB11 Battery

South Ossetia, which is de facto independent from Georgia. The region declared its intent to seek independence in 1990, leading to a conflict which led to a ceasefire in 1992. Separatism became powerful after the election of Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili in 2004, and a referendum in 2006 was in favour of declaring independence. HP Compaq HSTNN-UB18 Battery

The 2008 South Ossetia war between Georgian forces and the separatist and Russian forces led to Russia's recognition of South Ossetia's independence.^[22]

Nagorno-Karabakh, which is de facto independent from Azerbaijan. Ethnic conflict between Armenians and Azerbaijanis began in 1988, HP Compaq HSTNN-UB68 Battery

and expanded into warwhich lasted till a ceasefire in 1994. Sporadic attempts at negotiating a final peace and sporadic bursts of violence have continued since then.

There is a significant Russophone population in most of the post-Soviet states, whose political position as an ethnic minority varies from country to country.^[24] HP Compaq HSTNN-UB69 Battery

While Belarus, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, in addition to Russia, have kept Russian as an official language, the language lost its status in other post-Soviet states after the end of the Soviet Union. It maintains semi-official status in all CIS member states, because it is the organisation's official working language, but in the three Baltic States, HP Compaq HSTNN-W42C Battery

the Russian language is not recognized in any official capacity. Georgia, since its independence from the CIS in 2009, has begun operating its government almost exclusively in the Georgian language.

While under the Soviet system religious intellectual life was eliminated, traditions continued to survive. HP Compaq HSTNN-W42C-A Battery

After the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Islamic movements have emerged alongside ethnic and secular ones. Vitaly Naumkin gives the following assessment: "Throughout the time of change, Islam has served as a symbol of identity, a force for mobilization, and a pressure for democracy. HP Compaq HSTNN-W42C-B Battery

This is one of the few social disasters that the church has survived, in which it was not the cause. But if successful politically, it faces economic challenges beyond its grasp."^[25]

Ever since the dissolution of the Soviet Union a certain number of people have expressed a longing for the Soviet regime and its values. HP Compaq HSTNN-XB0E Battery

The level of post-Soviet nostalgia varies across the former republics. Russia as well as the Caspian Sea countries are inclined to be pro-Soviet, whereas the Baltic States have traditionally been the least nostalgic towards the Soviet Union.^[26] Nevertheless, HP Compaq HSTNN-XB11 Battery

there are certain groups of people even in the Baltic States who on their daily basis continue to blend the Soviet and post-Soviet experience. According to july 2012 polling in Ukraine by RATING 42% of respondents supported the formation of an unified state of Ukraine, Russia and Belarus; however early 2012 this support had been 48%.HP Compaq HSTNN-XB18 Battery

Russification (in Russian: русификация rusifikátsiya) is an adoption of the Russian language or some other Russian attributes (whether voluntarily or not) by non-Russian communities. In a narrow sense, Russification is used to indicate the influence of the Russian language onSlavic, HP Compaq HSTNN-XB21 Battery

Baltic and other languages, spoken in areas currently or formerly controlled by Russia, which led to the emerging of russianisms, trasianka and surzhyk. In a historical sense, the term refers to both official and unofficial policies of Imperial Russia and the Soviet Union with respect to their national constituents and to national minorities in Russia, aimed at Russian domination. HP Compaq HSTNN-XB24 Battery

The major areas of Russification are politics and culture. In politics, an element of Russification is assigning Russian nationals to leading administrative positions in national institutions. In culture, Russification primarily amounts to domination of the Russian language in official business and strong influence of the Russian language on national idioms. HP Compaq HSTNN-XB28 Battery

The shifts indemographics in favour of the ethnic Russian population are sometimes considered as a form of Russification as well.

Analytically, it is helpful to distinguish Russification, as a process of changing one's ethnic self-label or identity from a non-Russian ethnonym to Russian, from Russianization, HP Compaq HSTNN-XB51 Battery

the spread of the Russian language, culture, and people into non-Russian cultures and regions, distinct also from Sovietization or the imposition of institutional forms established by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union throughout the territory ruled by that party.^[1] HP Compaq HSTNN-XB52 Battery

 In this sense, although Russification is usuallyconflated across Russification, Russianization, and Russian-led Sovietization, each can be considered a distinct process. Russianization and Sovietization, for example, did not automatically lead to Russification – change in language or self-identity of non-Russian peoples to being Russian. HP Compaq HSTNN-XB59 Battery

Thus, despite long exposure to the Russian language and culture, as well as to Sovietization, at the end of the Soviet era non-Russians were on the verge of becoming a majority of the population in the Soviet Union.^[2] Few scholars would now claim that the Russian government had aimed to wipe out all non-Russian cultures and replace them with Russian culture and the Orthodox religion, though some non-specialists continue to keep the notion alive. HP Compaq HSTNN-XB61 Battery

The earliest example of Russification took place in the 16th century in the conquered Khanate of Kazan (medieval Tatar state which occupied the territory of former Volga Bulgaria) and other Tatar areas. The main elements of this process were Christianization and implementation of the Russian language as the soleadministrative language. HP Compaq HSTNN-XB62 Battery

After the Russian defeat in the Crimean War in 1856 and the Polish rebellion of 1861, Tsar Alexander II increased Russification to reduce the threat of future rebellions. Russia was populated by many minority groups, and forcing them to accept the Russian culture was an attempt to prevent self-determinationist tendencies and separatism. HP Compaq HSTNN-XB68 Battery

In the 19th century, Russian settlers on traditional Kirghiz land drove a lot of the Kirghiz over the border to China.

One example of 19th century Russification was the replacement of the Ukrainian, Polish, Lithuanian, and Belarusianlanguages by Russian in those areas, HP Compaq HSTNN-XB69 Battery

which became part of the Russian Empire after the Partitions of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. It intensified after the 1831 uprising and, in particular, after the January Uprising of 1863.^[5] In 1864, the Polish and Belarusian languages were banned in public places; HP Compaq HSTNN-XB85 Battery

in the 1880s, Polish was banned in schools and on school grounds and offices of Congress Poland. Research and teaching of the Polish language, history or of Catholicism were forbidden. Illiteracy rose as Poles refused to learn Russian. Students were beaten for resisting Russification. Sony VGP-BPS13 Battery

A Polish underground education network was formed, including the famous Flying University. According to Russian estimates, by 1901 one-third of the inhabitants in the Congress Kingdom was involved in clandestine education based on Polish national literature.

A similar development took place in Lithuania. Sony VGP-BPS13/B Battery

Its Governor General,Mikhail Muravyov, prohibited the public use of spoken Lithuanian and closed Lithuanian and Polish schools; teachers from other parts of Russia who did not speak these languages were moved in to teach pupils. Muravyov also banned the use of Latin and Gothic scripts in publishing. Sony VGP-BPS13/S Battery

He was reported saying, "What the Russian bayonet didn't accomplish, the Russian school will." ("что нѣ доделалъ русскій штыкъ – доделаетъ русская школа.") This ban, which was only lifted in 1904, was disregarded by the Knygnešiai, the Lithuanian book smugglers, Sony VGP-BPS13A/S Battery

who brought Lithuanian publications printed in the Latin alphabet, the historic orthography of the Lithuanian language, from Lithuania Minor, a part of East Prussia, and from the United States into the Lithuanian-speaking areas of Imperial Russia. The knygnešiai became a symbol of the resistance of Lithuanians against Russification. Sony VGP-BPS13B/S Battery

The campaign also promoted the Russian Orthodox faith over Catholicism. The measures used included closing down Catholic monasteries, officially banning the building of new churches and giving many of the old ones to the Russian Orthodox church, banning Catholic schools and establishing state schools which taught only the Orthodox religion, Sony VGP-BPS13S Battery

requiring Catholic priests to preach only officially approved sermons, requiring that Catholics who married members of the Orthodox church convert, requiring Catholic nobles to pay an additional tax in the amount of 10% of their profits, limiting the amount of land a Catholic peasant could own, and switching from the Gregorian calendar (used by Catholics) to the Julian one (used by members of the Orthodox church). Sony VGP-BPS13AS Battery

After the uprising, many manors and great chunks of land were confiscated from nobles of Polish and Lithuanian descent who were accused of helping the uprising; these properties were later given or sold to Russian nobles. Villages where supporters of the uprising lived were repopulated by ethnic Russians. Sony VGP-BPS13A/B Battery

Vilnius University, where the language of instruction had been Polish rather than Russian, was closed in 1832. Lithuanians and Poles were banned from holding any public jobs (including professional positions, such as teachers and doctors) in Lithuania; this forced educated Lithuanians to move to other parts of the Russian Empire. Sony VGP-BPS13B/B Battery

The old legal code was dismantled and a new one based on the Russian code and written in the Russian language was enacted; Russian became the only administrative and juridical language in the area. Most of these actions ended at the beginning of the Russo-Japanese War, but others took longer to be reversed; Sony VGP-BPS14 Battery

Vilnius University was reopened only after Russia had lost control of the city in 1919.

Bessarabia had been annexed by the Russian Empire in 1812. In 1816 Bessarabia became an autonomous status, but only until 1828. In 1829, the use of the Romanian language was forbidden in the administration. Sony VGP-BPl15 Battery

In 1833, the use of Romanian language had been forbidden in churches. In 1842, the teaching in Romanian was forbidden for the secondary schools; it was forbidden for the elementary schools in 1860.

The Russian authorities forced the migration of Romanians (Moldovans) Sony VGP-BPs15 Battery

to other provinces of the Russian Empire (especially inKuban, Kazakhstan and Siberia), while foreign ethnic groups (especially Russians and Ukrainians, called in the 19th century "Little Russians") were encouraged to settle here. According to 1817-census, Bessarabia was populated by 86% Romanians (Moldovans), Sony VGP-BPs18 Battery

6.5% Ukrainians, 1.5% Russians (Lipovans) and 6% other ethnic groups. 80 years later, in 1897, the ethnic structure was very different: only 56% Romanians (Moldovans), but 11.7% Ukrainians, 18.9% Russians and 13.4% other ethnic groups.^[9] During 80 years, between 1817 and 1897, the share of Romanian (Moldovan) population dropped by 30%.Sony VGP-BPS21A/B Battery

The Moldovan language introduced during the Interwar period by the Soviet authorities first in the Moldavian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, and after 1940 taught in the Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic, was actually the Romanian language but written with a version of the Cyrillic script derived from theRussian alphabet. Sony VGP-BPS21/S Battery

Proponents of Cyrillic orthography argue that the Romanian language was historically written with the Cyrillic script, albeit a different version of it (see Moldovan alphabet and Romanian Cyrillic alphabet for a discussion of this controversy).

After the 1917 revolution, authorities in the USSR decided to abolish the use of the Arabic alphabet in native languages in Soviet-controlled Central Asia, Sony VGP-BPS21B Battery

in the Caucasus, and in the Volga region (including Tatarstan). This detached the local Muslim populations from exposure to the language and writing system of theKoran. The new alphabet for these languages was based on the Latin alphabet and was also inspired by the Turkish alphabet. Sony VGP-BPS21 Battery

However, by the late 1930s, the policy had changed. In 1939–1940 the Soviets decided that a number of these languages (including Tatar, Kazakh, Uzbek, Turkmen, Tajik, Kyrgyz, Azeri, andBashkir) would henceforth use variations of the Cyrillic script. It was claimed that the switch was made "by the demands of the working class." Sony Vaio PCG-5G2L Battery

The early years of Soviet nationalities policy, from the early 1920s to the mid-1930s, were guided by the policy of korenizatsiya ("indigenization"), during which the new Soviet regime sought to reverse the long-term effects of Russification on the non-Russian populations.^[10] Sony Vaio PCG-5G3L Battery

As the regime was trying to establish its power and legitimacy throughout the former Russian empire, it went about constructing regional administrative units, recruiting non-Russians into leadership positions, and promoting non-Russian languages in government administration, the courts, the schools, and the mass media. Sony Vaio PCG-5J1L Battery

The slogan then established was that local cultures should be "socialist in content but national in form." That is, these cultures should be transformed to conform with the Communist Party's socialist project for the Soviet society as a whole but have active participation and leadership by the indigenous nationalities and operate primarily in the local languages. Sony Vaio PCG-5J2L Battery

Early nationalities policy shared with later policy the object of assuring control by the Communist Party over all aspects of Soviet political, economic, and social life. The early Soviet policy of promoting what one scholar has described as "ethnic particularism"^[11] and another as "institutionalized multinationality",^[12] had a double goal. Sony Vaio PCG-5K2L Battery

On the one hand, it had been an effort to counter Russian chauvinism by assuring a place for the non-Russian languages and cultures in the newly formed Soviet Union. On the other hand, it was a means to prevent the formation of alternative ethnically based political movements, including pan-Islamism^[13] and pan-Turkism. Sony Vaio PCG-5L1L Battery

One way of accomplishing this was to promote what some regard as artificial distinctions between ethnic groups and languages rather than promoting amalgamation of these groups and a common set of languages based on Turkish or another regional language.^[15] Sony Vaio PCG-6S2L Battery

The Soviet nationalities policy from its early years sought to counter these two tendencies by assuring a modicum of cultural autonomy to non-Russian nationalities within a federal system or structure of government, though maintaining that the ruling Communist Party was monolithic, not federal. Sony Vaio PCG-6S3L Battery

A process of"national-territorial delimitation" (ru:национально-территориальное размежевание) was undertaken to define the official territories of the non-Russian populations within the Soviet Union. The federal system conferred highest status to the titular nationalities of union republics, Sony Vaio PCG-6V1L Battery

and lower status to titular nationalities of autonomous republics, autonomous provinces, and autonomous okrugs. In all, some 50 nationalities had a republic, province, or okrug of which they held nominal control in the federal system. Federalism and the provision of native-language education ultimately left as a legacy a large non-RussianSony Vaio PCG-6W1L Battery

public that was educated in the languages of their ethnic groups and that identified a particular homeland on the territory of the Soviet Union.

By the late 1930s, however, there was a notable policy shift. Purges in some of the national regions, such as Ukraine, had occurred already in the early 1930s. Sony Vaio PCG-7111L Battery

Before the turnabout in Ukraine in 1933, a purge of Veli Ibrahimov and his leadership in the Crimean ASSR in 1929 for "national deviation" led to Russianization of government, education, and the media and to the creation of a special alphabet for Crimean Tatar to replace the Latin alphabet. Sony Vaio PCG-71511M Battery

Of the two dangers thatJoseph Stalin had identified in 1923, now bourgeois nationalism (local nationalism) was said to be a greater threat than Great Russian chauvinism (great power chauvinism). In 1937, Faizullah Khojaev and Akmal Ikramov were removed as leaders of the Uzbek SSR and in 1938, Sony Vaio PCG-6W3L Battery

during the third great Moscow show trial, convicted and subsequently put to death for alleged anti-Soviet nationalist activities.

The Russian language gained greater emphasis. In 1938, Russian became a required subject of study in every Soviet school, Sony Vaio PCG-7113L Battery

including those in which a non-Russian language was the principal medium of instruction for other subjects (e.g., mathematics, science, and social studies). In 1939, non-Russian languages that had been given Latin-based scripts in the late 1920s were given new scripts based on the Cyrillic script. Sony Vaio PCG-7133L Battery

One likely rationale for these decisions was the sense of impending war and that Russian was the language of command in the Red Army.

Before and during World War II, Joseph Stalin deported to Central Asia and Siberia several entire nationalities for their suspected collaboration with the German invaders: Sony Vaio PCG-7Z1L Battery

Volga Germans, Crimean Tatars, Chechens, Ingush, Balkars, Kalmyks, and others. Shortly after the war, he deported many Ukrainians and Balts to Siberia as well.^[17]

After the war the leading role of the Russian people in the Soviet family of nations and nationalities was promoted by Stalin and his successors. Sony Vaio PCG-7Z2L Battery

This shift was most clearly underscored by Communist Party General Secretary Stalin's Victory Day toast to the Russian people in May 1945:

I would like to raise a toast to the health of our Soviet people and, before all, the Russian people. Sony Vaio PCG-8Y1L Battery

I drink, before all, to the health of the Russian people, because in this war they earned general recognition as the leading force of the Soviet Union among all the nationalities of our country.

Naming the Russian nation the primus inter pares was a total turnabout from Stalin's declaration 20 years earlier (heralding the korenizatsiya policy) Sony Vaio PCG-8Y2L Battery

that "the first immediate task of our Party is vigorously to combat the survivals of Great-Russian chauvinism." Although the official literature on nationalities and languages in subsequent years continued to speak of there being 130 equal languages in the USSR,^[19] in practice a hierarchy was endorsed in which some nationalities and languages were given special roles or viewed as having different long-term futures. Sony Vaio PCG-8Z2L Battery

An analysis of textbook publishing found that education was offered for at least one year and for at least the first class (grade) in 67 languages between 1934 and 1980.^[21] However, the educational reforms undertaken after Nikita Khrushchev became First Secretary of the Communist Party in the late 1950s began a process of replacing Sony Vaio PCG-8Z1L Battery

non-Russian schools with Russian ones for the nationalities that had lower status in the federal system or whose populations were smaller or displayed widespread bilingualism already.^[22] Nominally, this process was guided by the principle of "voluntary parental choice." Sony Vaio PCG-7112L Battery

But other factors also came into play, including the size and formal political status of the group in the Soviet federal hierarchy and the prevailing level of bilingualism among parents.^[23] By the early 1970s schools in which non-Russian languages served as the principal medium of instruction operated in 45 languages, Sony Vaio PCG-6W2L Battery

while seven more indigenous languages were taught as subjects of study for at least one class year. By 1980, instruction was offered in 35 non-Russian languages of the peoples of the USSR, just over half the number in the early 1930s.

Moreover, in most of these languages schooling was not offered for the complete 10-year curriculum. Sony Vaio PCG-5K1L Battery

For example, within the RSFSR in 1958–59, full 10-year schooling in the native language was offered in only three languages: Russian, Tatar, and Bashkir.^[24] And some nationalities had minimal or no native-language schooling. By 1962–1963, among non-Russian nationalities that were indigenous to the RSFSR, Sony Vaio VGN-FZ Battery

whereas 27% of children in classes I-IV (primary school) studied in Russian-language schools, 53% of those in classes V-VIII (incomplete secondary school) studied in Russian-language schools, and 66% of those in classes IX-X studied in Russian-language schools. Sony Vaio VGN-FZ140E Battery

Although many non-Russian languages were still offered as a subject of study at a higher class level (in some cases through complete general secondary school – the 10th class), the pattern of using Russian language as the main medium of instruction accelerated after Khrushchev's parental choice program got under way. Sony Vaio VGN-FZ140E/B Battery

Pressure to convert the main medium of instruction to Russian was evidently higher in urban areas. For example, in 1961–62, reportedly only 6% of Tatarchildren living in urban areas attended schools in which Tatar was the main medium of instruction.^[24] Similarly in Dagestan in 1965, Sony Vaio VGN-FZ11S Battery

schools in which the indigenous language was the medium of instruction existed only in rural areas. The pattern was probably similar, if less extreme, in most of the non-Russianunion republics, although in Belarus and Ukraine schooling in urban areas was highly Russianized. Sony Vaio VGN-FZ11L Battery

The promotion of federalism and of non-Russian languages had always been a strategic decision aimed at expanding and maintaining rule by the Communist Party. On the theoretical plane, however, the Communist Party's official doctrine was that eventually nationality differences and nationalities as such would disappear. Sony Vaio VGN-FZ11M Battery

In official party doctrine as it was reformulated in the Third Program of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union introduced by Nikita Khrushchev at the 22ndParty Congress in 1961, although the program stated that ethnic distinctions will eventually disappear and a single lingua franca would be adopted by all nationalities in the Soviet Union, Sony Vaio VGN-FZ11E Battery

"the obliteration of national distinctions, and especially language distinctions, is a considerably more drawn-out process than the obliteration of class distinctions." At the present time, however, Soviet nations and nationalities were undergoing a dual process of further flowering of their cultures and of rapprochement or drawing together Sony Vaio VGN-FZ11Z Battery

(сближение – sblizhenie) into a stronger union. In his Report on the Program to the Congress, Khrushchev used even stronger language: that the process of further rapprochement (sblizhenie) and greater unity of nations would eventually lead to a merging or fusion (слияние – sliyanie) of nationalities.^[26] Sony Vaio VGN-FZ140N Battery

Khrushchev's formula of rapprochement-fusing (sblizhenie-sliyanie) was moderated slightly, however, when Leonid Brezhnev replaced Khrushchev as General Secretary of the Communist Party in 1964 (a post he held until his death in 1982). Brezhnev asserted that sblizhenie would lead ultimately to the complete "unity" (единство – yedinstvo) of nationalities. Sony Vaio VGN-FZ145E Battery

"Unity" was an ambiguous term because it could imply either the maintenance of separate national identities but a higher stage of mutual attraction or similarity between nationalities, or the total disappearance of ethnic differences. In the political context of the time, sblizheniye-yedinstvo was regarded as a softening of the pressure towards Russification that Khrushchev had promoted with his endorsement of sliyanie. Sony Vaio VGN-FZ15 Battery

Sony Vaio VGN-FZ150E Battery

The 24th Party Congress in 1971, however, launched the idea that a new "Soviet people" (Советский народ) was forming on the territory of the USSR, a community for which the common language – the language of the "Soviet people" – was the Russian language, consistent with the role that Russian was playing for the fraternal nations and nationalities in the territory already.Sony Vaio VGN-FZ150E-BC Battery

This new community was labeled a people (народ – narod), not a nation (нация – natsiya), but in that context narod implied an ethnic community, not just a civic or political community.^[27]

Thus, until the end of the Soviet era, a doctrinal rationalization had been provided for some of the practical policy steps that were taken in areas of education and the media. Sony Vaio VGN-FZ15G Battery

First of all, the transfer of many "national schools" (национальные школы) to Russian as a medium of instruction accelerated under Khrushchev in the late 1950s and continued into the 1980s.^[28]

Second, the new doctrine was used to justify the special place of the Russian language as the "language of internationality communication" (язык межнационального общения) Sony Vaio VGN-FZ15L Battery

in the USSR. Use of the term "internationality" (межнациональное) rather than the more conventional "international" (международное) focused on the special internal role of Russian language rather than on its role as a language of international discourse. That Russian was the most widely spoken language, Sony Vaio VGN-FZ15M Battery

and that Russians were the majority of the population of the country, were also cited in justification of the special place of Russian language in government, education, and the media.

At the 27th CPSU Party Congress in 1986, presided over by Mikhail Gorbachev, the 4th Party Program reiterated the formulas of the previous program: Sony Vaio VGN-FZ15S Battery

Characteristic of the national relations in our country are both the continued flourishing of the nations and nationalities and the fact that they are steadily and voluntarily drawing closer together on the basis of equality and fraternal cooperation. Neither artificial prodding nor holding back of the objective trends of development is admissible here. Sony Vaio VGN-FZ15T Battery

In the long term historical perspective this development will lead to complete unity of the nations....

The equal right of all citizens of the USSR to use their native languages and the free development of these languages will be ensured in the future as well. Sony Vaio VGN-FZ18 Battery

At the same time learning the Russian language, which has been voluntarily accepted by the Soviet people as a medium of communication between different nationalities, besides the language of one's nationality, broadens one's access to the achievements of science and technology and of Soviet and world culture. Sony Vaio VGN-FZ18E Battery

Progress in the spread of Russian language as a second language and the gradual displacement of other languages was monitored in Soviet censuses. The Soviet censuses of 1926, 1937, 1939, and 1959, had included questions on "native language" (родной язык) as well as "nationality." Sony Vaio VGN-FZ18M Battery

The 1970, 1979, and 1989 censuses added to these questions one on "other language of the peoples of the USSR" that an individual could "freely command" (свободно владеть). The explicit goal of the new question on "second language" was to monitor the spread of Russian as the language of internationality communication.^[29] Sony Vaio VGN-FZ18L Battery

Each of the official homelands within the Soviet Union was regarded as the eternal and only homeland of the titular nationality and its language, while the Russian language was regarded as the language for interethnic communication for the whole Soviet Union.^[30] As such, for most of the Soviet era, especially after the korenizatsiya (indigenization) Sony Vaio VGN-FZ18G Battery

policy ended in the 1930s, schools in which non-Russian Soviet languages would be taught were not generally available outside the respective ethnically based administrative units of these ethnicities. Some exceptions appeared to involve cases of historic rivalries or patterns of assimilation between neighboring non-Russian groups, Sony Vaio VGN-FZ18S Battery

such as between Tatars and Bashkirs in Russia or among major Central Asian nationalities. For example, even in the 1970s schooling was offered in at least six languages in Uzbekistan: Russian, Uzbek, Tajik, Kazakh, Turkmen, and Karakalpak. Sony Vaio VGN-FZ460E Battery

While formally all languages were equal, in almost all Soviet republics the Russian/local bilingualism was "asymmetric": the titular nation learned Russian, whereas immigrant Russians generally did not learn the local language.

In addition, many non-Russians who lived outside their respective administrative units tended to become Russified linguistically;Sony Vaio VGN-FZ21 Battery

that is, they not only learned Russian as a second language but they also adopted it as their home language or mother tongue – although some still retained their sense of ethnic identity or origins even after shifting their native language to Russian. This includes both the traditional communitiesSony Vaio VGN-FZ21M Battery

(e.g., Lithuanians in the northwestern Belarus (seeEastern Vilnius region) or the Kaliningrad Oblast (see Lithuania Minor)) and the communities that appeared during Soviet times such as Ukrainian or Belarusianworkers in Kazakhstan or Latvia, whose children attended primarily the Russian-language schools and thus the further generations are primarily speaking Russian as their native language; Sony Vaio VGN-FZ21E Battery

for example, for 57% of Estonia's Ukrainians, 70% of Estonia's Belarusians and 37% of Estonia's Latvians claimed Russian is the native language in the last Soviet census of 1989. Russian language as well replaced Yiddish and other languages as the main language of many Jewish communities inside the Soviet Union. Sony Vaio VGN-FZ21S Battery

Another consequence of the mixing of nationalities and the spread of bilingualism and linguistic Russification was the growth of ethnic intermarriage and a process of ethnic Russification—coming to call oneself Russian by nationality or ethnicity, not just speaking Russian as a second language or using it as a primary language. Sony Vaio VGN-FZ21J Battery

In the last decades of the Soviet Union, ethnic Russification (or ethnic assimilation) was moving very rapidly for a few nationalities such as the Karelians andMordvinians.^[31] However, whether children born in mixed families where one of the parents was Russian were likely to be raised as Russians depended on the context. Sony Vaio VGN-FZ21Z Battery

For example, the majority of children in families where one parent was Russian and the other Ukrainian living in North Kazakstan chose Russian as their nationality on their internal passport at age 16. However, children of mixed Russian and Estonian parents living in Tallinn (the capital city of Estonia), Sony Vaio VGN-FZ25 Battery

or mixed Russian and Latvian parents living in Riga (the capital of Latvia), or mixed Russian and Lithuanian parents living in Vilnius (the capital ofLithuania) most often chose as their own nationality that of the titular nationality of their republic – not Russian.^[32] Sony Vaio VGN-FZ31E Battery

More generally, patterns of linguistic and ethnic assimilation (Russification) were complex and cannot be accounted for by any single factor such as educational policy. Also relevant were the traditional cultures and religions of the groups, their residence in urban or rural areas, Sony Vaio VGN-FZ31M Battery

their contact with and exposure to Russian language and to ethnic Russians, and other factors.^[33]

A factor that may have retarded the process of ethnic Russification was the long-established practice of using nationality labels on official documents. Sony Vaio VGN-FZ31S Battery

For example, the "nationality" of Soviet citizens was fixed on their internal passports at age 16, and was essentially determined by the nationality of the parents. Only the children of mixed marriages had a choice: they could choose the nationality of one of their parents. Furthermore, Sony Vaio VGN-FZ31J Battery

an individual's nationality was inscribed on school enrollment records, military service cards (for men), and labor booklets. Although the census question on nationality was supposed to be only subjective and not determined by the official nationality in an individual's passport, Sony Vaio VGN-FZ31B Battery

the fixing of official nationality on so many official records may well have reinforced non-Russian identities.^[34] Among some groups, such as Jews, the ubiquitous use of such an official nationality on identity papers and records was viewed as a factor that fostered discrimination against them. Sony Vaio VGN-FZ32B Battery

Another factor that may also have begun to reduce pressure toward ethnic Russification was that beginning in the late 1960s immigration of Russians to some of the non-Russian republics slowed down or reversed.^[35] There was a net outmigration of Russians from Armenia and Georgia in the 1960s Sony Vaio VGN-FZ32 Battery

(though because of natural increase the number of Russians still increased during this decade). There was also essentially no net immigration or outmigration of Russians in Central Asia in the 1970s, and by the 1980s there was a net outmigration. To the Baltic republics and in the Soviet west (Ukraine, Belarus, and Moldavia), there was only a trickle of net immigration of Russians by the 1980s. Sony Vaio VGN-FZ38M Battery

Furthermore, because of differential fertility rates among ethnic groups, the Russian share of the population of the Soviet Union as a whole declined to just 51 percent by the time of the 1989 census. In the preceding decade Russians had comprised just 33 percent of the net increase in the Soviet population. Sony Vaio VGN-FZ31Z Battery

Assuming that these trends continued, Russians were likely to lose their status as a majority of the Soviet population around the turn of the 21st century. Sony Vaio VGN-FZ35 Battery,Sony Vaio VGN-FZ37 Battery,Sony Vaio VGN-FZ38 Battery