Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-dsjbd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-23T21:41:32.870Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Collapse of the Soviet Union: Nationalism During Perestroika and Afterwards

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 November 2018

Anatoly Khazanov
Anatoly Khazanov*
Affiliation:
University of Wisconsin
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

*“Democracy is next to impossible in a country made up of different nationalities.”

—John Stuart Mill

“I have no doubt that this great Eastern Slav empire … has entered the last decades of its existence … Marxist doctrine has delayed the break-up of the Russian Empire—the Third Rome—but it does not possess the power to prevent it.”

—Andrei Amal'rik

Our times do not make much of prophets. The Soviet dissident, Andrei Amal'rik, went to the Gulag for his prophecy, which nevertheless turned out to be remarkably correct.

Type
II The USSR and Beyond
Information
Nationalities Papers , Volume 22 , Issue 1: Special Issue - Ethnopolitics in Poland , Spring 1994 , pp. 157 - 174
Copyright
Copyright © 1994 Association for the Study of Nationalities of Eastern Europe and ex-USSR 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

*

The work on this article was supported from funds provided by the National Council for Soviet and East European Research, which however is not responsible for its contents and conclusions.

References

Note

1. Mill, John Stuart, Utilitarianism, Liberty, and Representative Government. New York: E. P. Dutton, 1951: 486.Google Scholar

2. Amal'rik, Andrei, Will the Soviet Union Survive Until 1984 ? New York: Harper & Row, Perennial Library, 1971: 65.Google Scholar

3. Few Western scholars have made similar predictions. See, for example, Hélène Carrere D'Encausse, Decline of an Empire: The Soviet Socialist Republics in Revolt. New York: Harper & Row, 1981.Google Scholar

4. See, for example, Keane, John, Democracy and Civil Society. London-New York: Verso, 1988.Google Scholar

5. For more details on the nationalities question in the Soviet Union see Robert Conquest (ed.), The Last Empire. Nationality and the Soviet Future. Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 1986; R. Karklins, Ethnic Relations in the USSR: The Perspective from Below. Boston: Allen & Unwin, 1986; Lubomyr Hajda and Mark Beissinger (eds.), The Nationalities Factor in Soviet Politics and Society. Boulder: Westview Press, 1990, and many other publications.Google Scholar

6. Amal'rik, Andrei. Op. cit.: 64.Google Scholar

7. Aron, Raymond, Democracy and Totalitarianism. Translated by Valence Ionescu. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1968: 222ff.Google Scholar

8. Hobsbawn, Eric J., Nations and Nationalism Since 1780. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991: 173.Google Scholar

9. Kohn, Hans, The Idea of Nationalism. 2nd edition. New York: Collier-Macmillan, 1967; Anthony D. Smith, The Ethnic Origins of Nations. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1986.Google Scholar

10. Khazanov, A. M., “The Current Ethnic Situation in the USSR: Perennial Problems in the Period of ‘Restructuring.'” Nationalities Papers, vol. XVI, No. 2, 1988: 147ff.Google Scholar

11. Cohen, Stephen F., “Gorbachev the Great,” The New York Times. March 11, 1991; it appears that he still holds this opinion, see Stephen F. Cohen, “What's Really Happening in Russia,” The Nation, March 2, 1992: 262–3.Google Scholar

12. Meeting report, Kennan Institute for Advanced Russian Studies, vol. IX, No. 4, 1991.Google Scholar

13. For a general survey of the literature see White, Clovis L., “Comparative Ethnic Stratification: A Critical Review of Theory and Research,” Research in Race and Ethnic Relations, vol. 5, 1988: 1–23.Google Scholar

14. Deutsch, Karl W., “Social Mobilization and Political Development,” American Political Science Review, vol. 55, 1961: 493–513; R. H. Bates, “Ethnic Competition and Modernization in Contemporary Africa,” Comparative Political Studies, 6, 1974: 468; Natan Glazer and Daniel P. Moynihan, “Introduction” in: Nathan Glazer and Daniel P. Moynihan (eds.), Ethnicity. Theory and Experience. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1975: 8; P. B. Brass, “Ethnicity and Nationality Formation,” Ethnicity, vol. 3, 1976: 231–2; Anthony D. Smith, Nationalism in the Twentieth Century. New York: New York University Press, 1979, passim.Google Scholar

15. For a chronicle of events and their analysis see Smith, Graham (ed.), The Nationalities Question in the Soviet Union. London and New York: Longman, 1990; Anatoly M. Khazanov, Soviet Nationality Policy during Perestroika. Falls Church, VA: Delphic, 1991.Google Scholar

16. Pomerants, G., “Po tu storonu zdravogo smysla,” Iskusstvo kino, No. 10, 1989: 26.Google Scholar

17. Izvestiia, April 27, 1990.Google Scholar

18. Izvestiia, September 24, 1989.Google Scholar

19. Pravda, April 6, 1990.Google Scholar

20. Izvestiia, November 24, 1990.Google Scholar

21. Izvestiia, May 25, 1990.Google Scholar

22. Suny, Ronald, “Incomplete Revolution: National Movements and the Collapse of the Soviet Empire,” New Left Review, No. 189, 1991: 119.Google Scholar

23. For a good analysis of the Soviet government's economic policy in 1990 and the beginning of 1991 see Andreev, Sergei, “Traurnyi marsh,” Oktiabr', No. 6, 1991: 161–185.Google Scholar

24. Izvestiia, March 1, 1991.Google Scholar

25. Gellner, Ernest, “Nationalism and Politics in Eastern Europe,” New Left Review, No. 189, 1991: 132.Google Scholar

26. Amal'rik, Andrei. Op. cit.: 64–65.Google Scholar

27. Ponomarev, V., Samodeiatel'nye obshchestvennye organizatsii Kazakhstana i Kirgizii 1987–1991 (opyt spravochnika). Moscow: Institut issledovaniia ekstremal'nykh protsessov, 1991.Google Scholar

28. See, for example, Mlechin, L., Chernova, T., “Why politicians become bureaucrats,” New Times, No. 47, November 26–December 2, 1991: 15; A. Rubinov, “Novaia Staraia Ploshchad?” Literaturnaia gazeta, January 1, 1992: 11; V. Vyzhutovich, “Old Games in Old Square,” Moscow News, No. 1, January 5–12, 1992: 3; “Stopping Corruption is Now a Priority. An Interview with Yu. Boldyrev, Russia's Chief State Inspector,” Moscow News, No. 13, March 29–April 5, 1992: 7.Google Scholar

29. “Nomenklaturnae podpol'e beret pod kontrol’ administratsiiu presidenta Rossii,” an analytical report of the Center for Independent Research, Nezavisimaia gazeta, January 24, 1992: 2.Google Scholar

30. Pertsevaya, L., “Reproduction by Division,” Moscow News, No. 18, May 3–10, 1992: 10.Google Scholar

31. Bunich, A., “Lakomnyi kusok,” Literaturnaia gazeta, February 5, 1992: 10.Google Scholar

32. Todros, V., “‘Novaia russkaia pravaia’ rodulas',” Nezavisimaia gazeta, February 11, 1992; E. Krasnikov, “General Rutskoi vernylsia v stroi,” Nezavisimaia gazeta, February 13, 1992: 2.Google Scholar

33. Ionin, L., “A coup tomorrow?” New Times, No. 51, December 24–30, 1991: 4–6.Google Scholar

34. Putko, A., “Nastroeniia v armii bespokoiat i samikh voennykh,” Nezavisimaia gazeta, February 5, 1992: 3.Google Scholar

35. Vitkovskaya, G., “Forced Migrants,” Moscow News, No. 11, March 15–22, 1992: 11.Google Scholar