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This article examines the impact the war in Ukraine has had on Russia's great power status. Post-Soviet Russia has been one of the most active status-seekers and sought to re-establish its rank among the existing great power status community. In its claim to high status, Russia has historically relied on traditional status markers, including its permanent seat at the UN Security Council, diplomatic prominence at the summits with other great powers, and the strength of its military. However, as this paper shows, Moscow's fateful choice to launch a war against Ukraine has led to considerable slippage of its status. Russia now struggles to get things done at international fora and has also faced increased diplomatic isolation. Moreover, the war – especially the struggles of the Russian armed forces – challenged Russia's claim of great military power and an exclusive security provider in the former Soviet space. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Russia's post-1991 nation-building project has been torn between competing interpretations of national identity. Whereas the other former Soviet republics opted for nation-building centered on the titular nation, Russia's approach to national identity was framed by the fact that the RSFSR had been defined not as a designated national homeland but as a multi-ethnic federation. This, coupled with Russia's definition as the legal successor of the Soviet Union, suggesting continuity and a history of uninterrupted statehood, has enabled a range of rivaling understandings of how to define the "nation." Focusing on top-down official nation-building, this article examines how, against a backdrop of shifting political contexts, structural constraints, and popular attitudes, the Kremlin has gradually revised its understanding of what constitutes the "Russian nation." Four models for post-Soviet Russian nation-building are identified – the ethnic, the multi-national, the civic, and the imperial. Over time, the correlation of forces among these has shifted. The article concludes that, despite some claims of an ethno-nationalist turn after 2014, the Kremlin still employs nationalism instrumentally: National identity has undoubtedly become more russkii- centered, but, at the same time, the Kremlin keeps the definition of "Russianness" intentionally vague, blurring the boundaries between "nation" and "civilization." [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Does religiosity make people happy? Many studies document positive associations between religiosity and various forms of subjective well-being. This holds true for general life satisfaction as well, both under normal economic conditions and in the case of economic shocks. However, both life satisfaction and religiosity may be correlated with unobserved individual and household traits or unobserved life shocks, which can relate to reverse causality. These facts result in endogeneity problems and make ordinary least square estimates biased. Endogeneity problems refer to situations in which an explanatory variable is correlated with the error term. They usually happen when an unobserved or omitted variable affects both independent and dependent variables. In this study, we employed two methods to avoid possible endogeneity issues: fixed effects and instrumental variable estimations. Using data from the Russian Longitudinal Monitoring Survey (RLMS-HSE) and different econometric models, we document positive associations between religiosity and life satisfaction. In particular, fixed effect and instrumental variable regressions provide evidence for a positive effect of religiosity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, the aggressive promotion of conservative ideology in Russia has increased. People with 'nonconventional' gender identities are problematized in the state mass media and completely excluded from the public space. This pressure is an incentive for the development of educational initiatives and groups of support for the community. Empirical data were collected through 14 in-depth interviews with LGBTQ people in Saint-Petersburg. Using the "scene approach" for analysis of youth activities allow researching not only actors and practices within the scene but also space where interactions occur. The emphasis of this article is on relations within the LGBTQ scene. The key question focus is on how participants of the LGBTQ scene understand the effectiveness of their actions and how they cope with a burnout in the hostile context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Ukraine crisis is usually treated either as Russia's return to the old-style empire-building (the right) or as a clash of two imperialisms (the left). However, the essence of this crisis can be understood only from the dual perspective of the consequences of the Stalinist degeneration of the Russian Revolution and the fate of the modern global capitalism. The most rotten sections of the Soviet bureaucracy moved the society to capitalism. However, this effort could secure only a peripheral (Ukraine) or at best semi-peripheral (Russia) position in the capitalist world-system as a provider of cheap raw materials. Meanwhile, modern capitalism led to world economic crisis. In these conditions, the capital of the core capitalist countries obviously decided to strengthen its control over the periphery, and Russia's aspirations to secure its domination over the former Soviet space were in the way. To thwart them, Western powers decided to provoke a Ukraine crisis, exploiting Ukrainians' justified indignation at the backwardness and corruption inherent in their own peripheral capitalism. Hence, a study of the properties of the post-Soviet societies and their place in the world hierarchy is the key to understanding the Ukraine crisis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The annexation of Crimea and the Russia enabled rebellion in Donbas created a need for radical improvements of Ukrainian military capability. This study discusses how different, mostly domestic, reform drivers and reform impeding factors had impact on the pace of Ukrainian top-down defence reform in the period since the confrontation with Russia started in 2014. It concludes that reform has been uneven, and that while vested organizational interests and dominant organizational ideas explain much of the slowness of reform, also corruption played a significant role. Furthermore, the Ukrainian case demonstrates how foreign pressure was important to facilitate reform even in a country that found itself facing the danger of major war. Nevertheless, the study does confirm previous findings that a "threat of defeat in war" in the end overcome domestic restraints to defence reform. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: This article develops an empirical model that tests whether in post‐communist Russia prior membership in a civil society organization (CSO) motivates civic activism. Revisiting Tocquevillian notions of a nurturing effect by formal civil society organizations of civic activism, we aim to help explain recent research findings showing that civic activism is sustainable and vital in Russia. Methods: To test the main hypothesis of the study, we use the cross‐sectional survey of Russians aged 18 and older in the fall of 2014 (N = 1,500) representing 43 regions conducted by the Russian Civil Society Monitoring Survey of the Higher School of Economics' Centre for Studies of Civil Society and the Nonprofit Sector (2006–). We use the propensity score matching (PSM) technique to estimate the main effects. We also show that the effect of unobserved factors on our PSM estimates is limited using Rosenbaum bounds analysis. Results: The PSM analysis suggests that for all four indicators of civic activism, that is, willingness to integrate with other members of society, participation in tenant meetings, engagement in charity activities, and engagement in home improvement, CSO participation positively impacts civic activism. The impact varies from a 7.2 to 15.8 percent higher propensity of civic activism for CSO participants. Conclusion: We conclude that prior participation in a CSO can have a motivating influence on civic activism such as charity work, residential home improvement, willingness to integrate with other members of the society, and participation in tenant meetings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article explores the history of and current relations (as of 2019) between Russia and Lebanon. Topics discussed include business deals between the Russian natural gas producer Novatek and the Lebanese government, the substantial Christian community in Lebanon and the network of religious and secular organizations formed to lobby for Moscow's interests in Lebanon by President Vladimir Putin. The author reports that Russia's growing influence in the country is worrying to some Lebanese politicians. The political and social climate in Syria is also examined.

The author asserts that the Russian state is incoherent and that the increasing authoritarian government should not repeat the mistakes of the old Soviet Union. Topics discussed include the rise of bureaucracy in the elite class, forms of resistance from Russians although they do not actively protest, and parallel processes that make an incoherent Russian state including the government's withdrawal from its social protector role, state paternalism and the exploitation of ordinary people.

The essence and main characteristics of the hybrid war are reviewed as a means of destroying the enemy country from inside due to the effective combination of conventional armed forces, subversion, propaganda, and dissemination of misinformation. The hybrid tactics used by the Russian Federation in Ukraine and Georgia are investigated. A comparativeanalysisof the military component in the confrontation between Russia, Ukraine and Georgia is conducted, the peculiarities of informational and psychological confrontation and factors that led to the significant achievements of the Russian side in the hybrid warfare are revealed, economic aspect of the hybrid confrontation are clarified (especially regarding the factors of financial, energy and raw material dependence) and, finally, the key conditions for the widespread use of hybrid methods of confrontation during modern armed conflicts are identified. Thedifference is proved between conflicts in Georgia and Ukraine, mainly in the use of military means. It is established that the conditions for the conflict in Crimea were unique, or at least extremely rare, and they can hardly be reproduced in any other place. It is noted that in the future, hybrid war will become rather a situational phenomenon, because the implementation of aggressive actions against another state without the necessary conditions for it will lead either to a quick defeat of the aggressor state, or will force such a state to move toconventional warfare, which requires significant financial costs and inevitably will cause decline in the prestige of such a state within the international community. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Tocqueville Review -- La Revue Tocqueville is the property of University of Toronto Press and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This article addresses the question of how the Crimean case relates to Russia's general understanding of territorial questions and border regimes. We examine the historical evolution of Russian discourse on borders and territorial questions and investigate to what extent they can explain Russia's decision to annex Crimea. We will look into the principles of inviolability of borders and territorial integrity that sustain the status quo, and how this has been challenged by three partly interlinked doctrines: national self-determination, geopolitics, and historical rights. We argue that the discourse on territorial integrity and the status quo has predominated in Russia since the Cold War, and that this has not changed fundamentally, either before or after the annexation of Crimea. Russia does not seem to want to abolish the existing norms altogether or to advocate any clearly articulated reformist agenda. Rather, it picks and chooses arguments on an ad hoc basis, imitating Western positions in some other cases when departing from the basic norm of the status quo. Hence, we claim that Russia's territorial revisionism is reactive, self-serving, and constrained by the desire to avoid changing the status quo doctrine to any great extent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A personal narrative is presented which explores the author's experience as a British immigrant and a language specialist in Russia.

This article analyses post-Soviet Russian nation building through examining the contradictions of 'ethnic' and 'civic' nation building processes. In so doing, this paper argues Shevel's (2011) characterization of post-Soviet Russia's nation-building as 'purposefully ambiguous', further discussing the legal framework of Russia's nation building and contemporary policies of the Russian government. As a result, this article proposes to characterize post-Soviet Russian nation building as a 'sufficiently flexible' combination of controversial ethnic and civic nationalisms with 'a Russian flavour'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

From the early 1990s through the 2008 "Russo-Georgian war," waves of armed conflicts in the Abkhazia and South Ossetia/Tskhinvali regions of Georgia forced thousands of residents, mainly ethnic Georgians, to leave their homes. More than two decades of protracted internal displacement, marked by tough economic and social problems, led this vulnerable community to a common trap in reckoning with the past: an overwhelming sense of the fundamental ruptures between the idealized past and current, miserable reality. Failures of the displacement policy and "side effects" of numerous humanitarian aid projects hinder internally displaced persons' social integration and leave them on the margins of Georgian society with almost a singular option: to constantly recall meaningful life in the lost homeland, which they remember as free of ethnic phobias and economic problems. In this article, we suggest that for persons who are internally displaced, memories are defined not only by their past lived experiences and present hardships, but also by the official historical narratives that argue that Georgian-Abkhazian and Georgian-Ossetian "endemic" unity and cohabitation was destroyed by Russian imperial politics. Living in constant pain also narrows the future expectations of the internally displaced persons. However, it is the past and the memories that are supposed to be useful in achieving the utopian dream of a return. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented to three articles published within the issue that explore how Neoacademism, created by artist and impresario Timur Novikov became the most important artistic movements to take shape in Russia in the 1990s.

Copyright of Dilemas Contemporáneos: Educación, Política y Valores is the property of Dilemas Contemporaneos: Educacion, Politica y Valores and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Abstract This paper examines the process of how Crimean Tatars strived to attain group-differentiated rights since they have returned to their homeland in the early 1990s. Whereas the politics of minority rights were viewed through security lens in earlier literature, we emphasize the significance of cultural constructs in influencing the minority policies, based on qualitative content analysis of "speech acts" of elites, and movement and policy documents. Focusing on the interaction of the framing processes of Crimean Tatars with the Crimean regional government, Ukraine, and Russia, we argue that the "neo-Stalinist frame" has played a major role in denying the rights of Crimean Tatars for self-determination and preservation of their ethnic identity in both pre and post annexation Crimea. The Crimean Tatars counter-framed against neo-Stalinist frame both in the pre and post-annexation period by demanding their rights as "indigenous people". Ukraine experienced a frame transformation after the Euromaidan protests, by shifting from a neo-Stalinist frame into a "multiculturalist frame", which became evident in recognition of the Crimean Tatar status as indigenous people of Crimea. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article studies contemporary Russian liberal establishment from the point of view of the main actors' propensity to consolidate. The authors identify distinguishing features of liberalism in Russia that determine the possible trends of cohesive interactions between the key actors and conclude that the main driver of consolidation is the protest and opposition to the current regime which is supported by the majority of population who tend to stigmatize the liberal activists due to that reason. The evidence of relatedness fluctuation is derived using the linkage index, introduced by the authors. The index is calculated using the results of actors' discourse analysis based on social networks data (Twitter): mutual mentions and their contextual sentiments are taken to weigh pairs of actors regarding their unanimity or contradiction. Dynamic interpretation of calculated indexes of consolidation in the two broad periods, different in levels of information pressure from the mainstream media, provides evidence of consolidation change, and allows to identify key drivers of cohesion and attributable followers. The authors apply social network analysis techniques to verify the findings and to determine tiers of key liberal actors and their clusters. Concluding remarks provide interpretation of empiric study results and links to further development of consolidation research methodology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines the failure of a Russian middle class to emerge and thrive following the fall of the Soviet Union. It cites the destruction of aristocracy and the creation of institutions and policies that provided a high degree of social mobility in Russia starting in 1991. It also examines how education created economic opportunities for Russians, as well as the manner in which oligarchs transformed their political capital into new forms of advantage.

The article explores the influence of external actors on the Russian foreign policy after the collapse of the Soviet Union. It identifies the tactics used by Russia in its foreign policy, including military intervention, fostering separatism and ethnic conflict, and supporting economic coercion. The effort of the European Union (EU) to engage with Russia is discussed, as well as the country's use of both hard and soft power in its foreign policy. In addition, the article analyzes the implications of the Ukraine crisis for Russia's foreign policy.

ABSTRACT Eberstadt seeks to illuminate recent demographic trends in Russia through the analysis of data with commentary. Eberstadt concentrates on four principle areas of crisis: Russia's paradox of high levels of education but very low levels of human capital, its disastrous health profile, the problem of "knowledge production", and an outlook on demographics and human resources. The picture that Eberstadt paints through his visual charts and graphs is a very pessimistic one for the Russian Federation. Clear commentary on the data provides the reader with a greater contextualization of why Russia is not a fully developed nation in terms of economics, health, and the production of knowledge. Indeed, as Eberstadt shows, Russia lags behind many developing nations in indices of morbidity and mortality and indicators of advanced economies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the developing cult of a new martyr – the Russian soldier Evgenii Rodionov, killed in 1996 in Chechen captivity, allegedly for his refusal to convert to Islam. I examine how the notion of moral personhood – a capacity to have convictions and values and to stand by them – emerges as a central object of ethical problematization across the disparate narratives of the soldier’s death. I argue that the appeal of the radical model of morality personified by the soldier’s figure reflects a pervasive trend of longing for spirituality in contemporary Russia, which developed in response to the perceived moral collapse that followed the democratic transition. Through investigating how Evgenii’s image is being employed as a public symbol of patriotism and as a private moral exemplar for militaristically oriented young men, this article contributes to the understanding of the entangled relationship among religion, nationalism and conservative morality in contemporary Russia. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Copyright of Yearbook of European Integration / Rocznik Integracji Europejskiej is the property of Faculty of Political Science & Journalism, Adam Mickiewicz University and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

After several decades of negative trends and short-term fluctuations, life expectancy has been increasing in Russia since 2004. Between 2003 and 2014, the length of life rose by 6.6 years among males and by 4.6 years among females. While positive trends in life expectancy are observed in all regions of Russia, these trends are unfolding differently in different regions. First, regions entered the phase of life expectancy growth at different points in time. Second, the age- and cause-specific components of the gains in life expectancy and the number of years added vary noticeably. In this paper, we apply decomposition techniques-specifically, the stepwise replacement algorithm-to examine the age- and cause-specific components of the changes in inter-regional disparities during the current period of health improvement. The absolute inter-regional disparities in length of life, measured by the population-weighted standard deviation, decreased slightly between 2003 and 2014, from 3.3 to 3.2 years for males, and from 2.0 to 1.8 years for females. The decomposition of these small changes by ages and causes of death shows that these shifts were the result of diverse effects of mortality convergence at young and middle ages, and of mortality divergence at older ages. With respect to causes of death, the convergence is mainly attributable to external causes, while the inter-regional divergence of trends is largely determined by cardiovascular diseases. The two major cities, Moscow and Saint Petersburg, are currently pioneering mortality improvements in Russia and are making the largest contributions to the inter-regional divergence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper analyzes the situation that has been developed after the collapse of the former USSR in the scientific and technical complex of the Russian Federation, which, according to the authors, developed from a crisis situation to a catastrophic one. The conclusion is drawn that its degradation was caused not only by the general paralysis of the socioeconomic sphere, and also by the lack of a conceptually elaborated state industrial, scientific and technical and innovation policy, by the weakness of the legal framework and the erroneous priorities chosen at that time by the reformers. In general, the state scientific and technical policy in the period under review was characterized by inconsistency and persistently unrealized plans. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A large literature expects rising middle classes to promote democracy. However, few studies provide direct evidence on this group in nondemocratic settings. This article focuses on politically important differentiation within the middle classes, arguing that middle-class growth in state-dependent sectors weakens potential coalitions in support of democratization. I test this argument using surveys conducted at mass demonstrations in Russia and detailed population data. I also present a new approach to studying protest based on case-control methods from epidemiology. The results reveal that state-sector professionals were significantly less likely to mobilize against electoral fraud, even after controlling for ideology. If this group had participated at the same rate as middle-class professionals from the private sector, I estimate that another 90,000 protesters would have taken to the streets. I trace these patterns of participation to the interaction of individual resources and selective incentives. These findings have implications for authoritarian stability and democratic transitions. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]