Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gbm5v Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-12T14:25:13.812Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Russian nationalists in the Komi Republic: a case study of the Frontier of the North

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 November 2018

Aleksandr G. Kuzmin
Affiliation:
Department of History, Political Science, and Sociology, Syktyvkar State University, Syktyvkar, Russia
Anastasia V. Mitrofanova*
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, Financial University under the Government of the Russian Federation, Moscow, Russia Department of Religion Studies, Moscow Orthodox Institute of St. John the Divine, Moscow, Russia
*
Corresponding author. Email: anastasia-mit@mail.ru

Abstract

The article examines some generic traits of the “new” Russian ethnic nationalism, namely, de-ideologization of the nationalist milieu and its inclination for civic activism. It results from a case study of the Frontier of the North (FN – Syktyvkar), an ideologically ambivalent organization that combines dual Russian/Komi ethnic nationalism, anti-migration sentiments, white racism, and fragments of other ideologies. The article demonstrates that, unlike nationalists of the previous generation, FN is not hostile to public authorities and is ready to cooperate with them. FN's grassroots activism, as well as sports and healthy recreational activities, attracts young people. The organization tackles the most acute social problems, often neglected by everyone else, and has become a working civil society institution. The authors argue that these tactics win the “new” nationalists sympathy among ordinary people and makes the groups politically stronger and more influential than the previous nationalist generation. However, state anti-extremist policy hampers the advancement of nationalists into mainstream politics.

Type
Special Section: Perspectives on Russian Nationalism
Copyright
Copyright © 2017 Association for the Study of Nationalities 

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.)

References

Allen, Chris. 2011. “Opposing Islamification or Promoting Islamophobia? Understanding the English Defence League.” Patterns of Prejudice 45 (4): 279294.Google Scholar
Al'perovich, Natalia, and Iudina, Vera. 2016. “Dvizhenie ultrapravykh v situatsii davleniia.” In Ksenofobiia, svoboda sovesti i antiekstremizm v Rossii v 2015 godu, edited by Verkhovsky, Alexander, 772. Moscow: SOVA Center.Google Scholar
Avdoshkin, Yurii. 2013. “Stenoshnyi boi kak sredstvo vospitaniia.” Rubezh Severa, March 11. http://rubsev.ru/2013/03/yurij-avdoshkin-stenoshnyj-boj-kak-sredstvo-vospitaniya-3/.Google Scholar
Belov, Aleksandr. 2006. “Stolknovenie s Vostokom neizbezhno. Interv'u.” Segodnya.ru, February 1. http://www.segodnia.ru/content/24592.Google Scholar
Berezin, Mabel. 2007. “Revisiting the French National Front: The Ontology of a Political Mood.” Journal of Contemporary Ethnography 36 (2): 129146.Google Scholar
Betz, Hans-Georg. 2013. “A Distant Mirror: Nineteenth-Century Populism, Nativism, and Contemporary Right-Wing Radical Politics.” Democracy and Security 9 (3): 200220.Google Scholar
Blee, Kathleen M. 1993. “Evidence, Empathy, and Ethics: Lessons from Oral Histories of the Klan.” The Journal of American History 80 (2): 596606.Google Scholar
Blee, Kathleen M. 1996. “Becoming a Racist: Women in Contemporary Ku Klux Klan and Neo-Nazi Groups.” Gender and Society 10 (6): 680702.Google Scholar
Blee, Kathleen M. 1998. “White-Knuckle Research: Emotional Dynamics in Fieldwork with Racist Activists.” Qualitative Sociology 21 (4): 381399.Google Scholar
Blee, Kathleen M. 2002. Inside Organized Racism: Women in the Hate Movement. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Blee, Kathleen M. 2007. “Ethnographies of the Far Right.” Journal of Contemporary Ethnography 36 (2): 119128.Google Scholar
BNK. 2012. “Patrioticheskala komi molodezh sozdala ‘ZyrIanskii soyuz.”’ BNK, February 19. http://www.bnkomi.ru/data/news/11868.Google Scholar
Bobrov, Igor, Cherepanov, Maksim, and Shishelyakina, Alena. 2013. “Russkii natsionalizm v Tiumenskom regione: transformatsiIa organizatsionnykh form, idei i strategii.” Politia (4): 106113.Google Scholar
Bukhantsev, Sergei. 2010a. “Kak utaili ot nas drevniuiu komi istoriiu.” Rubezh Severa, August 8. http://rubsev.ru/2010/08/sergej-buxancev-kak-utaili-ot-nas-drevnyuyu-komi-istoriyu/.Google Scholar
Bukhantsev, Sergei. 2010b. “Komi-Arii i rasovyi vopros.” Rubezh Severa, June 27. http://rubsev.ru/2010/06/s-buxancev-komi-arii-i-rasovyj-vopros/.Google Scholar
Lange, De, Sarah, L., and David, Art. 2011. “Fortuyn Versus Wilders: An Agency-Based Approach to Radical Right Party Building.” West European Politics 34 (6): 12291249.Google Scholar
Demintseva, Ekaterina, ed. 2013. Rasizm, ksenofobiia, diskriminatsiia. Kakimi my ikh uvideli…. Moscow: Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie. Dnevnik pravoslavnogo zyrianina. 2014. “Vybory Glavy Respubliki Komi. My nachinaem!” Dnevnik pravoslavnogo zyrianina, June 17. http://kolegov-a-o.livejournal.com/2014/06/17/.Google Scholar
Due Enstad, Johannes. 2013. “Maksim ‘The Hatchet’ Martsinkevich: The Activist and the Ideologist.” Paper presented at the 45th Annual Convention of the Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies, Boston, MA, November 2124.Google Scholar
Due Enstad, Johannes. 2016. “‘Glory to Breivik!': The Russian Far Right and the 2011 Norway Attacks.” Terrorism and Political Violence 10 (3): 120.Google Scholar
Eatwell, Roger, and Mudde, Cas, ed. 2009. Western Democracies and the New Extreme Right Challenge. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Ekishev, Yurii. 2005. “Chto plokhogo v “puchke'? Interv'u.’ Zyrianskaia zhizn”, November 6. http://www.zyryane.info/articles/page-1704.html.Google Scholar
Ekishev, Yurii. 2009. “Ia vybral etot put'. Interv'u.” Zavtra, January 1.Google Scholar
Ezekiel, Raphael S. 1995. The Racist Mind: Portraits of American Neo-Nazis and Klansmen. New York: Viking.Google Scholar
Ezekiel, Raphael S. 2002. “An Ethnographer Looks at Neo-Nazi and Klan Groups: The Racist Mind Revisited.” American Behavioral Scientist 46 (1): 5171.Google Scholar
Fangen, Katrine 1999. “On the Margins of Life: Life Stories of Radical Nationalists.” Acta Sociologica 42 (4): 357–373. Ganiushkina, Eleonora. 2014. “Protestnyi diskurs ‘Russkogo marsha'.” Vlast' (6): 140144.Google Scholar
Goodwin, Matthew J. 2006. “The Rise and Faults of the Internalist Perspective in Extreme Right Studies.” Representation 42 (4): 347364.Google Scholar
Horvath, Robert. 2014. “Russkii Obraz and the Politics of ‘Managed Nationalism'.” Nationalities Papers 42 (3): 469488.Google Scholar
Jurczyszyn, Lukasz. 2011. “Russian Radical Nationalist Interpretation of the French Riots of November 2005.” Demokratizatsiya, the Journal of Post-Soviet Democratization 19 (3): 277285.Google Scholar
Kimmel, Michael. 2007. “Racism as Adolescent Male Rite of Passage: Ex-Nazis in Scandinavia.” Journal of Contemporary Ethnography 36 (2): 202218.Google Scholar
Klandermans, Bert, and Mayer, Nonna, eds. 2006. Extreme Right Activists in Europe: Through the Magnifying Glass. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Kolegov, Aleksei. 2013. Interview with Anastasia Mitrofanova, November 2, Syktyvkar.Google Scholar
Kolst⊘, Pål. 2014. “Russia's Nationalists Flirt with Democracy.” Journal of Democracy 25 (3): 120134.Google Scholar
Kolst⊘, Pål. 2016. “The Ethnification of Russian Nationalism.” In The New Russian Nationalism: Imperialism, Ethnicity and Authoritarianism 2000–2015, edited by Kolst⊘, Pål and Blakkisrud, Helge, 1845. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.Google Scholar
Kolst⊘, Pål, and Blakkisrud, Helge, eds. 2016. The New Russian Nationalism: Imperialism, Ethnicity and Authoritarianism 2000–2015. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.Google Scholar
Krasnov, Petr. 2012. “V Pomozdino proshel uchreditel'nyi s”ezd ‘Zyrianskogo soiuza'.” Rubezh Severa, February 19. http://rubsev.ru/2012/02/v-pomozdino-proshel-uchreditelnyj-sezd-zyryanskogo-soyuza/.Google Scholar
Kuzmin, Aleksandr G. 2011. Russkii radikal'nyi natsionalizm v sovremennoi Rossii: traditsii i evolutsiia. Syktyvkar: SGU.Google Scholar
Laruelle, Marlène, ed. 2007. Sovremennye interpretatsii russkogo natsionalizma. Stuttgart: Ibidem.Google Scholar
Laruelle, Marlène, ed. 2008. Russkii natsionalizm: sotsialnyi i kulturnyi kontekst. Moscow: Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie.Google Scholar
Laruelle, Marlène. 2009a. In the Name of the Nation: Nationalism and Politics in Contemporary Russia. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.Google Scholar
Laruelle, Marlène, ed. 2009b. Russian Nationalism and the National Reassertion of Russia. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Laruelle, Marlène. 2010. “The Ideological Shift on the Russian Radical Right: From Demonizing the West to Fear of Migrants.” Problems of Post-Communism 57 (6): 1931.Google Scholar
Laruelle, Marlène. 2014. “Russkii natsionalizm kak oblast” nauchnykh issledovanii.” Pro et Contra (1–2): 5472.Google Scholar
Laruelle, Marlène. 2015. “The Three Colors of Novorossiya, or the Russian Nationalist Mythmaking of the Ukrainian Crisis.” Post-Soviet Affairs 32 (1): 5574.Google Scholar
Lindberg, Jonas. 2011. “The Uses of Christianity in Nordic Nationalist Parties’ Opposition to Islam.” Swedish Missiological Themes 99 (2): 137156.Google Scholar
Linden, Annette, and Klandermans, Bert. 2007. “Revolutionaries, Wanderers, Converts, and Compliants: Life Histories of Extreme Right Activists.” Journal of Contemporary Ethnography 36 (2): 184201.Google Scholar
Macklin, Graham. 2013. “Transnational Networking on the Far Right: The Case of Britain and Germany.” West European Politics 36 (1): 176198.Google Scholar
Mammone, Andrea, Codin, Emmanuel, and Jenkins, Brian, ed. 2013. Varieties of Right-Wing Extremism in Europe. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Mareš, Miroslav, and Laryš, Martin. 2015. “The Transnational Relations of the Contemporary Russian Extreme Right.” Europe-Asia Studies 67 (7): 10561078.Google Scholar
Mitrofanova, Anastasia. 2012. “Le nouveau nationalisme en Russie.” Hérodote: Revue de géographie et de géopolitique (144): 141153.Google Scholar
Mitrofanova, Anastasia. 2016. “Russian Ethnic Nationalism and Religion Today.” In The New Russian Nationalism: Imperialism, Ethnicity and Authoritarianism 2000–2015, edited by Kolst⊘, Pål and Blakkisrud, Helge, 104131. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.Google Scholar
Omel'chenko, Elena. 2014. “Skinkhed-identichnost” v lokal'nom kontekste: gomosotsialnost”, intimnost” i telo boitsa.” Etnograficheskoe obozrenie (1): 6178.Google Scholar
Oskolova, Tatiana, Cherepanov, Maksim, and Shisheliakina, Alena. 2015. “Nationalism in a Russian Multicultural Region.” Social Science Quarterly 96 (3): 860872.Google Scholar
Pain, Emil”. 2014. “Ksenofobiia i natsionalizm v epokhu rossiiskogo bezvremen'ia.” Pro et Contra (1–2): 3453.Google Scholar
Pain, Emil', and Prostakov, Sergei. 2014. “Mnogolikii russkii natsionalizm. Ideino-politicheskie raznovidnosti (2001–2014 gg.).” Polis (4): 96113.Google Scholar
Pierobon, Chiara. 2014. “Political Youth Organizations, Music and National Identity in Contemporary Russia.” Journal of Studies in Transition Societies 6 (2): 3956.Google Scholar
Pilkington, Hilary, Garifzianova, Al'bina, and Omel'chenko, Elena. 2010. Russia's Skinheads: Exploring and Rethinking Subcultural Lives. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Portnov, Aleksei. 2014. “Russkie natsionalisty ulits novogo tipa: noveishchaia istoriia.” Vestnik Saratovskogo gosudarstvennogo sotsial'no-ekonomicheskogo universiteta (4): 140144.Google Scholar
Rogatchevski, Andrei. 2007. “The National Bolshevik Party (1993–2001): A Brief Timeline.” New Zealand Slavonic Journal 41: 90112.Google Scholar
Severa, Rubezh. 2009. “Syktyvkarskie fanaty futbol'nykh komand ob”edinilis’ na pochve khokkeia.” Rubezh Severa, June 19. http://rubsev.ru/2009/06/syktyvkarskie-fanaty/.Google Scholar
Severa, Rubezh. 2013a. “Pozdravliaem soratnika!” Rubezh Severa, June 7. http://rubsev.ru/2013/06/pozdravlyaem-soratnika-3/.Google Scholar
Severa, Rubezh. 2013b. “ “14 slov” Russkogo Marsha.” Rubezh Severa, November 4. http://rubsev.ru/2013/11/14-slov-russkogo-marsha/.Google Scholar
Rydgren, Jens. 2007. “The Sociology of the Radical Right.” Annual Review of Sociology 33: 241262.Google Scholar
Sehgal, Meera. 2007. “Manufacturing a Feminized Siege Mentality: Hindu Nationalist Paramilitary Camps for Women in India.” Journal of Contemporary Ethnography 36: 165183.Google Scholar
Sezina, Irina. 2013. “Skinkhedy v Rossii: osobennosti subkul'turnogo koda i identifikatory.” Teoriia mody: odezhda, telo, kultura (1): 255271.Google Scholar
Shabaev, Iurii P. 2007. “Respublika Komi: Meniaiushchiesia liki migrantskogo soobshchestva.” Etnograficheskoe obozrenie (5): 3954.Google Scholar
Shlapentokh, Dmitry. 2012. “Russian Nationalists as Georgian Allies.” Iran and the Caucasus 16: 337353.Google Scholar
Shnirel'man, Vladimir. 2012. Russkoe rodnoverie: neoiazychestvo i natsionalizm v sovremennoi Rossii. Moscow: BBI.Google Scholar
Smyth, Lisa, and Mitchell, Claire. 2008. “Researching Conservative Groups: Rapport and Understanding Across Moral and Political Boundaries.” International Journal of Social Research Methodology 11 (5): 441452.Google Scholar
Sokolov, Mikhail. 1999. “Printsipy segmentirovaniia auditorii i ideologicheskii repertuar radikal'-nogo natsionalisticheskogo dvizheniia.” Teleskop: Sankt-Peterburgskii zhurnal sotsiologicheskikh i marketingovykh issledovanii (6): 1018.Google Scholar
Sokolov, Mikhail. 2001. “Strategiia politicheskoi kontrkul'tury v russkom radikal'nom natsionalisticheskom dvizhenii.” Rubezh: al'manakh sotsial'nykh issledovanii (16–17): 128139.Google Scholar
Sokolov, Mikhail. 2002. “Struktura i logika neterpimosti v russkom radikal'nom natsionalisticheskom dvizhenii.” Zhurnal sotsiologii i sotsial'noi antropologii 5 (3): 130140.Google Scholar
Sokolov, Mikhail. 2006. “Russkoe natsional'noe edinstvo: analiz politicheskogo stilia radikal'no-natsionalisticheskoi organizatsii.” Polis (1): 6777.Google Scholar
Sokolov, Mikhail. 2008. “Class as Ethnicity: The Rhetoric of the Russian Radical-Nationalist Movement.” Russian Politics and Law 46 (4): 8094.Google Scholar
Spierings, Niels, Zaslove, Andrej, Mugge, Liza M., and de Lange, Sarah L. 2015. “Gender and Populist Radical-Right Politics: An Introduction.” Patterns of Prejudice 49 (1–2): 315.Google Scholar
Tarasov, Aleksandr. 1999. “Skinheads au naturel. Interv'iu s kommentariiami.” Neprikosnovennyi zapas (5): 8188.Google Scholar
Tarasov, Aleksandr. 2000. “Porozhdenie reform: britogolovye, oni zhe skinkhedy.” Svobodnaia mysl” XXI (4): 4053.Google Scholar
Tarasov, Aleksandr. 2006. “Meniaushchiesia skinkhedy: opyt nabliudenia za subkulturoi.” Druzhba narodov (11): 149159.Google Scholar
Tipaldou, Sofia, and Katrin, Uba. 2014. “The Russian Radical Right Movement and Immigration Policy: Do They Just Make Noise or Have an Impact as Well?Europe-Asia Studies 66 (7): 10801101.Google Scholar
Turner-Graham, Emily. 2014. “‘Breivik Is My Hero': The Dystopian World of Extreme Right Youth on the Internet.” Australian Journal of Politics and History 60 (3): 416430.Google Scholar
Upravlenie Federal'noi migratsionnoi sluzhby Rossii po Respublike Komi. 2016. “Doklad “O migratsionnoi situatsii v Respublike Komi i osnovnykh rezul'tatakh deiatel'nosti UFMS Rossii po Respublike Komi” za 2015 god.” Upravlenie Federal'noi migratsionnoi sluzhby Rossii po Respublike Komi, January 28. http://www.11.fms.gov.ru/ob-upravlenii/pokazateli-deyatelnosti/_1215.docx.Google Scholar
Verkhovsky, Alexander, ed. 2005a. Tsena nenavisti: natsionalizm v Rossii i protivodeistvie rasistskim prestupleniyam. Moscow: SOVA Center.Google Scholar
Verkhovsky, Alexander, ed. 2005b. Putiami nesvobody. Moscow: SOVA Center.Google Scholar
Verkhovsky, Alexander, ed. 2006. Russkii natsionalizm: ideologiia i nastroenie. Moscow: SOVA Center.Google Scholar
Verkhovsky, Alexander, ed. 2007. Verkhi i nizy russkogo natsionalizma. Moscow: SOVA Center.Google Scholar
Verkhovsky, Alexander. 2011. “Evolutsia postsovetskogo dvizheniia russkikh natsionalistov.” Vestnik obshchestvennogo mneniia (1): 1135.Google Scholar
Verkhovsky, Alexander, ed. 2014. Rossiia – ne Ukraina: Sovremennye aktsenty natsionalizma. Moscow: SOVA Center.Google Scholar
Verkhovsky, Alexander, and Kozhevnikova, Galina, ed. 2009. Radikal'nyi russkii natsionalizm: struktury, idei, litsa. Moscow: SOVA Center.Google Scholar
Verkhovsky, Alexander, and Strukova, Elena. 2014. “Partiinoe stroitel'stvo na krainem pravom flange rossiiskogo politicheskogo spectra.” Politicheskie issledovaniia (4): 131151.Google Scholar
Virchow, Fabian. 2007. “Performance, Emotion, and Ideology: On the Creation of ‘Collectives of Emotion’ and Worldview in the Contemporary German Far Right.” Journal of Contemporary Ethnography 36 (2): 147164.Google Scholar
Virchow, Fabian. 2013. “Creating a European (Neo-Nazi) Movement by Joint Political Action?” In Comparative Perspective Varieties of Right-Wing Extremism in Europe, edited by Mammone, Andrea, Codin, Emmanuel, and Jenkins, Brian, 197213. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Wodak, Ruth, Khosravinik, Majid, and Mral, Brigitte, eds. 2013. Right-Wing Populism in Europe: Politics and Discourse. London: Bloomsbury Press.Google Scholar
Wolfreys, Jim. 2013. “The European Extreme Right.” In Comparative Perspective Varieties of Right- Wing Extremism in Europe, edited by Mammone, Andrea, Emmanuel Codin, and Brian Jenkins, 1937. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Zuev, Dennis. 2010. “A Visual Dimension of Protest: An Analysis of Interactions During the Russian March.” Visual Anthropology 23: 221253.Google Scholar
Zuev, Dennis. 2013. “The Russian March: Investigating the Symbolic Dimension of Political Performance in Modern Russia.” Europe-Asia Studies 65 (1): 102126.Google Scholar