K A A R I N A A I T A M U R T OA L E K S A N T E R I I N S T I T U T E

K A A R I N A . A I T A M U R T O @ H E L S I N K I . F I

SOUTHERN AND EASTERN MIGRANTS IN RUSSIA

THE RUSSIAN CROSS

REASONS FOR MIGRATION

• Russia is the second biggest receiver of migrant after the USA• Huge inequalities between the living standards• Political pressure in many central Asian countries

RUSSIA NEEDS MIGRANTS

• For the demographics• On such developing areas as Moscow and St.

Petersburg• Migrants are doing the jobs that Russians will not?

HIERARCHIES OF MIGRANTS

• Citizens of Russian Federation• Officially registered migrants• People with ”non-Slavic appearances”• http://nelegal.ru/

THE EVERYDAY LIFE OF A MIGRANT

• Problems in housing• Problems in registration• Raids by the police• Nationalistic gangs• Exploitation by the employer

LEGALTY AND ILLEGALITY

• Not a clear division, but a grey zone• Soviet ”propiska” vs. current registration• Racism and the discussion about the ”illegals”

MIGRATION POLITICS

• Sergey Abashin: there has not been one, but many competing migration policies. No coherent line

• “The National Issue in Russia”, written by the President of Russia, Vladimir Putin and published in Nezavisimaya Gazeta in February in 2012: “The ‘melting pot’ of assimilation is stalling and smoking, unable to ‘digest’ the growing migration flow. In politics, a reflection of this fact has been ‘multiculturalism’, which rejects the notion of integration through assimilation. It elevates the ‘right of minorities to be different’ to the absolute and, at the same time, fails to balances this right with civil, behavioral, and cultural obligations with regard to the indigenous population and society as a whole.”

THE SOCIAL CONTEXT

• The rise of nationalism, including xenophobic radical nationalism in Russia

• The target of nationalists is most often migrants from South and South-East, a central element in this criticism is the ”cultural argument”, the claim that the migrants cannot integrate to (modern) Russian society due to their cultural specificity

• Similar xenophobic rhetoric can also be found in the mainstream media

• The increasing criticism of the authoritarianism of the ruling elite and demands for political reformations

• Putin’s proposal of the Eurasian Union

INTEGRATION OR ASSIMILATION

• Russian language• There are not enough services

for migrants, especially the kind they would need• Education instead of practical

help• The myth about the critical

number of migrants• Western Europe as a warning

example• The role of religion?

ILLEGAL MARKETS(ANNA-LIISA HEUSALA)

• “Economic crime leads to direct monetary losses and indirect societal consequences through unhealthy market competition, loss of entrepreneurial innovativeness and structural corruption. Where firms hire workers illegally, there is space for criminal organizations to emerge as intermediaries or authorities in such markets. These intermediaries – which can also include state authorities of various levels - contribute to keeping workers’ claims low, playing a sort of anti-union role. The products and services themselves may suffer from lower standards, thus in the worst case, producing hazards to the wider public.”

WHY IS IT SO DIFFICULT TO FIGHT AGAINST ILLEGALITY

• The police system: reliance on bribes, quotas for arrest• Illegal migrants are cheap labor• The prevalence of corruption, grey markets

provide much room for money laundering

THE CONSEQUENCES TO THE RUSSIAN WELFARE REGIME

• Citizenship and citizen’s rights are not unambiguous categories• Social problems explained in ethnic or cultural

terms• Masses of socially unprotected migrant workers

THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION!