Rich Russians

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elisabeth Schimpfössl
Keyword(s):  
Social Change ◽  
Family History ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Max Weber ◽  
Historical Context ◽  
Pierre Bourdieu ◽  
Social Resources ◽  
Russian Society ◽  
The West ◽  
The Soviet Union

This book looks at representatives of the top 0.1 per cent of Russian society: their stories, trajectories, ideas about life, and how they see their role and position at the top of Russian society. They are explored through their own stories: eighty interviews with multimillionaires and billionaires, and their spouses and children, conducted between 2008 and 2017. These people grew up and lived through a historically unique period of economic turmoil and social change following the collapse of the Soviet Union. When taken in a wider historical context, however, we see the repetition of a time-honored process whereby new money becomes respectable money. Rich Russians applies the sociological frameworks of Max Weber and Pierre Bourdieu in substantiating the claim that bourgeois Russians have acquired all sorts of cultural and social resources that help consolidate their power individually and as a group. They have elaborated more distinguished and refined tastes, rediscovered their family history, and begun actively engaging in philanthropy. Most importantly, they have worked out a narrative for themselves justifying why they deserve their elitist position in society—because of who they are and their superior qualities over others—and why they should be treated as equals by the West. This new, empirically grounded research helps us to understand the Russian bourgeois elite and its increasingly complex relations with Western societies.

Punk in Russia: From the “Declassed Elements” to the Class Struggle

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ivan Gololobov
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Social Engagement ◽  
Initial Conditions ◽  
Russian Society ◽  
Political Commitment ◽  
Political Movement ◽  
The West ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Significant Difference ◽  
The Right

This chapter discusses the evolution of punk in Russia since its inception at the end of the 1970s. It pays particular attention to the changing perception of class belonging and the political engagement of the punk scene in Russia. Whereas in the West punk was a political movement closely associated with its working-class background, in the Soviet Union it emerged as a protest of middle-class intellectuals fighting for the right to be different and to stand out from the uniformed workers’ and peasants’ collective. This defined the particular stand of early Russian punk toward the genre’s social engagement and political appeal. Working-classness and political commitment—initial conditions of punk identity in the West—became something early Russian punk was positioned against. The dramatic transformation of Russian society over the following decades inevitably affected the cultural ideology of Russian punk, and from the 1990s onward it had to find its place and defend its significant difference amid the realities of “wild” neoliberal capitalism. The chapter shows how in Russia punk evolved from being a highly individualistic and apolitical practice to one of the most radical and politically committed scenes, closely affiliated with other struggles on the Left.

Century of Ukraine's diplomatic service

2017 ◽  
pp. 77-94
Author(s):  
Yuriy Makar
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
State Committee ◽  
The West ◽  
Sovereign State ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
National University ◽  
Central Council ◽  
History Of ◽  
Late Twentieth

On December 22, 2017 the Ukrainian Diplomatic Service marked the 100thanniversary of its establishment and development. In dedication to such a momentous event, the Department of International Relations of Yuriy Fedkovych Chernivtsi National University has published a book of IR Dept’s ardent activity since its establishment. It includes information both in Ukrainian and English on the backbone of the collective and their versatile activities, achievements and prospects for the future. The author delves into retracing the course of the history of Ukrainian Diplomacy formation and development. The author highlights the roots of its formation, reconsidering a long way of its development that coincided with the formation of basic elements of Ukrainian statehood that came into existence as a result of the war of national liberation – the Ukrainian Central Rada (the Central Council of Ukraine). Later, the Ukrainian or so-called State the Hetmanate was under study. The Directorat (Directory) of Ukraine, being a provisional collegiate revolutionary state committee of the Ukrainian People’s Republic, was given a thorough study. Of particular interest for the research are diplomatic activities of the West Ukrainian People`s Republic. Noteworthy, the author emphasizes on the Ukrainian Socialist Soviet Republic’s foreign policy, forced by the Bolshevist Russia. A further important implication is both the challenges of the Ukrainian statehood establishing and Ukraine’s functioning as a state, first and foremost, stemmed from the immaturity and conscience-unawareness of the Ukrainian society, that, ultimately, has led to the fact, that throughout the twentieth century Ukraine as a statehood, being incorporated into the Soviet Union, could hardly be recognized as a sovereign state. Our research suggests that since the beginning of the Ukrainian Diplomacy establishment and its further evolution, it used to be unprecedentedly fabricated and forged. On a wider level, the research is devoted to centennial fight of Ukraine against Russian violence and aggression since the WWI, when in 1917 the Russian Bolsheviks, headed by Lenin, started real Russian war against Ukraine. Apropos, in the about-a-year-negotiation run, Ukraine, eventually, failed to become sovereign. Remarkably, Ukraine finally gained its independence just in late twentieth century. Nowadays, Russia still regards Ukraine as a part of its own strategic orbit,waging out a carrot-and-stick battle. Keywords: The Ukrainian People’s Republic, the State of Ukraine, the Hetmanate, the Direcorat (Directory) of Ukraine, the West Ukrainian People`s Republic, the Ukrainian Socialist Soviet Republic, Ukraine, the Bolshevist Russia, the Russian Federation, Ukrainian diplomacy

Explosive Change in China and the Soviet Union: Implications for the West

1989 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 95-111
Author(s):  
Amos A. Jordan ◽  
Richard L. Grant
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
The West ◽  
The Soviet Union

Fleeing the Soviet Union, Dancing on the West Coast

Experiment ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 297-316
Author(s):  
Lorin Johnson ◽  
Donald Bradburn
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Los Angeles ◽  
High Power ◽  
West Coast ◽  
Southern California ◽  
The West ◽  
The Arts ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
First Time

In the 1970s and 1980s, Los Angeles audiences saw Soviet defectors Mikhail Baryshnikov, Alexander Godunov, Natalia Makarova, and Rudolf Nureyev in the prime of their careers at the Hollywood Bowl, The Dorothy Chandler Pavilion and the Greek Theater. Dance photographer Donald Dale Bradburn, a local Southern California dancer describes his behind-the-scenes access to these dancers in this interview. Perfectly positioned as Dance Magazine’s Southern California correspondent, Bradburn offers a candid appraisal of the Southern California appeal for such high-power Russian artists as well as their impact on the arts of Los Angeles. An intimate view of Russian dancers practicing their craft on Los Angeles stages, Bradburn’s interview is illustrated by fourteen of his photographs, published for the first time in this issue of Experiment.

scholarly journals A big picture: bibliometric study of academic publications from post-Soviet countries

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maia Chankseliani ◽  
Andrey Lovakov ◽  
Vladimir Pislyakov
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Research Output ◽  
Historical Context ◽  
Research Capacity ◽  
Scarce Resources ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Academic Publications ◽  
Big Picture ◽  
Global Research

AbstractThe world’s largest community of scientists disintegrated following the dissolution of the Soviet Union. With extremely scarce resources and limited academic freedom as starting points, researchers in this region have been creating new knowledge; they have been building on rich scientific traditions in selected disciplines and, at times, paving new paths in non-traditional disciplines. At present, the cumulative contribution of post-Soviet countries to global research output is only three percent, indicating that these countries are not key players on the global research scene. This study uses bibliometric methods to offer novel empirical insight into the quantity and impact of academic publications; it also looks at the quality of journals in which the output is published. The findings reveal that fifteen post-Soviet countries differ considerably in terms of how much they have prioritised research, as well as the quantity, quality, and impact of their publications. The research productivity across the region has not been high and, taken together, these countries have produced publications of considerably lower quality and lower impact when viewed in the context of global research output. At the same time, researchers from post-Soviet countries tap into international collaborative networks actively, resulting in an exceptionally large proportion of publications from this region being internationally co-authored. In the historical context of Soviet research being known as one of the least collaborative globally, this finding indicates that researchers in the region are attractive to international collaborators and may be seeking such partnerships due to relatively modest research capacity at home.

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