bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
The Hungarian Minority in Croatia and Slovenia1
Authors: Székely András Bertalan
Published: October 2007

In December 1918, Hungary ceded 21,000 square kilometers to what was soon to become the Serbo-Croatian-Slovenian Monarchy. According to 1910 census data, of the total 577,000 ethnic Hungarian population on the ceded territory, one-fifth came under the jurisdiction of Croatia, approximately one-twentieth came under the jurisdiction of Slovenia, and the rest became citizens of Serbia in the region that was to become the autonomous province of Vojvodina. According to 1991 census data, the Hungarian-speaking minority decreased by 200,000 (over one-third), and its proportion of the population also changed: currently, only 6 percent live in independent Croatia and 2 percent in independent Slovenia. The population of Hungarians in Croatia decreased by four-fifths, and that of Slovenia decreased by two-thirds. Already between 1980 and 1990, the decrease in the Hungarian minority population exceeded 10 percent in both republics. Despite the differences in the condition of the Hungarian community in Croatia and Slovenia, their total assimilation can be averted only if serious measures are taken. An analysis of the political, economic, demographic, cultural and other factors contributing to the population decline since the post-world war peace treaties is beyond the scope of this article. I would merely like to point out the general demographic trends and indicate that, according to estimates, the Hungarian population is 1.5 times larger (22,400 in Croatia and 8,500 in Slovenia) than the figure revealed by census data.
The Hungarians in Romania Since 1989
Authors: Bell Andrew
Published: October 2007

The fate of the Hungarian minority in Romania is closely linked to the political situation in that country, its economic development, and its geopolitical location. This was the case before 1989 and remains so today. On the other hand, the Hungarians of Romania are an important factor affecting the internal and the external political relations of the country. This was dramatically confirmed by the revolution of 1989 which had been triggered by ethnic unrest. This study will focus on major political and economic developments from December 1989 until December 1993, analyzing them in terms of their impact on the Hungarian minority.
Two Possible Alternatives to Turf War
Authors: Nás Beáta Kovács
Published: October 2007

Mass movements based on reason and morality—the enforcement of freedom, equal human dignity, justice, sovereignty of the people and self-determination—are not mere expressions of pious desire, but are expressions of real, irresistible political necessity that must not be ignored.

István Bibó

The preceding studies in this volume have provided an overview of the history and current situation of Hungarians living as minorities in Slovakia, Ukraine, Romania, and the regions of the former Yugoslavia. The purpose of this conclusion is not to analyze past experience and current hardships but rather to illuminate the future prospects of Hungarian communities located outside Hungary's current state borders by looking at various autonomy proposals. Since the collapse of state socialist regimes in the late 1980s and early 1990s, persons belonging to Hungarian national communities in the region have expressed a political will to preserve their identity and to determine and govern their own affairs. It is, therefore, instructive to take a closer look at the various proposals for autonomy advocated by the representatives of these Hungarian communities because they offer a peaceful and democratic solution, not only to the current problems of the countries they inhabit, but also to the growing destabilization of the region due to ethnic strife.
Ethnic Modernity and the Russian Empire: Russian Ethnographers and Caucasian Mountaineers
Authors: Jersild Austin Lee
Published: October 2007

Late Imperial Russian society experienced a time of profound social and cultural change in spite of the fact that aristocratic privilege and monarchical power endured until 1917. Contemporary writers bear witness to an emerging working-class consciousness in the cities, a peasant culture increasingly in contact with the wider world of the city and beyond, and a literary culture shaped by the latest currents in the experimental modernism of the West.1Scholars have long explored the Russian variant of interest group politics that emerged in the wake of the Great Reforms, such as technological innovation and the Russian Navy, the development of a legal consciousness, new cultural expectations about the city and the process of urbanization, the modern aspirations and ambitions of a thriving popular culture, and even an emerging modern set of assumptions about individual sexual autonomy.2
The Outflow of Minorities from the Post-Soviet State: The Case of Kazakhstan
Authors: Esenova Saulesh
Published: October 2007

Since achieving independence in December 1991, Kazakhstan has made cautious progress in assuring political rights and freedoms for all its citizens by stressing, among other things, the equality of the different ethnic groups in society, and the equality of individuals before the law. However, an observable outflow of the non-Kazakh population2 from the territory of Kazakhstan has caused a certain hesitation about this. It has received a fairly consistent international response in the scholarly literature and press.3 In almost all cases, the emphasis is on emerging Kazakh nationalism as the most obvious reason for the emigration of the non-native population. It has also been suggested that the Kazakhs would have little to gain from it, given the allegedly dominant economic role of Russians, in particular, within the country, and given also their external dependence on Russia.
In Search of the Nation: Hungarian Minority Youth in the New Czechoslovak Republic
Authors: Cornelius Deborah S.
Published: October 2007

The question of the national minorities of East Central Europe has again become a major topic of debate, as it was at the Paris Peace Conference 75 years ago. In 1994 and 1995, as the Horn government has attempted to hammer out bilateral treaties with Slovakia and Romania, the Hungarian minority populations have been a subject of public debate. The debate takes place in two forums. The interstate debate revolves around the same problems discussed in Paris; the question of the legal protection of minority rights in states in which the nation was declared to belong to the majority, and the further question of whether rights should be protected on an individual or collective basis. The second forum is that of the larger Hungarian community and concerns the nature and cohesion of the fifteen million Hungarians throughout the world. The implicit question is who actually belongs to the Hungarian community and what should be the relationship between so-called “minority” Hungarians and the Hungarian state.
The Turks of Bulgaria: Karpat's Excursion Into Nationalist Propaganda
Authors: Sardamov Ivelin
Published: October 2007

In his recently published article, “The Turks of Bulgaria: The Struggle for National-Religious Survival of a Muslim Minority,” Kemal H. Karpat addresses an important and sensitive topic. The manner in which he undertakes to explore it, however, leaves much to be desired.
Feminism, Patriarchy, Nationalism, and Women inFin-de-SiècleSlovakia
Authors: Weber Nora
Published: October 2007

The association of nationalist consciousness and feminist ideology in Slovakia in the late nineteenth century was a protracted and uneven process. This conclusion rests upon the results of this study which examines the feminist and nationalist views of Slovak women intelligentsia who were at the forefront of Slovak nationalist efforts. It explores responses of leading Slovak women to the following issues of nationalist concern: traditional Slovak patriarchy, women's education, and Western feminism. It demonstrates that in Slovakia, gender was not the primary factor determining women's loyalties; there were other connecting allegiances and loyalties to the nation and the community. Slovak women developed their own unique concept of gender equality that aided Slovak nationalist efforts. In doing so they employed the language of motherhood, domestic duties, and religious commitment.

Around the turn of the century, a small group of Slovak women intelligentsia attempted to reconcile their own agenda with contemporary nationalist, social, and political currents. Spurred by nationalist efforts of the Slovak male intelligentsia, middle-class women tried to determine what type of new nationalist woman should replace the traditional woman. This question was answered by five women, in four very distinct ways: (1) Ľudmila Ríznerová-Podjavorinská portrayed the goals of Western feminism as a danger to Slovaks; (2) Elena Maróthy-Šolthésová and Terézia Medvecká Vansová encouraged the growth of Christian feminism; (3) Marína Ormisová-Maliaková favored the introduction of pragmatic feminism in Slovak nationalist efforts; and (4) Hana Lilge-Gregorová argued for the establishment of Western feminism as the basis of social and national development. Although the personal lives of these five women represent the social and national distress of the Slovak people, they also show women's fight for the acceptance of new ideas which would improve the fate of their sisters and their nation. Yet this small collection of feminist intellectuals could not and did not effect Slovak public opinion in any substantial way. Their influence, except perhaps that of Hana Lilge-Gregorová, did not stretch beyond the Slovak urban middle-class milieu.
The Sibiriachka Encounters Revolution
Authors: Rassweiler Anne D.
Published: October 2007

In sweeping away the Tsarist political empire, the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 also challenged a way of life. It provided opportunities for women in Siberia, the Sibiriachki, and in the rest of Russia, to change their lives. The revolution's democratic and Marxian socialist policies, carried to these women by the zhenotdel, determined officials in the women's department of the Communist Party, created wide possibilities for change. This essay examines Siberian women's responses—both negative and positive—to the revolution's teachings about women's rights and their equality with men. Women's cultural backgrounds—ethnic, educational, urban and rural—influenced their responses to the revolutionary call to claim their rights, their successes and failures in efforts to defend themselves from violence, their efforts to achieve health care and education, and their progress toward greater political and economic equality. This essay also explores conditions on the eve of the revolution, illustrating the variety of strata existing in Siberia's vast lands. It discusses the significant advances in women's self-awareness and their changing activities in the early and mid-1920s. The Party's political mobilization of women expanded into a critique of the social status quo. Subsequently, in the late 1920s and 1930s, the context for their activities was radically altered: political and social criticism were no longer acceptable. For women the gains of the revolution were corrupted and women lost more than they had previously gained. While one can see the throttling of the women's revolution as an indication of its fundamental weakness, one can also see it as the Party's response to a movement that was gaining strength and raising questions about the Party's primacy.
Mother Russia and the Crisis of the Russian National Family: The Puzzle of Gender in Revolutionary Russia*
Authors: Hemenway Elizabeth Jones
Published: October 2007

Once upon a time there lived a rich widow, with a beautiful face and vigorous body, not old and not young, by the name of Mother Russia. She had been married twice, the first time to the peasant-bogatyr Mikula Selianinovich, and the second to the no less renowned warrior-bogatyr Il'ia Muromets.

Her husbands had left her countless riches. And God had blessed both her marriages with many children. For the most part, her children were hard-working people and valiant warriors. They worked their father's land and protected it from hostile neighbors.

But, as always happens, the family was not without its black sheep. Mother Russia also had some children who were good-for-nothings, idlers, drunkards, and empty-headed chatterboxes. And it was not surprising that these good-for-nothings grabbed power over all the widow's other children.

As the loving mother began to grieve and take ill from their indecent debauchery, they assumed control over her and all her possessions. And they began to squander and drink up her wealth, and to send all sorts of healers to try and cure their sick mother.
Women in the Hungarian Populist Youth Movement: The Szeged Youth
Authors: Cornelius Deborah S.
Published: October 2007

Background

During the conservative period in Hungary between the two world wars, three unusual young women, Erzsébet Árvay, Judit Kárász, and Viola Tomori, joined a vanguard of youth who claimed to lead a new generation of Hungarians. As members of the Szeged Youth, they took up the cause of the peasantry of the Great Hungarian Plain, an isolated and neglected population presumed to bear “original Hungarian characteristics.” Until recently, the relationship between gender and nationalism in studies on Eastern Europe has been neglected. Current developments in post-communist societies have sharpened our realization that historical periods are experienced differently and have different implications when seen from the vantage point of women rather than men. Intriguing questions are raised concerning these women's participation in the Szeged Youth Movement and their active role with the peasantry. In a society often characterized as restrictive and limiting, what was the experience of the young woman activist? Was she accepted by her peers as their intellectual equal? How did she feel about her final place in national affairs? These questions are elusive and complex, yet the example of the Szeged Youth Movement in the 1920s and 1930s provides a compelling study of the intersection of gender and national identity in the Hungarian context.

During the interwar period in Hungary, the question of the fate of the Hungarian “nation”—which included the Hungarian population in the territories lost after World War I—took precedence over all others. This was true in respect to women's issues as well. The peace settlement was viewed as a national tragedy, reviving fears that the Hungarians or magyarsag would disappear, swallowed up by the surrounding Germanic and Slavic peoples. Virtually the whole population believed that the Treaty of Trianon of 1920, which had reduced the Hungarian state to two-thirds of its former size, leaving 33.5% of the ethnic Hungarian inhabitants outside the borders, had been unjust and should be revised. The government under Prime Minister István Bethlen struggled to restore economic stability and to regain acceptance by the Western powers, on whom revision of the treaty depended. Certain moderate reforms were introduced, including the extension of the franchise to women and the broadening of educational opportunities. Yet, social insurance reforms for the urban populations were not extended to the masses of peasantry and rural proletariat, which still constituted over half of the population. In fact, the need to maintain the support of the large landowners precluded any extensive land reform, and Hungary remained a country of large estates.
The Intersection of Gender, Ethnicity and Islam in Soviet and Post-Soviet Azerbaijan*
Authors: Tohidi Nayereh
Published: October 2007

How do I define Azerbaijani women's identity? This is very complicated, because we have been influenced by Russia, Iran, Turkey, the Caucasus and Islam … Every day we have to wear different masks and juggle multiple identities. You cannot find a single or typical Azeri female identity. You cannot generalize any type to the whole population of Azeri women since we vary so much.
Difference Unveiled: Bulgarian National Imperatives and the Re-dressing of Muslim Women, 1878-1989
Authors: Neuburger Mary
Published: October 2007

Recent scholarship has poignantly argued that the founding of modern “Western” nation-states is to a large degree a product of their drawn out colonial encounters with “the East.” It is convincingly argued that “the West” constructed its own self-assured, national and supra-national identities in the process of “discovering” and “inventing” the exotic yet inferior “East.” Furthermore, a diverse body of scholarship has delineated the central role of discourses on gender and sexuality in the development of Western societies and, in particular, nation-states. If the image of “pious mother” became key to Western national self-images, it was the counter-image of the women of the harem—veiled, oppressed, and mysterious—that typified representations of Eastern barbarism. Furthermore, Western economic and political penetration of its colonies was to a large degree justified by the “gendering” of the “irrational Orient” versus the “rational Occident.” The “liberation” of Islamic women from their “oppression” as typified by the veil became central to Western “civilizing” missions, which had far-reaching echoes on the frontiers of European society.
Radical Nationalist Parties and Movements in Contemporary Ukraine Before and After Independence: The Right and Its Politics, 1989–1994
Authors: Kuzio Taras
Published: October 2007

The radical right in the Ukrainian political spectrum is dominated by three movements—the Nationalist Union Ukrainian State Independence (DSU), the Ukrainian National Assembly (UNA, formerly the Ukrainian Inter-Party Assembly, UMPA) and the Congress of Ukrainian Nationalists (KUN). The UNA is dominated by the highly secretive Ukrainian Nationalist Union (UNS) which grew out of the nationalist wing of the Association of Independent Ukrainian Youth (SNUM). The KUN was launched in 1992 in Ukraine as the overt arm of the émigré Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists-Bandera faction (known commonly as OUN revolutionaries, or OUNr).
Identity Building and the Holocaust: Roma Political Nationalism
Authors: Kapralski Slawomir
Published: October 2007

It is significant that, at a time in which violent nationalisms are re-entering the European political stage, one of the basic aims of Romani elites in the area of human rights is to be recognized as a nation, a fact marked symbolically by the attention being paid to national emblems. Of course, other issues (equal civil rights, minority rights, political representation or community development) are also among the objectives of Roma organizations (PER Report, 1992, p. 7). However, in the case of these latter issues, the question can be asked, to whom are these basic human rights to be granted? In other words, Romani elites seem to realize that the most important right for which they should strive is the right to have a commonly accepted and externally recognized self-definition as a group which should be granted consequent rights. In the present circumstances, especially in Eastern Europe, there is little doubt that the elected self-identification by the Romani people will be a national one, since this is perceived as stronger and more respectable than other identity-constructs such as ethnic minority.
The Colonization and Peoples of Novaya Zemlya Then and Now
Authors: Serebryanny Leonid
Published: October 2007

The huge polar archipelago of Novaya Zemlya is well known as a nuclear testing site devoid of a civilian population. But in many cartographical sources, e.g., maps in the National Geographic Magazine, one can still see a set of settlements along its coasts. Soviet sources showed these settlements until 1956 (Atlas mira, 1954; Atlas mira, 1955), at a time when full military control was established on the islands. But what is the fate of these high latitude settlements now? It is their historical background and population that will be reviewed with special reference to ethnic problems, proving to be a unique experiment in the economic use of this high Arctic area.

Taken as a key area, Novaya Zemlya is the largest archipelago of the European Arctic, ca. 83,000 sq.km., consisting of two main islands and numerous smaller ones. The main islands, Northern and Southern, are separated by the narrow strait, Matochkin Shar. The huge archipelago stretches almost 900 km in a submeridional direction and is considered a structural continuation of the Urals. The mountains often rise more than 1,000 m above sea-level, the highest summit attaining 1,547 m. Almost 25% of the total area is covered by ice. The most extensive glaciation is on the northern and central parts of the Northern Island, which is a vast ice sheet and an outlet of several glaciers.
The Building of Yugoslavia: The Yugoslav Idea and the First Common State of The South Slavs
Authors: Zlatar Zdenko
Published: October 2007

Three full brothers were building a city,

Three full brothers, three Mrljavcevices:

The first brother was King Vukasin,

The second was Voivode Ugljesa,

The third was Mrljavcevic Gojko;

They were building Skadar on the Bojana,

They were building for full three years,

For three years with three hundred masons,

But they could not lay the fundament,

Much less raise up the turreted city:

What the masons built by the day

The highland oread destroyed by night.

Upon the dawn of the fourth year,

The oread cried from the mountain:

“Do not torment yourself, King Vukasin,

Torment yourself and waste your treasure;

You cannot, O king, lay the fundament,

Much less raise up the turreted city,

Until you find two kindred names,

Until you find Stoja and Stojan,

One a sister and the other brother,

And wall them up in the fundament,

So that the fundament will be maintained,

So that you will build your turreted city.”

[From a Serbian epic song “The Building of Skadar,” quoted by Ivo Banac, The National Question in Yugoslavia, p. 406.]
Prelates and Politicians in Bosnia: The Role of Religion in Nationalist Mobilisation
Authors: Cohen Lenard J.
Published: October 2007

The role of historical and cultural influences in recent Balkan warfare has been the subject of considerable debate among commentators both within and outside the former Yugoslavia. For example, some observers, who might be considered members of the primordial hatred school, have emphasized the cyclical role of “ancient enmities” and atavistic impulses in the Balkans. In contrast, another group of analysts, who have subscribed to the paradise lost approach, focus on the long periods during which populations of different languages, religions, and other facets of Balkan ethnic identity, managed to peacefully co-exist. This second perspective downplays historical factors and attributes the violence and savagery of recent years to nationalist leaders who whipped up antagonisms to suit their own political agendas.
The International Involvement in the Former Yugoslavia's Dissolution and Peace Settlement
Authors: Trifunovska Snezana
Published: October 2007

Why do Balkan wars start and why do they finish? We know that in all Balkan wars there are significant internal factors, among them the various nationalities of the former Yugoslavia who are seeking to establish, consolidate or otherwise enhance their new nation states. However, one should not discount external factors present in the Balkans, such as the interests of other states, in particular imperial interests.
Ukraine and the Yugoslav Conflict
Authors: Kuzio Taras
Published: October 2007

Even before gaining independence in December 1991 from the former USSR, Ukraine had supported Slovenia and Croatia's drive to independence from the former Yugoslavia. In May 1991, Croatian President Franjo Tudjman paid an official visit to Ukraine where then parliamentary speaker Leonid Kravchuk expressed sympathy with Croatia's desire for independence. Tudjman pointed out how Ukraine's seat at the United Nations had given it a head start in obtaining international recognition of its independent status. On 12 December 1991, twelve days after the Ukrainian referendum on independence, Kyiv became one of the first states to diplomatically recognise Croatia and Slovenia; and further, it announced its readiness to open embassies in both countries. Ukraine was the first member of the U.N. to recognise Croatia; the second and third countries, Slovenia and Lithuania, were not members of the U.N. when they recognised Croatia.
The Distant Observers? Towards the Politics of Diasporic Identification
Authors: Skrbiš Zlatko
Published: October 2007

There are two common ways of reflecting upon the disintegration of the former Yugoslavia. The first one, journalistic, transmits and animates the images of horror, brutality, deprivation, and displacement. The second one, historicist—as opposed to historical—invests its energy into interpretation, construction and reconstruction of the past, attributing it with a self-explanatory power. “When and where did it all start? … So what does the past tell us?” (Sinclair-Loutit, 1994, p. 230). In this way, history is given the power to serve as an undisputed indicator and guide in the disarray of myths and facts. Both these positions share a common denominator; they both help us to assume a position of contemporary voyeurs—comfortable, distant observers who can do nothing but consume the provided imagery.
Carving a Moldavian Identity out of History
Authors: van Meurs Wim
Published: October 2007

“For what we all are, really, is elegant scarecrows on fields of words.” Gabriel Liiceanu's metaphor of “discourse” is particularly revealing for the case of the Moldavian nation. When the field is already covered with scarecrows, a new one will have trouble finding a free spot and functioning properly. Rivaling nationalist and communist interpretations of Moldavian history have left little free space for an original view: historical facts have been interpreted and reinterpreted time and time again, so it has become increasingly difficult to create new meanings and to find fresh words.
Territorial Autonomy in Gagauzia
Authors: Chinn Jeff , Roper Steven D.
Published: October 2007

The year 1995 was momentous for the Gagauz people located primarily in the towns and villages of southern Moldova in the area known as Gagauzia. The Gagauz leadership in Comrat and the Moldovan government in Chişinău reached agreement in December 1994 on autonomy for Gagauzia, ending a five-year secessionist movement involving both a war of words and sporadic conflict. For Chişinău, this agreement settled the lesser, but nonetheless important, of two secessionist movements that threatened the Moldovan state's viability. For Gagauzia, the agreement set the terms for extensive cultural, political, and social autonomy within Moldova. For Europe, this agreement broke new ground in granting a small nation control of its affairs within a larger state.
The Transnistrian Republic: A Case of Politicized Regionalism
Authors: Kolstø Pål , Malgin Andrei
Published: October 2007

The collapse of communism in the Soviet Union has opened up a Pandora's box of communal conflicts. In most Western analyses the majority of these conflicts are subsumed under the heading “ethnic.” This is often the case also with the conflict in Moldova between the national regime in Chišinàu and the insurgent regime in Tiraspol that controls the left bank of the Dnestr river. To be sure, there is an ethnic component to this conflict, but ethnicity clearly is not the main driving force behind it. While ethnic Moldovans make up approximately 70% of the inhabitants on the right bank, there is no ethnic majority on the left bank: 40% of the population are Moldovans, 25% Ukrainians, and 23% Russians. In fact, the Chišinàu leadership downplays the ethnic component in its standoff with Tiraspol. The values at stake, they insist, are basically political in nature.
Reform, “Rebirth” and Regret: The Rise and Decline of the Ethnic-German NationalistWiedergeburtMovement in the USSR and CIS, 1987–1993
Authors: Schmaltz Eric J.
Published: October 2007

In early 1989, the Soviet Germans established theWiedergeburt(“Rebirth”) All-Union Society. An umbrella-organization originally designed to protect and advance ethnic-German interests in the USSR, the “Rebirth” Society adopted the most effective legal means by which it could confront the regime—namely, political dissent based on Lenin's notion of national self-determination. The “Rebirth” movement evolved in this context and represented the fifteenth-largest Soviet nationality numbering more than two million in the 1989 Soviet census. By 1993, official membership in the “Rebirth” Society included nearly 200,000 men and women. Ironically, at the very moment the Soviet Germans became more politically conscious, the Soviet Union and the ethnic-German community were disintegrating.
Cross-Border Regional Cooperation: Current Concerns in Slovakia
Authors: Dodder Richard A. , Faltan Lubomir
Published: October 2007

The search for ways to solve problems in Europe after World War II has sometimes touched on the subject of regional and inter-regional development. However, socio-spatial definitions of region are very diverse. According to macro approaches, a category of region is established on the basis of a certain kind of affinity (e.g., social, economic, cultural) and more intensive cooperation (already realized or expected) among groups of neighboring countries within the European continent. But on the other side of this socio-spatial continuum there are significantly smaller socio-spatial categories of region which are defined by certain commonly shared affinities existing within individual countries.
A Brief History of the Kazak People*
Authors: Otarbaeva Bakhytnur
Published: October 2007

We, the people of Kazakstan, creatingstatehood on the ancient KAZAK land … Constitution of the Republic of Kazakstan

In December 1995, Kazakstan celebrated its fifth anniversary as a sovereign state, although the rich, tumultuous history of the Kazaks themselves encompasses more than five centuries. The complexity of this history is revealed in a statement by Kemal Akishev, a well-known archeologist: “Kazakstan reveals itself through territorial contact, where, beginning in ancient times, infiltration and aggression, immigration and ethnic immigration, the integration and spreading of culture, and racial and linguistic palimpsests took place.” The ethnogenesis of the Kazak people can be divided into three periods: the pre-Turkic, the Turkic, and the Turko-Mongolian periods. The development of modern Kazakstan likewise falls into three periods: the pre-revolutionary, the Soviet, and the modern republic.
The Importance of Being Ethnic: Minorities in Post-Soviet States—The Case of Russians in Kazakstan
Authors: Davis Sue , Sabol Steven O.
Published: October 2007

Introduction

The fall of the Soviet Union prompted an outpouring of concern over borders, identity, and stability. Many students of the region predicted that the breakup would lead to violence and instability. Scholars of the Soviet region emphasized cultural pluralism—in particular ethnic and religious pluralism or the “national question”—as the ultimate lesson of the Gorbachev era. In other words, ignore ethnicity at your own peril. To this point, that has not been the case. There have been only a few areas where instability, ethnic strife, and violence have been rampant—the Transdniestr region, Tajikistan, and Chechnia in particular. Why has this been the case? The lack of ethnic violence and severe ethnic tensions in this diverse region should lead one to reconsider the role of ethnicity in politics.
Medical Traditions, Kazak Women, and Soviet Medical Politics to 1941*
Authors: Michaels Paula A.
Published: October 2007

In 1929 a young Communist activist named A. Nurkhat traversed Central Asia gathering information about grassroots-level party social work and propaganda among indigenous women. An Uzbek woman who converted to Bolshevism, Nurkhat accepted the social and political reasons for the regime's push to win the support of local women in its struggle against traditional ways of life. Seeking to document these efforts, she traveled to nomadic regions and followed a “red yurt” expedition. Over one hundred red yurts operated across Kazakstan, providing literacy programs, medical treatment, and legal counseling to remote nomadic areas. When Nurkhat visited one red yurt, a Kazak man from a nearby village rushed in seeking help for his wife, who had endured more than a day in labor. The localbaqsy(shaman) had been unable to induce birth and the family desperately sought help from the red yurt's nurse, an ethnic Russian, who was able successfully to deliver a healthy baby. Afterward, Nurkhat asked the red yurt's nurse, “What is the Kazak women's attitude to [Western] medical treatment?” The nurse responded,
The Uighurs of the Kazakstan Borderlands: Migration and the Nation
Authors: Roberts Sean R.
Published: October 2007

One of the most important characteristics of the newly independent republic of Kazakstan is the multinational nature of its population. In addition to the members of the titular Kazak nationality, numerous Slavic, Turkic, and other peoples have made, or have been forced to make, Kazakstan their home. Most of these peoples, with the exception of the Kazaks, could be characterized as diasporas. However, the Uighurs, a Turkic Muslim people living in Kazakstan, are not a standard example of a diaspora. Unlike many of Kazakstan's diasporic communities, such as the Russians, Koreans, Uzbeks, Kyrgyz, and Germans, who can rely on outside support from recognized nation states to protect their rights, the Uighurs are a stateless people whose claims to sovereignty are not internationally recognized. Furthermore, unlike other stateless diasporas in Kazakstan, such as the Tatars, the Chechens, and the Mesketian TurksM whose homelands are clearly located outside of Kazakstan, the Uighurs’ “homeland” in China's Xinjiang province borders on the former Soviet republic, which raises the question of whether or not many Uighurs are indigenous to the territory of Kazakstan.
Kazakstan's Political Transformation since 1991
Authors: Dzhunusova Zhanylzhan
Published: October 2007

According to the 1993 Constitution, the Republic of Kazakstan was proclaimed as a democratic, secular, and unitary state. Human beings, their life, freedom, and inherent rights were granted the status of supreme value. A presidential republic as a form of government arose from the functions of the head of state and executive. The supreme legislative body, a one-chamber parliament (Supreme Soviet), preserved remnants of the old Soviet state system in name and function, denying the principle of the division of power. The Supreme Soviet was the only legislative and higher representative body that did not correspond to its legislative function, since that implied a hierarchical power structure. As the only legislative body, parliament could not have subordinate structures. According to the Constitution, the Supreme Soviet issued laws, controlled the observance of laws, and made formal interpretations of laws. This contradicted the power-division principle, according to which it should be the legislative body only. Judicial power in the republic in accordance with the 1993 Constitution belonged to the Constitutional Court, the Supreme Court, and the Supreme Court of Arbitration, which was to be elected by the Supreme Soviet. But this also contradicted the power-division principle.
Whither Kazakstan? Changing Capitals: From Almaty to Aqmola/Astana*
Authors: Huttenbach Henry R.
Published: October 2007

On 10 December 1997, accompanied by much pomp and fanfare, President Nursultan Nazarbaev triumphantly declared Aqmola to be the new capital of Kazakstan in accordance with a 1995 decree he had signed in Almaty. Henceforth, he ordered, all official state business would be transferred from Almaty to Aqmola as expeditiously as possible. Even more dramatic was the context in which President Nazarbaev chose to make the announcement, namely, in the company of the then Russian Prime Minister Viktor Chernomydrin. Clearly, the intention was, once again, to impress on Moscow Nazarbaev's determination to demonstrate specifically to Russia his personal commitment to transform Kazakstan into a genuine, independent post-Soviet state, or so one could interpret the timing of the event. But, before subjecting the long move from Almaty to Aqmola to further analysis, it might help to bring some perspective to the phenomenon of capital shifting, a practice that dates back at least to classical times.
Theories of Nation Formation and Case Selection: The Meaning of an Alternative Model
Authors: Rakic Vojin
Published: October 2007

The following paragraphs are not intended to give a review of theories of nation building. Rather their aim is to highlight the most salient features of the modernist and primordialist position on nation formation. The central assumptions of a couple of influential theories will serve only as an illustration of these features and are supposed to help the reader obtain a clearer picture of the two positions, without the pretension to compare or contrast different theories of nation formation. The first step, however, will be an effort to give an exact assessment of the context of the modernist‘-primordialist dichotomy.
The Kuban’ Cossack Revival (1989–1993): The Beginnings of a Cossack National Movement in the North Caucasus Region*
Authors: Boeck Brian J.
Published: October 2007

The Cossacks are coming straight out of some nineteenth century nightmare. Those fearsome horsemen once again stalk the Russian steppes, whips stashed in their belts, defending God and country and longing for the restoration of the Romanov dynasty.

Kyle Crichton,New York Times

The emergence of a strong Cossack movement has great implications for the future of Russia and the post-Soviet space. It is at once the glorification of a mythical past and a powerful alternate vision of the future. Old questions of Cossack identity are once again being debated and a Cossack presence is strongly felt in the cities of southern Russia. In the volatile North Caucasus region the Cossack revival has increasingly assumed many of the features of national movements in other areas of the former Soviet Union.
Social Capital in the Latvian Transition: Trust and Other Managerial Values
Authors: King Gundar J. , Barnowe J. Thad
Published: October 2007

Values play an important role in any culture, shaping attitudes and aspirations, and supporting economic activities. They are widely acknowledged to be defining elements of business culture for managers and workers alike, despite difficulties in tracing the exact linkages they have with behaviors and events (Connor and Becker 1994). They impact individuals’ ability to make critical adjustments under conditions of accelerating technological change and unprecedented expansion of information transfer (Rothschild 1992). They also are thought to affect how well technological changes and economic activity are integrated with dominant social-political structures, helping to make public policy harmonious with frames of reference individuals hold, and lending meaning to appeals for courses of action (Buchholtz 1986).
Russian Federalism: Political, Legal, and Ethnolingual Aspects—A View from the Republic of Bashkortostan
Authors: Ilishev Ildus G.
Published: October 2007

Problems of building a new democratic Russia based on federative principles and the region's long-refractory “national question,” forming a knotty tangle of complicated issues, have steadily remained in the political limelight. In a number of regions worldwide dramatic changes have occurred, related in one way or the other to the processes of national-territorial self-determination. As a result of this, the Eurasian political landscape has been marked by the emergence of some twenty newly independent states. Suffice it to say that the Soviet Union, a preponderant superpower feared by all, collapsed; and in Europe the Federative Republic of Yugoslavia ceased to exist, bringing on a long-term national conflict threatening not only regional but even global security. In East Central Europe binational Czechoslovakia split up into two independent nation states. Elsewhere, even in the absence of militarized national conflict, political processes have dramatically intensified. In Asia, for example, the multinational Chinese Republic with its Tibetan and Uighur problems, and ethnically heterogeneous India with its population speaking more than 400 languages and dialects have long attracted public attention as sources of potential instability in the region. The “Sikh issue” alone, for instance, continues to pose a threat to India. Even the North American continent, a peaceful region in terms of its political and ethnic stability, is confronted with similar problems. The integrity of Canada is still in question with the franco-lingual province of Quebec striving for independence.
Working with users: some implications for educational research
Authors: Edwards Anne , Sebba Judy , Rickinson Mark
Published: October 2007

In its emphasis in working with users of research throughout the processes of pedagogic research, the Teaching and Learning Research Programme (TLRP) has reflected a current interest across disciplines in user engagement to enhance research. The scale of the TLRP and the range of research genres encompassed by it have meant that it has provided a useful site for considering in some detail what is meant by enhancing pedagogic research in this way. The authors draw on a TLRP‐funded seminar series which examined a variety of forms of user engagement, their purposes and their implications. The series attempted to understand the intertwined features of new education spaces where research and policy can meet; the negotiations with policy communities that occur there; and the implications for these negotiations and for research design in the production of pedagogic knowledge in partnership with practitioners. The lessons revealed included the following: user engagement strengthens the warrants of research with potential users in both practice and policy communities; it needs to be understood and sustained as an aspect of project management; and research mediation is a developing form of expertise. The authors conclude that TLRP has provided an unrivalled opportunity for the public to ‘speak back to science’ in pedagogic research, and enabled an emerging reciprocity where the public understand(s) how science works but equally science understands how its publics work.
Improving the effectiveness of collaborative group work in primary schools: effects on science attainment
Authors: Baines Ed , Blatchford Peter , Chowne Anne
Published: October 2007

This longitudinal research tests the effectiveness of the SPRinG programme, which was developed through a collaboration between researchers and teachers and designed to provide teachers with strategies for enhancing pupil group work in ‘authentic’ classroom settings. An evaluation study involved comparing pupils in SPRinG classrooms and trained in group work skills with those who were not in terms of science attainment. There were 560 and 1027 pupils (8–10 years) in the experimental and control groups respectively. ‘Macro’ attainment data were collected at the start of the year. ‘Micro’ attainment data were collected in the spring and summer before and after science lessons involving either group work (intervention) or the control teachers' usual approach. SPRinG pupils made greater academic progress than control pupils. Findings are discussed relative to enhancing the quantity and quality of group work in schools and a social pedagogic approach to classroom learning.
Exploring variations in teachers' work, lives and their effects on pupils: key findings and implications from a longitudinal mixed‐method study
Authors: Sammons Pam , Day Christopher , Kington Alison , Gu Qing , Stobart Gordon , Smees Rebecca
Published: October 2007

This article outlines the research design of a large‐scale, longitudinal research study in England intended to describe and explore variations in teachers' work, lives and their effects on pupils' educational outcomes. The study, funded by the Department for Education and Skills (DfES) and incorporated into the Teaching and Learning Research Programme (TLRP) as an ‘Associate Project’, used an innovative mixed‐methods research design to create case studies of 300 teachers in Years 2, 6 and 9. The research was conducted over three consecutive academic years and collected a wide range of data through interviews, questionnaire surveys of teachers' and pupils' views and assessment data on pupils' attainments in English and mathematics. The text summarises the main findings from the research in relation to four interconnected themes of the study: Professional Life Phases; Professional Identity; Relative Effectiveness; and Resilience and Commitment. The influence of school context, in terms of level of social disadvantage of pupil intake, is also investigated. Key findings and their implications for policy and practice are highlighted.
Possibilities for pedagogy in further education: harnessing the abundance of literacy
Authors: Ivaniç Roz , Edwards Richard , Satchwell Candice , Smith June
Published: October 2007

In this report, it is argued that the most salient factor in the contemporary communicative landscape is the sheer abundance and diversity of possibilities for literacy, and that the extent and nature of students' communicative resources is a central issue in education. The text outlines the conceptual underpinnings of the Literacies for Learning in Further Education project in a social view of literacy, and the associated research design, methodology and analytical framework. It elaborates on the notion of the abundance of literacies in students' everyday lives, and on the potential for harnessing these as resources for the enhancement of learning. It provides case studies of changes in practice that have been undertaken by further education staff in order to draw upon students' everyday literacy practices on Travel and Tourism and Multimedia courses. It ends with some of the broad implications for conceptualising learning that arise from researching through the lens of literacy practices.
How policy impacts on practice and how practice does not impact on policy
Authors: Coffield Frank , Edward Sheila , Finlay Ian , Hodgson Ann , Spours Ken , Steer Richard , Gregson Maggie
Published: October 2007

The TLRP project reported on in this article attempts to understand how the Learning and Skills sector functions. It traces how education and training policy percolates down through many levels in the English system and how these levels interact, or fail to interact. The authors first focus upon how policy impacts upon the interests of three groups of learners: unemployed people in adult and community learning centres, adult employees in work‐based learning and younger learners on Level 1 and Level 2 courses in further education. They focus next upon how professionals in these three settings struggle to cope with two sets of pressures upon them: those exerted by government and a broader set of professional, institutional and local factors. They describe in particular how managers and tutors mediate national policy and translate it (and sometimes mistranslate it) into local plans and practices. Finally, the authors criticise the new government model of public service reform for failing to harness the knowledge, good will and energy of staff working in the sector, and for ignoring what constitutes the main finding of the research: the central importance of the relationship between tutor and students.