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Nations & Nationality |
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| Civil & Political Society Asymmetrisch Federalisme Nations & Nationality Communist Party | |
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When in the 1990s the Russian state tried eliminating the official designation of nationality from internal passports, it had to stall this reform because of widespread protests in Tatarstan and Bashkortostan. If we look at the history of the concepts narod and narodnost’ (as designations of the notion of nationality), we may find an answer to the question why this reform of passports had to be stalled. Further more, we could assess whether such a reform has a chance of being implemented in the future. If there are distinct features about narod and narodnost’, it could be that they still bare importance in contemporary Russia and that they were important in the Soviet Union too. We will first take a look at the history of the concepts narod and narodnost’ to find peculiarities that might explain the failure of the mentioned reform. Subsequently, we will try to argue that certain distinct features of narod and narodnost’ were institutionalized under Communist rule, and that they still have an influence on contemporary Russia and its understanding of nationality.
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