Program
14.00 – Opening words, Harri Melin (Professor of Sociology, Tampere University)
14.05 – Ethnic conflicts in Russia, Mikhail Chernysh (Professor of Sociology, Moscow)
14.35 – Conflict in Chechnya: past, present, future, Oxana Chelysheva (Journalist, Helsinki)
15.05 – Discussion
Moderator: Vadim Romashov (Tampere Peace Research Institute)
15.45 – Closing words, Harri Melin
Abstracts
Ethnic conflicts in Russia, Mikhail Chernysh (Professor of Sociology, Moscow)
Russia is a multi-ethnic state like many other states in Europe and beyond. Its current architecture of inter-ethnic relations goes back to the Soviet times when the imperial Russian state underwent dramatic reforms. It was Lenin’s idea of ethnicity as a matter of secondary importance to the socialist construction that prevailed in the Soviet Union. Contemporary Russia has to deal with the legacy of the Soviet state by reconfiguring inter-ethnic relations. This process opens Pandora’s box of inter-ethnic tensions and conflicts. The search for solutions is complicated by numerous other social problems – inequality, inadequate institutions and international tensions. Will Russia be able to cope with these problems and what options tend to look realistic in the contemporary situation?
Conflict in Chechnya: past, present, future, Oxana Chelysheva (Journalist, Helsinki)
The two wars in Chechnya of 1994-1996 and 1999-2004 have been presented as consequences of the two-century history. Oxana Chelysheva will be discussing the complicated history as a tool of demonization in order to justify armed activities in the contemporary conflict in Chechnya. She will also touch upon the question of whether the path chosen by Moscow to ‘pacify’ Chechnya by putting the Kadyrov family into power has brought steady peace to the region.
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