Are we looking for a “guinea pig”? Difficulties in researching the “middle class” in Russia
How to Cite
Begemann B. Are we looking for a “guinea pig”? Difficulties in researching the “middle class” in Russia. Interaction. Interview. Interpretation. 2018. Vol. 10. No. 16. P. 7-22. DOI: https://doi.org/10.19181/inter.2018.16.1 (in Russ.).
Abstract
Since the dissolution of Soviet Union, Russian society has undergone historic change. Following the upheaval of the 1990s, the beginning of the 21st century was characterised by economic growth and stabilisation. This period of socioeconomic change has frequently been interpreted as the cradle of an emerging “middle class”, triggering the transition from a socialist to capitalist society. However, while some researchers find a fuzzy share of “middle class” in descriptive criteria, others question the applicability of the analytical category of “middle class” to contemporary Russian society on principle. Drawing from ongoing research in Moscow, this article scrutinises this conventional class ontology by pointing out the ambiguities of the socioeconomic dynamics, based mainly on qualitative ethnographic fieldwork. As a productive lens to reveal social dynamics, the article distinguishes between formalist and substantivist uses of the term “middle class”, thus implying that a new language is needed to reflect this distinction. Illustrating these arguments through two ethnographic examples, it aims to contribute to current anthropological debates about class and post-socialism.
Keywords:
Middle Classes, Russia, Anthropology of Class, Post-Socialism, Social Mobility
References
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Balzer, H. Russia’s Missing Middle Class. The Professions in Russian History. Armonk: Sharpe, 1996.
Berdahl, D. Introduction. After Socialism // Altering States. Ethnographies of Transition in Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union / Ed. by D. Berdahl, M. Bunzl, M. Lampland. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2000. P. 1–13.
Burawoy, M., Verdery, K. Introduction // Uncertain Transition: Ethnographies of Change in the Postsocialist World / Ed. by M. Burawoy, K. Verdery. O: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999. P. 1–18.
Bridger, S., Pine F. Surviving Post-Socialism. Local Strategies and Regional Responses in Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union. New York: Routledge, 1998.
Carrier, J. The Trouble with Class // Archives Européennes de Sociologie. 2012. № 3. P. 263–284.
Carrier, J. The Concept of Class // Anthropologies of Class. Power, Practice, and Inequality / Ed. by J. Carrier, D. Kalb. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015. P. 28–40.
Carrier, J., Kalb, D. Anthropologies of Class. Power, Practice, and Inequality. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015.
Durkheim, E., Lukes, S. The Rules of Sociological Method and Selected Texts on Sociology and its Method. New York: The Free Press, 1982.
Ėcho Moskvy. Srednyj Klass v Rossiyskikh Regionakh [Middle Class in Russian Regions] // Ėcho Moskvy. 2018. 19th June. URL: https://echo.msk.ru/news/2224352‑echo.html (accessed 24 June 2018).
Fehérváry, K. The Postsocialist Middle Classes and the New “Family House” in Hungary // The GlobalMiddle Classes. Theorizing through Ethnography / Ed. by R. Heiman, C. Freeman, M. Liechty. Santa Fe:
SAR Press, 2012. P. 117–144.
Fukuyma, F. Das Ende der Geschichte. Wo stehen wir? [The End of History. Where Do We Stand?]. New York: The Free Press, 1989.
Gerasimenko, T. The Premier’ 2017 Survey: Upper Middle Class Portrait in Russia // IPSOS. 2017. 6th June. URL: https://www.ipsos.com/en/premier‑2017‑survey-upper-middle-class-portrait-russia (accessed 27 November 2018).
Gill, L., Kasmir, S. History, Politics, Space, Labor: On Unevenness as an Anthropological Concept // Dialectical Anthropology. 2016. № 40 (2). P. 87–102.
Giordanio, C., Kostova, D. The Social Production of Mistrust // Postsocialism: Ideas, Ideologies and Practices in Eurasia / Ed. by C. Hann. London, New York: Routledge, 2002. P. 74–92.
Gontmakher, E. Sredniy Klass kak Rezul’tat Razvitiya Obshchestvennykh Institutov [The Middle Class as a Result of the Development of Social Institutions] // Institut Sovremennogo Razvitiya (INSOR). Diskussiya o Srednem Klasse. Sredniy Klass. Problemy Formirovaniya i Perspektivy Rosta. Moscow, 2008.
Gontmakher, E. Ross, C. The Middle Class and Democratisation in Russia // Europe-Asia Studies. 2015. № 67 (2). P. 269–284.
Gorshkov, M. K., Tikhonova, N. E. Sredniy Klass v Sovremennoj Rossii [The Middle Class in Contemporary Russia]. Moscow: Institut Sotsiologii RAN, 2008.
Gorshkov, M. K. The Middle Class as the Reflection of the Economic and Sociocultural Model of Russia’s Development Today // Russian Social Science Review. 2016. № 57 (6). P. 488–504.
Gudkov, L. Dubin, B., Zorkaia, N. The “middle class”. (If There Is Such a Thing) // Russian Education & Society. 2009. № 51 (8). P. 34–69.
Hage, G. A Not so Multi-sited Ethnography of a Not so Imagined Community // Anthropological Theory. 2005. № 5 (4). P. 463–475.
Hann, C., Hart, K. Economic Anthropology. History, Ethnography, Critique. Cambridge: Polity, 2011.
Hann, C., Humphrey, C., Verdery, K. Introduction. Postsocialism as a Topic of Anthropological Investigation // Postsocialism: Ideas, Ideologies and Practices in Eurasia / Ed. by C. Hann. London, New York: Routledge, 2002. P. 1–30.
Hann, C. The Economistic Fallacy and Forms of Integration Under and After Socialism // Economy and Society. 2014. № 43 (4). P. 626–649.
Heiman, R., Freeman, C., Liechty, M. Introduction. Charting an Anthropology of the Middle Classes // The Global Middle Classes. Theorizing through Ethnography / Ed. by R. Heiman, C. Freeman, M. Liechty. Santa Fe: SAR Press, 2012. P. 3–30.
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APA
Begemann, B. (2018). Are we looking for a “guinea pig”? Difficulties in researching the “middle class” in Russia. Interaction. Interview. Interpretation, 10(16), 7-22. https://doi.org/10.19181/inter.2018.16.1
Section
Theoretical discourses and debates
