MIGRANTS FROM CENTRAL ASIA: THEIR ROLE IN CHANGING THE SOCIOCULTURE ENVIROMENT OF A RUSSIA MEGALOPOLIS

Abstract

The research topicality is due to the fact that, under globalization, huge migration movement is observed in many countries. The processes of blurring the cultural and national boundaries of states (creation of the European Union, CIS, etc.) and increased migration from Islamic states to Europe, from the Central Asian states, former Soviet republics to Russia, greatly influence the processes of changing the urban sociocultural environment of these states. Russia is one of the major actors on the global scene, while the Ural region is, on the one hand, a rapidly developing region of the country, and on the other hand, one of the main Russian regions where migrants from Central Asia arrive. Although the issue of migration is rather well developed in the Russian and foreign scientific literature, poorly studied is the question of the migrants’ role in changing the sociocultural environment of Russian megalopolises. Meanwhile, this topic is relevant and publicly significant both for the Ural region and Russia as a whole. This research is aimed at bridging this gap. The research objective is to study the role of migrants from Central Asia in changing the sociocultural environment of the Russian, including Ural, megalopolises. The research methodology combined quantitative and qualitative approaches. Primary data were collected with methods of a questionnaire (n=500) and in-depth interviews (n=30). The research revealed a new trend in migrant communities of the Ural region – forming ethnic elite in migrant communities of the same nationality, with relatively high income and high probability of planning to stay in Russia. The research showed an existing demarcation in constructing the environment of the modern Ural megalopolis: migrants are separated into a specific area – “an immigrant community”, which is actually not integrated into the culture of the receiving country but is changing the urban sociocultural environment (55.0%). These migrants create a migrant community within the culture of a Ural megalopolis. The research identified two large urban districts inhabited by migrants from Central Asia (south-west of Yekaterinburg and “railroad station area” – Zheleznodorozhniy district). These are “Kyrgyz-town” and “Tajik-town” of the modern Russian megalopolis. About 60.0% of respondents live there. The districts inhabited by immigrants drastically change the sociocultural environment of the megalopolis. The authors conclude that social institutions (schools, shopping malls, cafes, hairdresser’s, etc.) are the public places where the complicated interaction between the migrants and the receiving community is manifested. Research of such public places of the sociocultural environment of a megalopolis will help to predict the prospects of interaction between the migrants and the receiving community and to identify the forming predominant models of such interaction.