"Minorities in Europe”
Session 8:
Russian minority in abroad.
The case of the Baltic States
Denis Gruber
Faculty of Sociology, St. Petersburg State University
DAAD-Lecturer for Sociology
Classical American Sociology of migration
• Assimilation = Integration
• a one-side process which has to be fulfilled by migrants / ethnic minorities
(cf. Sellin 1938, Park/Burgess 1921)
• the goal is full assimilation of migrants and their descendants
• cultural adaptation of migrants to the culture of the majority society
• 5 stages of „race relation cycle“ (Robert E. Park / Ernest W. Burgess 1921)
 migration into a new territory
 after a peaceful phase of becomming acquainted a competition for short
ressources arise
 results in a conflict
 segregation and separation of the ethnic group and increased interethnic
contacts and intermingling („melting pot“)
 full assimilation adisbandment of ethnic group(s)
Newer American Sociology of migration
• Shmuel N. Eisenstadt (1954): 3 stages of assimilation of Jews
in Israel
 migration and absorption of minorities (absolute adaptation
of the members of diaspora)
 minorities have to orientate by re-sozialisation to the norms
of the majority society and old (traditional) norms do not
have further relevance
 absorption is more an exception than a rule what results in
stratification of the minority societies
Newer American Sociology of migration
Gordon (1964): assimilation as a 7th stage process, but not all stages
have to be passed by immigrants because there is not a logical order
of stages
 main focus on passing a „structural assimilation“
 Integration of minorities depends on their capabilities to incorporate
in institutions of the majority society
 assimilation is often not succesful because it stops at the behavioral
level
 „melting pot“- conzept has failed because segregation and isolation
by US American society hinder one-sided expectations of assimilation
 integration does not only depend on the will of minorities or
migrants, but also by the will of the majority society and nation-state
integration policy to eleminate ethnic discrimination and to guarantee
the same law for all citizens
Newer American Sociology of migration
• in the following years more and more a view was constructed
that integration is not only a singular task of migrants or
minorialso an active participation of the members of the
majority society
• Ronald Taft (1957): „Stage model of assimilation“ contradicts
the formal adaptation of only one unit to the other one and
emphasizes the possibility of mutual adaptation, which takes
place by interactions and parallel existence of the groups
• assimilative social integration depends on contextual
conditions of the host state
Hartmut Esser - Assimilation
• „Assimilation“ is not a political concept of ethnic or cultural adaptation
• „‚adoptation of different groups in certain characteristis“ as language
ability and filling of jobs
• assimilation does not mean absolute equality of actors because also the
domestic population is not homogenous
• important is the fact that there are no systematic differences in the
distribution of certain characteristics and ressources fordifferent groups in
one society
• assimilation means dissolution of systematic differences between groups
and categories, but not the equality of individuals in every department
• there can be social inequalities but not between ethnic groups!
• domestic and minority population participate equally at laws and
ressources of a society (Esser 2001:21 f.)
Annett Treibel (1999
• „Assimilation“ is not the state or result of adaptation but a process of
gradual adaptation
• for Heckmann (1992) the will for acculturation of migrants is a necessary
but not sufficient condition for integration  results often in
accomodation  refers to a gradual form of assimilation
• learning and adaptation processes of persons which by a change of
location have to appropriate basic means and rules of communication and
activity of the new society and knowledge of institutions and belief
systems to be able for interaction and working (Heckmann 1992: 168)
• Aus dieser Definition geht hervor, dass sich Migranten und ethnische
Minderheiten einen bestimmten Fundus von Wissensbeständen und
Qualifikationen aneignen, der für die Kommunikation in der
Mehrheitsgesellschaft notwendig ist, allerdings brauchen sich hierdurch
nicht notwendigerweise die Denkweisen, Werte, Vorlieben und
Überzeugungen der Migranten und Minderheitenakteure zu verändern.
Assimilation or Integration
• Asimilaton: adaption of language, cultural traditions, norms,
behavior patterns of the host society
• in contradiction to cultural and ethnic pluralis
• Integration: processes by which migrants or minorities will be
accepted members of the host society
• mutual process which have to be fulfilled by minorities and
majority
• requires efforts and good will
Integration
• Interactions by actors and actor‘s interaction
in the social system
• Integration depens on the willingness of
migrants and/or ethnic minorities as well as
orientations and problem solutions of the
titular society
• Integration requires the disappearing of ethnic
discrimination and the acceptance of the
same laws for ethnic majorities as well as
minorities (Gordon, 1964:252)
Integration
is„(…) a process of political and social
‚inclusion of the excluded‘, and was defined in
an operational way as a process of removing
barriers which prevented non-Estonians from
participating in the local social and political
life, from being competitive in the labour
market, and from taking advantage of the
opportunities of the Estonian educational
system.“ (Lauristin/Heidmets 2002b: 324)
• noticeable in this view on integration is that the
propagate approach of the Estonian government does
not distinguish between „Integration“ and „Inclusion“
• No difference between „systemic Integration“ and
„social integration“ of migrants and/or members of
ethnic groups
• Common understanding of „integration“ and
„inclusion“ means that the individual integration
process in the „Lebenswelt“ is similarily to the
inclusion in the Estonian titular society (special rights,
occupying of certain positions, appropriation of
important societal ressources)
• therefore it is important to distinguish between the
complex processes of systemic and social integration of
the Russian Minority in Estonia
• use of the integration approach of German
scholar Hartmut Esser (1999, 2001)
• differs between social and systemic integration
• allows to focus on processes of inclusion and
exclusion of ethnic minorities
• on the one hand, social and systemic integration
can be distinguished as single units, but
otherwise systemic integration is pursued by
actors‘ interaction
• In this way, the sociological differentiation of
„social system theory“ and „actors theory“ have
to be seen as an interplay, because actors are
able to consolidate and change social systems
Systemic Integration
• takes place independently (anonymiously) from
the motives and relationships of individual actors
• refers to the integration in a social system like
integration in the world-market, nation-state,
international concerns, corporative actors or
supra-national entities like the EU
• refers to particular mechanisms of the market,
institutioanl laws of the nation-state and
particular media resources (not mass media, but
money)
Social Integration
• focuses on motives, orientations, and purposes of
individual actors,
• refers to the „embedding process“ of individual actors in a
social system
• is associated with the grant of laws, learning of the titular
population‘s language, embedding in the education system
and the national employment market, interethnic
friendships and identification with the nation-state
• my thesis: succesful „social integration“ of ethnic minorities
can not only be evaluated by their embedding in the
„Lebenswelt“ but also by their inclusion in the sub-systems
of the social system of the titular society and possibilities to
control important resources in state and society
Spheres of Social Integration
titular society
ethnic community in the titular
society (Russian group in Estonia)
Society of origin (kinship, ethnic
networks, transnatonalism,
translocalism)
Four types of social integration
 plural integration: integration in the titular society as well
as in the ethnic community and the society of origin
 segmentation / segregation: integration in an „ethnic
milieu“ (Chinese in New York, Turkeys in Berlin) 
establishment of „We-Groups“
 marginalisation: Park (1928, „marginal man“):
disintegration in the titular society as well as in the society
of origin/ethnic community  processes of self-exclusion,
no language assimilation, marginal interactions and
identification with the own ethnic community as well as
members of the titular society
 assimilation: dominant model of integration in European
societies
Dimensions of social integration
Placement
• societal position of migrants and/or ethnic minorities in
a social system: e.g. labour market positions
• important for pursuing ressources
• bounded to certain laws, like citizenship, election laws
Culturation
• process of adoptation
• necessary knowledge and qualifications for the
interaction in the titular society, like language
• often results in „acculturation“: semi or partial
culturation
Acculturation
• exchange of cultural features that results when groups of
individuals having different cultures come into continuous first hand
contact
• original cultural patterns of either or both groups may be altered,
but the groups remain distinct (cf. Kottak 2007)
• anthropologists Redfield, Linton and Herskovits (1936, p. 149)
developed the oft quoted definition:
"Acculturation comprehends those phenomena which result when
groups of individuals having different cultures come into continuous
first-hand contact, with subsequent changes in the original culture
patterns of either or both groups".
Dimensions of social integration
Interactions
• helpful for minority actors to „come in
contact“ with the members of the titular
society
Identification
• emotional/identificative orientation of actors
with the titular society as well as the society
of origin
Ethnic Russian Minority in Estonia
 have an ethnic Russian migration background (even descendants of
migrations; migrants of the 2nd or 3rd generation)
 have citizenship of Estonia, Russia or are stateless
 are using the Russian language in everyday life as primary language
The question of citizenship
• members of the Russian group have been divided
in two sub-groups:
1. Those who have been already lived in the First
Estonian Republic f(1918-1940) and their
descendants)
2. those who were comming to ESSR as labourforce
in the course of the industrialisation process
• last group has been classified by conservative
Estonian Politicians as a threat for the achieved
national souveranity and where called from now
on „Aliens“
Alien
• Term „Alien „(Estonian „muulane“) is used for a
„person of another nationalitaty („Alien Law” by July
1992)
• “An alien is a person who is not an Estonian citizen and
aliens staying in Estonia are guaranteed rights and
freedoms equal to those of Estonian citizens unless the
constitution, this Act, other Acts or international
agreements of Estonia provide otherwise. Aliens are
guaranteed the rights and freedoms arising from the
generally recognised rules of international law and
international custom. Aliens staying in Estonia are
required to observe the constitutional order and
legislation of Estonia.”
Statelessness
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
main problem of exclusive citizenship regulations refers to the large number of noncitizens in Estonia
marker for lacking placement in the political system of Estonia (cf. Barrington 1995,
Poleshchuk 2004, Semjonova 2001), emphasized also by UNHCR (2007a) und
Amnesty International (2006)
although the number of stateless has decreased from ca. 400,000 in 1991 to
124,681 in 2007, a rising stagnition for citizenship by naturalization is obvious (cf.
EMFA 2005)
more than the half of applicants are minors of which more than one third passed
the language and citizenship test (ibid.)
on the average more than 60 per cent of apllicants pass the waystage user-Test (cf.
Tomusk 2002: 46)
relatively low success rate has to be traced back to the fact that individual efforts
and test-specific requirements have to be fulfilled to get Estonian citizenship
otherwise one has to give attention to the fact that ca. 275,000 ethnic Russians who
have been stateless did not decide for Estonian but for Russian citizenship
Connection between citizenship and ressources
• What are the reasons that ethnic
Russians decide for Estonian citizenship?
• What are the reasons that ethnic
Russians decide for Russian citizenship?
• What are the reasons that ethnic
Russians in Estonia decide to stay
stateless?
Reasons for application for Estonian citizenship and
its functions
• by Estonian citizenship comprehensive political rights (e.g. right to vote)
and possible upward moility in high political and administrative positions
can be reached
 those ethnic Russians without Estonian citizenship are missing
automatically lower political rights of participation
 non-citizens of Estonia do not have the possibility to practice active and
passive electoral rights by the election of the Estonian national assembly
 they also do not have the passive electoral right in local elections
 Non-Estonians do not can candidate for political positions and
administrative positions as well as do not can work in leading positions of
state enterprises (cf. EP 2000)
 only Estonian citizens can be member of Estonian political parties what
complicate the representation of interest of non-citizens (cf. Elsuwege
2004: 26)
Reasons for application for Estonian citizenship
and its functions
• ethnic Russians are conscious about their decission to apply for Estonian
citizenship or not
• will to become an Estonian and will for placement („political inclusion“)
depends on very rational motives and criteria
 to be a full member of the Estonian society
 to have better chances on the Estonian and EU labour market
 to give children a better future and career chances
 to be EU-citizen and not be exluded from taking part in elections
(elections of the European Parliament)
• for younger stateless persons a trend is obvious that a decission „pro
Estonia“ offers opportunities
 possibilities to travel in EU without barriers and to study and work there
Reasons for application for Russian citizenship
and its functions
• three main reasons:
Measures of Russia‘s diaspora policy
existence of social networks
appropriation of economic advantages
Appropriation of pension entitlements
Economy of Citizenship
Russia‘s diaspora policy
 particularities in the bilateral relations between Russia and Estonia lies in the fact
that both have a different general view on history (cf. Budryte 2005, in 2006,
Wehner 2006)
 Baltic States show for „Putin’s Russia“ „the biggest tragedy of the 20th century“
(Putin quotes in Wehner 2006), because the internal erosion of the Soviet state
strted with the independence attempts of the Baltic states
 quintessential point of the historical quarrel refers to the fact that Putin does not
recognise the occupation of the Baltic states by Stalin as a result of the confidential
additional protocol of the Molotow-Ribbentrop- pact.
 „Putin’s Russia“ looks at the annexation of the Baltic States by the Soviet army as a
voluntary act to join the Soviet Union
 Estonia emphasizes mass deportations, suppression and terror during the Soviet
occupation (cf. Wehner 2006).
 to accept the full independence of the Baltic states (cf. Kolstø 1995)
 Russia protests regularly against citizenship regulations concerning “its” minority
and against the restrictive language policy, loss of importance of Russian language
and regulations concerning electoral laws (cf. Dorodnova 2000)
 highlighting the fact of „ethnic discrimination“ (cf. Hughes 2005) and continuing
“Russiaphobie" (cf. Long 2003)
Russia‘s diaspora policy
- some authors (Dittmer 2003, Kolstø 1995) find out that the loyalty of ethnic Russians
with the members of the Estonian titular society is rather low, because Estonia like
Latvia did not grant citizenship automatically after independence
- On the other hand, Russia granted already in 1991 every ethnic Russian in the successor
states of the SU the possibility "automatically" to accept the Russian citizenship (cf.
Mironov/Mironov 2003)  but since 2001 "automatic“ citizenship was not furthermore
granted
- nevertheless, since 2003 Russia recognised that demographic changes (natural ageing
and sinking birth rates) require to find new solutions for ethnic Russians abroad
(Russian Diaspora in the successor states of the SU) (cf. NOVOSTI 2006c)
- By specific recruitment of members of the Diaspora in the former Soviet republics the
„demographic problem” beyond the metropolises Moscow and St. Petersburg shall be
solved (cf. Pörzgen 2007)
- as a result the conditions of entry and “coming home to Russia” as well as citizenshipspecific regulations (restrictions) were eased for Russian "compatriots“ (cf. NOVOSTI
2006d)
Russia‘s diaspora policy
Putin:
• „We know about the fact that the overwhelming majority of Russians and
other ethnic groups from the Russian federation do not live abroad
because they it wish […] We will do everything to help those who want to
come back to their motherland […] We must to deal with realities which
determine the life. Above all, it is about the return of our compatriots in
such territories of today's Russia which urgently need manpower (…) The
level of moving allowance depends on the need of manpower in the
regions. Where the need is especially big, the move money will be more.“
(Putin quotes in Pörzgen 2007)
- In October 2006, the coordination gremium of the Russian compatriots
was founded at the world congress of compatriots in St. Petersburg (cf.
NOVOSTI 2007a)
- President Putin asked 600 delegates from nearly 80 countries for vigorous
support of his voluntary remigration programme (cf. RIAN 2007a)
- Only in 2007, 4,6 milliard roubles from the household of the federation
were provided to finance moving allowance and to support job searches
and school choice
Russia‘s diaspora policy
• in RDP is strong emphasis on the identity concept
• Kortunow (1997:15) speaks about a „selective engagement“, which gives returns to
a construction of an Ethnic-Russian, more precise Rossianian identity, and uses for
this symbolic acts, e.g. the visit of a delegation of Duma members after the quarrel
about the dismantling of the Soviet memorial in Tallinn in April, 2007
• this conflict about the demolition of the soldier's monument makes in all sharpness
clear that Russia anytime is able to mobilize above all younger ethnic Russians in
the „close foreign countries“ (Savoskul 2001)
• “selectice engagment” means a “policy of pinpricks”: „To be 'selective' means to
use different rules in different situations, to abstain from every universal approach,
to renounce general rules” (Kortunov 1997)
• proponents of “selective engagement” assume that Russia does not have enough
resources to rebuild the Russian or previous Soviet empire or to build up a security
system on the territory of the former Soviet Union, but…
• …on the other hand, Russia can not afford a isolationistic policy, that is why
“selective engagement” reffering to neighbouring states means first of all to show
several regional and subregional arrangements with different degrees of Russian
participation“ (Kortunow 1997:15)
Russia‘s diaspora policy
• not only by symbolic acts, also by financial support Russia is supporting “its”
diaspora
• in 2007 approx. 10 million Euro were given abroad to support the organisation
of school holidays, the care of veterans, supply of literature and cultural
activities (cf. RIAN 2006a, RIAN 2006b), material and ideological support of the
Russian language and education of teachers (cf. Simonow 2004)
• especially the financial engagement for the Russian language should be a
factor to attract ethnic Russians in the „near abroad“ to decide for Russian
citizenship and to (re)-migrate to Russia
• „Many Russians in Estonia still think that they are a part of this big Russian
community and also a part of this big culture as well as the big Russian history,
especially if they have Russian citizenship. I also think that this a part of our
national problems here in Estonia. Of course, a lot of Russians have problems
to speak and or to communicate in Estonian and use their mother tongue in
everyday life (…) It is also quite difficult for older people to learn Estonian
language. Many of them already live in Estonia their whole life and during the
Soviet time they did not need to learn the Estonian language, because they
always used Russian. I think that the language is the basic reason, why they
decide for Russian citizenship.“ (Interview 27)
reasons that ethnic Russians in Estonia decide
to stay stateless
• self-exclusion of ethnic Russians not to become full members of
Estonia
• personal deprivation  social isolation of certain individuals or
groups as a result of dicontent, seclusion, shortages and services
• negative experiences  personal frustration
• difficult social situation
• desinterest in politics
• weak identification with Estonia
• disenchantment with politics
• critic about language test and citizenship procedures
• appropriation of state welfare support
"Minorities in Europe”
Session 9:
People with Migration Background in
Germany
Denis Gruber
Faculty of Sociology, St. Petersburg State University
DAAD-Lecturer for Sociology
German nationality law
• German citizenship is based primarily on the principle of Jus
sanguinis
• one usually acquires German citizenship if a parent is a
German citizen, irrespective of place of birth
• significant reform to the nationality law was passed by the
Bundestag in 1999, and came into force on 1 January 2000
• new law makes it somewhat easier for foreigners resident in
Germany on a long-term basis, and especially their Germanborn children to acquire German citizenship
German nationality law
Birth in Germany
• Children born on or after 1 January 2000 to non-German
parents acquire German citizenship at birth if at least one
parent:
 has a permanent residence permit (and has had this status for
at least 3 years) and
 has been residing in Germany for at least 8 years
 Such children will be required to apply successfully to retain
German citizenship by the age of 23
 they do not hold any foreign citizenship
German nationality law
Descent from a German parent
• People born to a parent who was a German citizen at the time of birth are
usually German citizens; does not matter whether they were born in
Germany or not
• those born after January 1, 1975 are Germans if the mother or father is a
German citizen
• Those born before January 1, 1975 could normally only claim German
citizenship from the father and not the mother
• Exceptions included cases where the parents were unmarried (in which
case German mothers could pass on citizenship) or where the German
mother applied for the child to be registered as German on or before 31
December 1977
• those born outside Germany to a German parent who was also born
outside Germany after 1999 will need to be registered as German citizens
within 12 months of birth
• Persons who are Germans on the basis of descent from a German parent
do not have to apply to retain German citizenship by age 23
German nationality law
Naturalisation as a German citizen
• naturalisation by those with permanent residence who have lived in
Germany for 8 years
• additional requirements include an adequate command of the German
language and an ability to be self-supporting without recourse to welfare
• Exceptions to the normal residence requirements include:
 a spouse of a German citizen may be naturalised after 3 years residence in
Germany. The marriage must have persisted for at least 2 years
 persons who have completed an integration course may have the
residence requirement reduced to 7 years
 refugees and stateless persons may be able to apply after 6 years
residence
 former German citizens
German nationality law
Victims of Nazi persecution
• people who lost German citizenship under the Nazi regime (mainly
German Jews) may be eligible for naturalisation without requiring
residence in Germany or renunciation of their existing citizenship
• Children and grandchildren of such persons may also be eligible for
German citizenship
German-born children
• children who were born in Germany in 1990 or later, and would have been
German, were entitled to be naturalised as German citizens
• child was required to apply for retention of German citizenship by age 23
and normally show that no other foreign citizenship was held at that time
German nationality law
Loss of German citizenship
• A German child adopted by foreign parents, where the child automatically acquires
the nationality of the adoptive parents under the law of the adoptive parents'
country
• German citizen who voluntarily serves in a foreign army (over and above
compulsory military service) from 1 January 2000 may lose German citizenship
unless permission is obtained from the German government
• Persons acquiring German citizenship on the basis of birth in Germany (without a
German parent) lose German citizenship automatically at age 23 if they have not
successfully applied to retain German citizenship
• when a German citizen voluntarily acquires the citizenship of another country
• two exceptions:
 When the German citizen acquires a nationality from within the European Union,
Switzerland, or another country with which Germany has a corresponding treaty
 When permission to obtain a foreign citizenship has been applied for and granted in
advance of foreign naturalisation
German nationality law
Dual citizenship
• can only be held in limited circumstances:
 where a child born to German parents acquires another
citizenship at birth (e.g. based on place of birth, or descent
from one parent)
 where a German citizen acquires a foreign nationality with the
permission of the German government
 where a naturalized German citizen, or a child born to nonGerman parents in Germany, obtains permission to keep their
foreign nationality
4. Historical Development of Migration (cont‘d)
Typs of ethnic minorities:
1.
ethnic Germans
2.
ethnic German immigrants from Balkan and former SU
labour migrants
2006: 60% of foreigners are labour migrants
1980: 75%
3.
4.
Refugees
-
490.000 recognized refugees
-
200.000 open applications for asylum
Illegale Immigrants
-
without permits
-
150,000 – 1,000,000
4 stages of German Migration History after WW II:
1.
Stage of Recruiting (1955-73):
-
Agreements with Mediteranian Countries
-
foreign labour force instead of integration of women in labour market
(as in GDR)
2.
3.
4.
-
stop of immigration from GDR
-
Rotationsprinzip
Stage of consolidation (1973-80)
-
recruitment stop 1973 until 2000
-
Familiennachzug
-
first steps of integration: Department for Integration
-
In 1980s Asylum seeking
defensive measures (1981-98)
-
limitation of asylum seekers
-
silent metamorphose of guest workers to immigrants
stage of acceptance (1998-)
-
1.1.2000: liberal, open citizenship law
-
Greencard for IT-Specialists
-
Federal Department for Foreigners, Migrants and Refugees
a) Anwerbeverträge (Vgl. Treibel, 1999: 56)
Reports
1955
Italien
1960
Spanien, Griechenland
1961
Türkei
1963
Marokko
1965
Tunesien
1968
Jugoslawien
Recruitment of Guest Workers
• starts in the 1950s til the mid 1970s
• In 1955 first recruitment contract “Anwerbevertrag” with Italy
• entrepreneurial, wage-political and job market-political considerations
were decisive, although unemployment in 1955 was with 1.1 million or 7%
relatively high (cf. Treibel, 1999:55)
• Besides, the employment of foreigners should only be a temporarily
appearance  political ideology of “Guest worker" – employment
• By the recruiting principle of rotation "young", "fresh" foreign workers
should be available for the West-German economy
• „The recruiting nation-states, enterprises and recruited workers assumed
themselves that they remain certain time in the recruiting country to save
money for independent existence or long-term acquisitions and sooner or
later to return to their country of origin“ (ibid55)
Recruitment of Guest Workers
• There was a need for unqualified manpower for dirty and or badly paid
work
• recruited workers were employed in those branches of the secondary
sector which became more and more unattractive for local employees and
female employees, thus, e.g., in the mining, in constructions, metal
industry, textile industry
• furthermore, a need for the tertiary sector: health service and gastronomy
• "foreign workers" were accommodated often in mass accommodations,
camps and hostels
• „Guest workers are therefore functional for the structural change of the
German labour system, because they allowed the rise of the local
manpower.“ (Treibel, 1999:56)
Recruitment of Guest Workers
•
•
•
•
in 1966/67 rise of unemployment rate in Western Germany
in 1973 stop of labour force recruitment and rotation principle
A new phase of the West German foreigners policy: consolidation
Until the end of the 1970s numerous restriction and adaptation measures
took place: (1974: reference regulation, 1975: Child benefit regulation;
immigration stop)
• aim which was pursued was not furthermore to “replace” “old" foreign
manpower by new ones and final remigration of labourforce in their
homelands
• number of the foreign employees decreased: 2.6 million in 1973 (year of
the highest level) to 1.6 million in 1984
Recruitment of Guest Workers
• In the 1970s also the process of migration of foreign employees’ families
has started (family reunification)
• „Longer duration of stay, better living conditions and unrestricted
possibilities of entry and leaving of the border, and this is especially
important, the return possibility, led to the fact that foreign workers began
to reunite their families.“ (Korte/Schmidt, 1983:17)
• Anwerbestopp of 1973 had caused the opposite
• „When the foreigners had understood that from now on a return was
correctable definitively, not more like during former years by a renewed
recruitment, a part of them began to organize the reunification of the
family. Especially strongly this was observed for Turks. While in Greece,
Spain and Portugal consolidated their economies, the economic and social
situation in Turkey became from year to year worse.“ (ibid. 19)
• „Turks expected, stricter regulations for family reunification could follow,
and, therefore, brought in their families to Germany
Migration from Turkey 1961-73
• German Turkish arrangement about the recruitment of manpower started
on 30.10. 1961
• the Turkish military government intended „by a limited emigration to
relieve the labour market, to bring in urgently required foreign currency.
and to promote the economic modernisation of Turkey by know-how of
the certified repatriates
• from 1961 to 1973 German enterprises employed about 710,000
manpower from Turkey
• rotation principle which limited the work permit to two years was also in
interest for the Turkish government to control the migration flows and to
use certified manpower in the country after remigration
• under the pressure of the German economy the rotation principle was
dropped already in 1962 formally and was stopped in 1964
Migration from Turkey 1973-93
• The second military putsch in 1980 in Turkey was a new turning point after
1973
• from now on migrants from Turkey came as regime opponents to Germany
• in the 1980s the number of those immigrants was 125,000 people
• another reason for the migration to Germany was the economic situation
(e.g. rate of unemployment 18 percent)
• „Besides, a return to the native country was irreversible – for Turkish
migrants because of the non-membership in the EC – there was no
freedom of movement. Therefore, the time for returning to Turkey was
shifted. Because also the medical care as well as the school education and
professional training in Germany were better the stay duration rose on
and on.“ (ibid. see 11)
Movements into and out of Germany by Germans and foreign
nationals
from 1991 to 2006
1.600.000
1.400.000
1.200.000
1.000.000
800.000
600.000
400.000
200.000
0
1991
1992
1993
1994
1995
1996
1997
1998
1999
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
Zuzüge
Sources: Federal Statistical Office, together with our own calculations
2006
Fortzüge
"Minorities in Europe”
Session 10:
Ethnic Minorities in
South-Eastern and
South-Western Europe
Denis Gruber
Faculty of Sociology, St. Petersburg State University
DAAD-Lecturer for Sociology
Migration in the EU
• present immigration situation among EU member states is highly
heterogeneous
• European Statistical Office (Eurostat) data for 2007 indicate the
continuation of highly differing forms of immigration
• clear shift in the relationship between “old” and “new” immigration
countries
• Thus countries on the southern border of the EU (Spain and Italy) are
experiencing the highest level of immigration
• even the Czech Republic, a new member, has already overtaken the
traditional receiving countries of central and northern Europe
• only the Baltic States, Bulgaria and Poland show negative immigration
balances, although even the Netherlands recorded more emigration than
immigration in 2007
Migration in the EU
• percentage of foreign population in the EU member states extends from
less than 1% of the total population (Slovakia) through to 39%
(Luxemburg)
• In most countries, however, the foreign percentage is between 2% and 8%
of the total population
• in all EU member states excluding Luxemburg, Belgium, Ireland and
Cyprus, the majority of the foreign population is made up of so-called
third country nationals, i.e. non-EU citizens
Migration in the EU
• strong differences with regard to the legal categories on which the
immigration flows are based
• labour migration dominates in countries with less regulated labour
markets (e.g. the United Kingdom, Ireland, the Czech Republic and
Denmark)
• in most other states family reunification represents the strongest
immigration category (especially apparent in France and Sweden)
• Italy and Germany adopt a middle position, i.e. similar percentages are
attributable to labour migration and family reunification, although in
Germany “other” migration also makes up a large percentage 
Spätaussiedler (ethnic German immigrants from the countries of the
former Soviet Union)
• in Germany, Denmark and the Netherlands, Turkish citizens make up the
biggest group of foreigners
• by contrast, citizens of former colonies are numerous in Portugal (Cape
Verde, Brazil and Angola) and in Spain (Ecuador and Morocco).
Migration in the EU
• majority of foreigners in Greece are from Albania
• majority in Slovenia from other parts of the former Yugoslavia
• citizens from the former Soviet Union are most significant among the
foreign populations of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania
• in most of the member states immigration is dominated by the low skilled
• only the United Kingdom records almost equal percentages of highly and
low-skilled migrants
• in Italy, Austria and Germany, by contrast, immigration is dominated now
as ever by the lower skilled
Spain
• Languages: Spanish (Castilian), Catalan (regional), Basque (regional),
Galician (regional)
• Population (2008): 46,063,511 (INE, Padrón municipal1)
• Foreign population (2008): 5,220,577 Persons (11.3 %) (INE, Padrón
municipal)
• Percentage of foreign employees amongst gainfully employed: 14.4 %
(1/2008)
• Unemployment rate: 9.6 % (1/2008), 8.6 (4/2007), 8.3 (4/2006) (INE,
Encuesta de Población Activa)
• Unemployment rate of foreign population: 14.6 % (1/2008), 12.4 %
(4/2007), 12.0 % (4/2006) (INE, Encuesta de Población Activa)
• Religions: 35 mln. Catholics (77 %), approx. 1.2 mln. Protestants and free
churches (2.7 %), approx. 1.1 mln. Muslims (2.4 %), approx. 48 000 Jews
(0.1 %) (estimations, International Religious Freedom Report 2007)
Spain
From emigration country to immigration country
• history of Spanish migration over the last five hundred years has mostly
been a tale of emigration
• Traditionally, waves of emigrants have headed to Latin America, with flows
peaking at the beginning of the 20th century
• from 1905-1913, 1.5 million Spaniards left the country for Argentina,
Brazil, Uruguay and Venezuela
• following interruptions stemming from the World Wars and the Spanish
Civil War (1936-1939)
• between 1946 and 1958, about 624,000 people left the country for
overseas
• approximately 300,000 people joined this final wave of emigration to Latin
America between 1958 and 1975
Spain
• Northern and Western European countries began to recruit foreign
workers
• Spain became a source country of the “guest workers” needed by France,
Germany and, later, Switzerland
• economic and energy crises of 1973/74 led to the end of foreign labour
recruitment by those countries, resulting in a drastic reduction in
emigration from Spain
• from 1960 to 1975, approximately two million Spaniards migrated to other
European countries
• from the mid-1970s to 1990, approximately 15,000 people per year went
to other European countries through Spain’s “controlled” emigration
programme
• majority of these migrants went to Switzerland and, to a lesser extent,
France for a period of less than a year
• number of people sent abroad through the “controlled” emigration
programme declined drastically following Spain’s entry into the EU (1986)
Spain
• Spain’s foreign population has been increasing slowly since the middle of
the 1980s
• In the beginning, Northern and Western Europeans, in search of a
(retirement) residence in a warmer climate, accounted for a considerable
proportion of incoming migrants
• overall migration trends have changed, with increased levels of southnorth migration from the “Third World” and, after the fall of the Iron
Curtain, east-west migration from Central and Eastern Europe
• these new trends, combined with a period of prolonged economic growth
in Spain, have led to a rise in the number of migrant workers entering
Spain
Spain
• In 1975, there were approximately 200,000 foreigners living in Spain
• number increased fivefold in the following 25 years to reach 1 million by
the end of the century
• in 2007, around 3.98 million foreigners were in possession of a residence
permit
• foreigners represented 11.3% of the total population of 46.1 million at the
beginning of 2008
• high level of immigration has been responsible for Spain’s considerable
population growth
• country’s population grew by 2.1% from 2004 to 2005, 1.4% from 2005 to
2006, 1.1% from 2006 to 2007 and 1.9% from 2007 to 2008
Minorities and political
participation in South-East Europe
- participation of minorities in public life is essential:
 to ensure that their particular concerns are taken into account
 to enable them to influence the general direction of development of
society
 participation in social and economic life enables them to take care of their
needs through their own active contribution
- investigation in South East European (SEE) countries shows:
• a wide range of mechanisms in connection with minority participation and
representation, adjusted to the relevant situations in practice
• mechanisms vary from federalism, through territorial autonomy,
proportional electoral systems and guaranteed minority seats in
parliament and on advisory boards to various committees and
commissions
Minorities and political
participation in South-East Europe
suggestions:
• if minorities are effectively represented in public affairs,
discriminatory standards and practices can be more readily
eliminated
• effective participation of minorities in various areas of public
life is essential for the development of a truly democratic,
cohesive, inclusive and just society
• effective participation of minorities in decision-making
processes, is a fundamental precondition for the full and
equal enjoyment of the human rights of persons belonging to
minorities
Minorities and political
participation in South-East Europe
what is the state in SEE-countries?
- both differences and common ground with regard to political parties
representing minorities
- every country has political parties representing minorities and for them,
ethnopolitical mobilization is the main agent of organization
- such parties provide for the political participation of minority groups, but
tend to be mono-ethnic, attracting support only from the one ethnic
group they represent
- such parties are a stronger factor in local politics than in national politics,
due to their voter base
- influence exerted by parties representing minorities on the policy process
is dependent on the importance of the party in the country which vary
across SEE
Minorities and political
participation in South-East Europe
Romania
•
•
Ethnic minorities comprise more than 10% of Romania’s total population
Minorities in Romania can be divided into three categories, mainly taking the size
of the minority group into consideration:
1) Hungarians, the most numerous and politically well organized
2) Roma, the second most numerous with several political organizations to
represent them
3) 18 other minority groups with at least one political organization per group
- Romanian Constitution guarantees one seat in the lower house of Parliament for
each minority group whose candidates cannot gather enough votes to enter the
Parliament in accordance with the electoral system (Article 59)
- Through this clause, in the 2004-2008 Parliament 18 minority groups had
representatives in Parliament
- With exception of the Democratic Alliance of the Hungarians in Romania (DAHR),
which was able to gain enough votes to win seats in Parliament, the other
organizations representing minorities have benefited from this provision
"Minorities in Europe”
Session 11 and 12:
The Informal Sector, Minorities and
Ethnic Minority Entrepreneurship
Theoretical Approaches, Empirical
Findings in Russia and Europe
Denis Gruber
Faculty of Sociology, St. Petersburg State University
DAAD-Lecturer for Sociology
Informal Sector definition
• term "informal sector" has been used to describe a wide spectrum of
activities, which do not necessarily have much in common
- tax evasion, corruption, money laundering, organised crime, bribery,
subsistence farming, barter etc.
• concept was introduced by the ILO (International Labor Office) in a study
on Kenya in 1972
• often the term is used to refer to economic activities that take place
outside a given recognized and legal institutional framework
• activities in the IS generate an income that is both not taxed and not
controlled by the legal institutions which regulate the legal sphere
• following Bernabè (2002) it refers to small either unregistered and
unregulated activities, or activities concealed in order to avoid tax
payment, or even activities producing goods and services forbidden by the
law
Describing the Informal Sector
Differences to the Formal Sector
-
smaller scale of enterprises and production units (varying from individuals,
single households to enterprises with a few employees)
lower complexity of the production process
use of high technology and expensive energy to a much lesser extent
less division of labour
lower capital-intensity
wages that are not based on the working time but on quantities (number
of produced pieces)
high fluctuation of employees
production that is located in the housing/ living space or on the streets
high degree of Insecurity
Describing the Informal Sector
ILO World Employment Programme Report puts the following
characteristics:
- ease to entry
- reliance on indigenious ressources
- family ownership of enterprises
- small scale of operation
- skills aquired outside the formal school system and
unregulated and competetive markets.
but: following Kumar and Jena the above mentioned
characteristics lack validity, because one has to focus on rural
and urban as well as regional and international differences
Linkages between the Formal and Informal Sector
• earlier studies show a clear distinction between the informal and
the formal sector
• recent studies emphasize that both sectors cannot be dealt with
as two separate and independent spheres
• Indeed there exists a number of linkages and interdependencies
• Following Singh (1996) one can find „upward vertical linkages“
and “downward vertical linkages“
• „Downward vertical linkages“, e.g.: sale of goods and services
from the formal to the informal sector
• „upward vertical linkages“, e.g.: sale of goods and services from
the informal to the formal sector
Linkages between the Formal and Informal Sector
• example: “subcontracting“: requires cheap and flexible
employees, i.e. workers who are not bound to stable working
contracts and social insurances, it leads to price cuts of the
informal produced goods and the low status of the respective
employees (Singh 1996:50)
• the fact that many informal enterprises nevertheless work on
a sub-contract-basis for the formal economy indicates that the
informal sector is to a large extent dependent on ‘external’
orders
The Informal Sector in Russia
• worsening of formal employment conditions, reduction in real wages and
quasi absence of social security
• during the first decade of transformation a lot of households with working
age member fall into poverty
• "new” phenomenon of "working poor" has become wide-spread
• facing negative economic conditions, Russian population has to change its
behaviour on the labour market: selfemployment, moonlighting and
informal activities have become a reality for many individuals (Kim, 2002)
• since 1998 the number of persons working in the IS increased
c.f.: Beuran/Kalugina
2006: Social exclusion
and the informal
sector: the case of
Russia
The structure of informal employment in Russia
•
•
•
among all types of informal employment the major input — over 50% — comes from
the employees of informal sector
self-employed, multiple job holders and incompliant formal sector employees
account respectively for 21, 13, and 15%
c.f. Merkuryeva, Irina (2006): Informal Employment in Russia: Combining Disadvantages and Opportunities,
Discussion Paper, CENTRE FOR ECONOMIC REFORM AND TRANSFORMATION, School of Management and
Languages, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, p.6
The structure of informal employment in Russia
• age structure of informal employment by gender shows that the highest
informal employment rates are observed among younger age groups
c.f. Merkuryeva, Irina (2006): Informal Employment in Russia: Combining Disadvantages and Opportunities,
Discussion Paper, CENTRE FOR ECONOMIC REFORM AND TRANSFORMATION, School of
Management and Languages, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, p.7
The structure of informal employment in Russia
• Informal employment on average provides lower wage rates as well as
lower monthly wage amounts
c.f. Merkuryeva, Irina (2006): Informal Employment in Russia: Combining Disadvantages and
Opportunities, Discussion Paper, CENTRE FOR ECONOMIC REFORM AND TRANSFORMATION,
School of Management and Languages, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, p.8
The structure of informal employment in Russia
• the prevalence of formal employment — 90% — is observed in the
organizations owned by different levels of government
• 50% of the employees of private sector are employed on informal basis
• 10% of municipal and 8% of federal and regional employees work
informally
c.f. Merkuryeva, Irina (2006): Informal Employment in Russia: Combining Disadvantages and Opportunities,
Discussion Paper, CENTRE FOR ECONOMIC REFORM AND TRANSFORMATION, School of
Management and Languages, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, p.9
Infomal Sector does not
automatically mean
Informal Practices!!!
Ethnic Minority Entrepreneurship
Denis Gruber
Faculty of Sociology, St. Petersburg State University
DAAD-Lecturer for Sociology
Who is an entrepreneur?
•
•
Gartner (1989): “(…)the entrepreneur is the one who creates an organization.”
organizations are created all the time by people who are not entrepreneurs
(e.g., political parties, associations, and social groups)
• Gartner criticizes Carland et. al.’s (1984, 358) definition of entrepreneur: “An
entrepreneur is an individual who establishes and manages a business for the
principal purposes of profit and growth”
• Hebért & Link (1989, 47) conclude that “(…) entrepreneur is a person, not a
team, committee or organization”
• Pickle & Abrahamson (1990, 5,9) introduce a compact definition of an
entrepreneur: “An entrepreneur is one who organizes and manages a business
undertaking, assuming the risk, for the sake of profit. The entrepreneur
evaluates perceived opportunities and strives to make the decisions that will
enable the firm to realize sustained growth.”
 this definition does not include any process characteristics thought to be
important at least in high growth ventures
Definitions of Entrepreneurship
•
four main concepts: concepts
 entrepreneur is an individual actor in the market
 focusing on the entrepreneurial spirit to analyze the behavior in the market
 entrepreneurship is put into the centre and attempts to combine the actor
(entrepreneur) and the behavior in the market
 emphasizing the entrepreneurial process and combining time dimension and
behavior in the market
1Nevertheless, no commonly accepted definitions of the entrepreneur,
entrepreneurial (behavior) or entrepreneurship exist
one of the best definitions of entrepreneurship is found in Ronstadt (1984, 28):
“Entrepreneurship is the dynamic process of creating incremental wealth. The wealth
is created by individuals who assume the major risks in terms of equity, time
and/or career commitment or provide value for some product or service. The
product or service may or may not be new or unique but value must somehow be
infused by the entrepreneur by receiving and allocating the necessary skills and
resources.”
Ethnic entrepreneurship studies
• split into two types of discussion (Greene et al., 2003)
 apart of an underserved minority population that needs business
assistance to guide venture small businesses and development
 models of entrepreneurial approaches by certain ethnic groups
are not lauded but adopted for trial by other types of
communities, whether those communities be natural or
artificially created
• The concern over the definition of ‘ethnic entrepreneurship’ has
been increasing over the past few years
• Minority entrepreneurs are business owners who do not belong
to the majority population
• A minority may not (necessarily) be an immigrant and may not
share a strong sense of group solidarity with an ethnic group, in
terms of a shared history, religion, or language (Basu, 2002
Georg Simmel as starting point?
• Simmel’s conception of the ‘stranger’ has opened minority discussions
• Simmel was using the term ’stranger’ to describe a person arriving in a
new geographical location and becoming classified as a minority by dint of
race, religion, or ethnicity
• According to Butler and Greene (1997), these early scholars developed
ideas based on:
- the ‘stranger’ as trader
- the social structure of society
- the value systems produced
- religious tenets
These explained fundamental issues led to the emergence of a theoretical
framework for ethnic entrepreneurship
Approaches to Ethnic Entrepreneurship
-
‘Enclave Theory’
‘Middleman Theory’
‘Theories of Immigration’
‘Ethnic-controlled economy’
‘Enclave Theory’
• is concerned with immigrants, entrepreneurship and labor market issues
(Nee & Nee, 1986)
• adherents maintain that ethnic enclaves, as well as being economically and
culturally linked, have historically been geographically based (cf. Menzies,
2003)
• an ethnic economy that is clustered around a territorial core
– Cultural identity is key
– Businesses and customers proactively and significantly recapture spending
along ethnic lines and at all levels
– Examples: Coreatown, Chinatown, Bombaytown
‘Middleman Theories’
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
cf. Bonacich, 1973; Bonacich & Modell, 1980; Waldinger et al., 1990
middlemen are between elites and the broad mass on societal level
considered as mediators between producers and consumers on economic level
they do business and are less committed themselves to the sphere of
production
‘Middlemen theories’ deal with emerge and formation of these minorities
formations are a reaction to the animosity of the native population  hence,
group pride and mutual help are developing which prevent that group members
will be economically isolated
other views: middlemen minorities claimed as a kind of ‘lock-up’ persons
between elites and the broad mass  for economic survival the group members
turn to self-employment and business creation activities that generally have low
barriers to entry and a high degree of liquidity (Greene et al., 2003)
in ‘Middleman Theories’ the focus is on: trading peoples residing in diasporas
define ethnic entrepreneurship as “a set of connections and regular patterns of
interaction among people sharing common national background or migration
experiences” (Waldinger et al., 1990)
‘Theories of Immigration’
•
•
•
•
-
focus on the elements and models of the business creation process for
immigrant entrepreneurs (Menzies, 2003
term ’diaspora’ is often used
Diaspora does not only refer to its Greek origin referring to ‘migration and
colonization’ but also to the voluntary residence without any colonialist
motives within a country if there is a strong cohesion by collective identities
Robin Cohen calls different features for ‘diasporas’:
scattering from a home country to at least two other regions
scattering occurs often involuntary and traumatically but, however, can also
occur voluntary
members of diaspora share collective memory and myth about their home
country and idealize this and his history
it results in a return movement
strong self-group consciousness is developing
relationships to native population are problematically because fear is occurring
that the group could be attacked or at least not be accepted by the majority
population
solidarity with ethnic group members who live in other countries; however, an
especially creative, pluralistic life can be established within the group
‘Ethnic-controlled economy’
• significant and persistent economic power exercised by ethnic employees in
the mainstream economy
•
•
Ethnic entrepreneurs usually cluster in the same occupations and industries
This can encourage and confer market power above and beyond individual wealth
and human capital
• Booker T. Washington describes mutual help among Afro-Americans to start
an own business and the advantages that result from networks for business
activities
• this approach can be seen as a further development of the three other main
theories of ethnic entrepreneurship
• according to Ivan Light (2000: 9), “an ethnic economy (…) exists whenever
any immigrant or ethnic group maintains a private economic sector in which
it has a controlling ownership stake.”
• Edna Bonacich and John Modell define an ‘ethnic economy’ as “any ethnic
or immigrant groups self-employed, its employers, their co-ethnic
employees, and their unpaid family workers.”
Use of Ethnic Strategies
• Strategy definition: “the positioning of oneself to others in order to
accomplish one’s goals”
• Typical challenges that necessitate strategy:
–
–
–
–
–
skills acquisition and training
recruitment and management of workers
managing relations with customers and suppliers
surviving competition
protecting oneself from political attacks
• Strategic responses
–
–
–
–
–
self-exploitation
business expansion by moving forward or backward in the chain of production
founding and supporting ethnic trading associations
cementing alliances to other families through marriage
Bribery, penalty payments, searching for loopholes, and organizing protests
Informal Practices an Activities
• formal institutions of the state socialism broke down
relatively quickly
• informal structures, practices and relation patterns
are resources that the actors in the transformative
process can make use of
• How do these inherited informal structures and
relation pattern influence the transformation
process?
Types of ‘hidden’ (unmeasured, untaxed and/or
unregulated) activities
• informal activities, which are undertaken ‘to meet basic
needs’;
• underground activities, which are deliberately concealed from
public authorities to avoid either the payment of taxes or
compliance with certain regulations;
• iIllegal activities, which generate goods and services
forbidden by the law or which are unlawful when carried out
by unauthorised producers; and
• household activities, which produce goods and services for
own consumption and are outside the SNA production
boundary
c.f. System of National Accounts (SNA, 1993)
98
What are “informal practices”?
• people’s regular strategies to manipulate or exploit formal rules by
enforcing informal norms and personal obligations in formal
contexts
• reflect changes in the balance between constraining and enabling
qualities of the structure
• functions move away from compensating for rigid constraints
toward the active exploitation of weaknesses in the new systems
• it does not mean that informal practices are simply responses to
political and economic constraints; they are also shaped by
historical and cultural factors (c.f. Ledeneva 2008:119)
c.f. Ledeneva, Alena (2008): Blat and Guanxi: Informal Practices in Russia
and China, Comparative Studies in Society and History;50(1):118–144
Grossman’s five types of activities in the illegal
second economy
• Stealing from the state, which involved stealing anything
from enterprise light bulbs and toilet rolls to output
produced, was widespread.
• Speculation
• Illicit production
• Underground enterprises or formal enterprises that were
simultaneously involved in anything from small-scale
‘plan manipulation’ to large-scale illegal production
• Corruption
c.f. Grossman (1982:249)
100
Grossman’s three types of corruption
• the daily ‘petty bribing’ of Soviet authorities, and
particularly of law enforcement officials
• the tradition of prinosheniye, nowadays
podnosheniye, which involved the regular
bringing of valuable gifts to one’s supervisors;
and the purchase of lucrative official positions
• blat, or the use of personal influence to obtain
favours to which a person or firm was lawfully
entitled
(Grossman 1982:251-2)
Bribery
• an act implying money or gift given that alters the behaviour of
the recipient
• constitutes a crime
• Black's Law Dictionary defines bribery as follows: „the offering,
giving, receiving, or soliciting of any item of value to influence
the actions of an official or other person in discharge of a public
or legal duty“
• can be any money, good, right in action, property, preferment,
privilege, object of value, advantage, or merely a promise or
undertaking to induce or influence the action, vote, or
influence of a person in an official or public capacity
Is Post-Communism more Corrupt?
The Social Capital Answer
• understanding “blat” as social capital
• blat was widespread in socialist period; the dominant
form of corruption in the communist period
• blat was an exchange of favors: even if gifts and
money were sometimes part of blat relations, the
driving force of the transaction was the exchange of
favors, and not a bribe
• Blat was totally conditioned by the existence of the
economy of shortage
c.f. Krastev, Ivan (2007): The Corruption Paradox. Why Post-Communism Is/Looks More Corrupt
Than Communism, in: http://www.colbud.hu/honesty-trust/krastev/pub02.doc
Personal Networking in Russian Post Soviet Life
• Blat emerged in the early socialist state and is still
highly relevant today
• Blat was first observed by Sovietologists in 1950s
(Crankshaw 1956, Berliner 1957)
• a comprehensive sociological study (Ledeneva 1998)
was undertaken in the middle of the 1990s
• recent publications on Russian managerial culture
have continued research into blat.
c.f. Butler, B. & Purchase, S. (2004). Personal Networking in Russian Post Soviet Life,
Research and Practice in Human Resource Management, 12(1), 34-60
Definition and Origin of Blat
• There is no unified, agreed meaning of blat and the term cannot
easily be translated into English (Michailova & Worm 2003)
• Joseph Berliner (1957: 182), “...the term blat is one of the many
flavoured words which are so intimate a part of a particular
culture that they can be only awkwardly rendered in the language
of another...”
• Blat involves a “reliance for favours upon personal contacts with
people in influential positions” (Kryshtanovskaia 1994: 9)
The Concept of Blat (Alena Ledeneva)
• Ledeneva defines blat “as an exchange of ‘favours of access’ to public
resources in conditions of shortages and a state system of privileges”
(Ledeneva, 1998:37)
• blat is the use of personal networks and informal contacts to obtain
goods and services in short supply and to skirt formal procedures
(Ledeneva 1998: 1)
• “blat is a roundabout way of arranging things, circumventing the
formal procedure by using personal contacts” (Ledeneva, 1996:26).
• Through blat networks public resources were redirected to private
uses and to the needs of personal consumption
• These relations were often disguised by the rhetoric of friendship,
such as ‘helping out’ a friend or an acquaintance
• Typical of blat was the misrecognition of the reciprocity of exchanges
• blat was omnipresent and uses in all spheres of society to fulfil
perceived needs and goods - or in other words: blat was normal
107
research of blat derives from three main areas:
• Sociology where blat was studied in a social context as an
instrument of satisfying basic needs of common people in
everyday life (Ledeneva 1998, Ledeneva, Lovell &
Rogachevskii 2000).
• Business ethics where blat was briefly mentioned as a
peculiarity of the Russian business class (Blackwell 1991,
Stojanov 1992, Puffer et al. 1997, Hendley et al. 2000, Hunter
2003).
• Cross cultural analyses of Russian and Western managers that
pointed out the different attitudes towards blat by Western
and Russian managers (Puffer 1994, Puffer & McCarthy 1995).
c.f. Butler, B. & Purchase, S. (2004). Personal Networking in Russian Post Soviet Life,
Research and Practice in Human Resource Management, 12(1), 34-60
The meanings of blat
1. refers to personal networking
- the term blat came to Russia from the Polish blat, meaning ‘someone
who provides an umbrella, a cover’
- this in turn is taken from Yiddish blat which means ‘close, familiar’, ‘one
of us’, ‘one of our circle’.
- This meaning of blat contributes to its human face: people give special
treatment and help to those of their circle, but often this help is provided
to meet the expenses of those who are out of their circle
2. alludes to insignificant criminal activity, such as minor theft
- (criminal) meaning that explains the fact that most people either pretend
to have nothing to do with blat or refer to it in other words
- ‘I obtained it by blat’ one could say ‘I received it from an acquaintance’
- In a business context it is acceptable to say ‘I solved this problem using
my connections’ rather than to say ‘I used blat’
c.f. Butler, B. & Purchase, S. (2004). Personal Networking in Russian Post Soviet Life,
Research and Practice in Human Resource Management, 12(1), 34-60
The meaning of blat in the Soviet period
• often disguised by the rhetoric of friendship or acquaintance,
in terms of “helping out,” “friendly support,” and “mutual
care,” (Ledeneva 1998: 37)
• continue a tradition of give and take practices in Russia
(Lovell, Ledeneva, and Rogatchevsii 2000)
• moral obligations imposed by social relationships compel
people to break formal rules, which results in the
instrumental use of personal networks for achieving goals in
other domains, often in a situation of acute need
• blat gave people in socialist period access to state resources
through personal channels and other redistributive
mechanisms of goods and services in short supply
c.f. Ledeneva, Alena (2008): Blat and Guanxi: Informal Practices in Russia and China, Comparative
Studies in Society and History 2008;50(1):118–144
The meaning of blat in the Soviet period
“Blatmeisters” in the Russian context are people:
- with certain talents to be successful blat transactors
- characters who solve problems and arrange things for others, and
are thus called “useful people” (nuzhnye liudi)
- “brokers” with many contacts, not necessarily pleasant to everyone
but energetic, jolly, and cheerful
• were often employed in professions which delivered personal
services—doctors, beauticians, or sauna workers—or which gave
them special access to goods—shop assistants, or supply and
storage employees
c.f. Ledeneva, Alena (2008): Blat and Guanxi: Informal Practices in Russia and
China, Comparative Studies in Society and History 2008;50(1):118–144
Discussion in Sociology
•
The role of blat in contemporary’s Russia and
its disappearance or continuing
1. The Give Me a Bribe Society
2. The Relevance of Blat-Relations
Blat as a Personal Network in Former Command
Economy
• One of the key meanings of blat is communication
within one’s circle, or one’s personal network
• according to Michailova and Worm (2003) the three
main features of personal networking are:
- Social resourcing
- Continuity of relationship
- Coexistence of trust and cooperation on the one
hand and power and domination on the other.
Butler, B. & Purchase, S. (2004). Personal Networking in Russian Post Soviet Life,
Research and Practice in Human Resource Management, 12(1), 34-60
Social Resourcing
• As blat exists not only within one’s own network, but also
between blat network members, the phenomenon has
become termed ‘set blatnyih’
• Within ‘set blatnyih’, the members are involved in both
double and multisided relationships  ‘social resourcing’ or
the ability to access various types of resources through one’s
social connections
• following example: Exchange is often facilitated by
participants outside the double-sided relationship. Hence,
obligations might stretch to people whom one does not know
directly or will never meet. In such a network persons A, B
and C have mutual commitments of exchanging favours. In
spite of this, only A and B as well as B and C are involved in
double-side relations. Thus, even without knowing each other,
A and C are mutually committed through their involvement
with B
Butler, B. & Purchase, S. (2004). Personal Networking in Russian Post Soviet Life,
Research and Practice in Human Resource Management, 12(1), 34-60
Continuity of Relationships
• long-term personal relationships of former Komsomol (Young
Communist League in the former Soviet Union) officials help
them to survive and succeed in business and in maintaining
opportunities to acquire greater wealth for people of their
circle
• indicated, most of the current ‘new Russians’ – wealthy
Russian businessmen – are former Komsomol officials
• Their ability to ‘go through’ various issues in business can
often be explained not only by their excellent self-discipline
and organisational skills gained in the Komsomol, but to a
large extent by having everywhere a circle of former
colleagues and acquaintances
• They still have better access to government funds and
permissions, bank loans, and resources
Lonkila, M. (1997) 'Informal Exchange Relations in PostSoviet Russia: A Comparative Perspective'
• compares the informal exchange of favours, goods and
information in St. Petersburg and Helsinki
• Forty secondary school teachers in St. Petersburg and thirtyeight in Helsinki kept a diary of their important social relations
for two weeks
• Each evening they recorded their significant social encounters
of the day in structured questionnaires, e.g. whom they met
• furthermore they added persons whom they had not met
during the study period but whom they nevertheless
considered as significant for their social life
• Clear differences were found between the informal exchange
practices of Russian and Finnish respondents
Lonkila, M. (1997) 'Informal Exchange Relations in
Post-Soviet Russia: A Comparative Perspective'
• Russian teachers exchanged more favours, goods and important
information
• Russian respondents having to use their relatives, friends, colleagues or
acquaintances in order to obtain informally products or different kinds of
services (eg. medical care)
• half of the Russian respondents reported blat exchanges, a practice not
found in the Finnish data
• A good example is Olga who described her mother as 'blatnoi chelovek'
(person inclined to do things by blat) as opposed to her father who never
wanted to use his social relations
• Olga: ...[my own] mother - she is a 'blatnoi' person. Generally there is a
category of people - whereever they go, nobody will ever deny them
anything. But my father ... he was a very intelligent person, always 'please'
and 'thank you'. He was always treated with rough words and left in tears..
Lonkila, M. (1997) 'Informal Exchange Relations in
Post-Soviet Russia: A Comparative Perspective'
• Interviewer: And did not achieve anything.
• Olga: And did not achieve anything. He did not know how to ask, he sent
mother everywhere. I am probably the same kind of person. I love
achieving things myself. Well, of course, if I need something some kind of
contacts appear, it even turned out that I got po blatu to hospital!
• Interviewer: You got there through relations [po znakomstvu]?
• Olga: Yes, I did not expect it! I asked [my student's] mother to come to see
me, the son of whom had started to skip lessons and behave badly. There
were complaints about him, and I asked her to come. During our
conversation she appeared to be an 'uzi' specialist [a doctor specialized in
ultra wave diagnostics] at our maternity clinic. I did not know this at all.
And I complained that I did not feel good and she invited me to her office.
This is how it all happened. ...
Lonkila, M. (1997) 'Informal Exchange Relations in
Post-Soviet Russia: A Comparative Perspective'
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Interviewer: And she also arranged things for you at the hospital?
Olga: She arranged everything, she arranged for me to go very quickly to the
hospital and undergo all these analyses etc. But had I gone myself! You know
how you take care of your own health - you do everything at the last moment.
Interviewer: Yes, that's the way it happens.
Olga: And this happened again - po blatu [by blat].
Interviewer: Now it is interesting; did you feel indebted to her?
Olga: Yes, I brought her a box of chocolates and a bunch of flowers, and - well,
she is just such a tender person, that...
Interviewer: And you resolved the conflict with her son?
Olga: Yes, we resolved it , here everything is ok (laugh)
Interviewer: And what about the doctor? Were you operated on free of
charge?
Olga: Yes, free of charge. ... it was only a maternity hospital, not far from here.
But I was amazed how they took care of patients. Completely gratuitous
maternity hospital ...
Lonkila, M. (1997) 'Informal Exchange Relations in
Post-Soviet Russia: A Comparative Perspective'
• The informal exchanges reported in the St. Petersburg data were more
often carried out with colleagues or other work-mediated relations
• stressing the importance of the Russian workplace as a social milieu
• In the Russian data the informal exchange relations also involved more
examples of informal exchange mediated by a third person, whereas in
Helsinki the relations were more of a dyadic nature
• continuing lack of trust in official institutions and social services was
compensated for Russian respondents with the use of their personal
relations
• through the use of brokers or a common social context, particularly the
workplace
• resulting forms of social life can be characterized as personalized (and
mediated (since the brokers were often used)
• networks of personal relations still continue to play a significant role in the
life of post-Soviet citizens.
Table 1: Typical Content of the Exchanges of Favours and Material Goods in St. Petersburg and Helsinki
Content of the Exchange
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
1
0.
1
1.
1
2.
St. Petersburg
Helsinki
Obtaining (dostat), bringing or buying (on other
person's behalf with her money) foodstuffs or other
kinds of products
40
(17%)
6
(6%)*
Arranging medical or paramedical aid; eg. arranging a
contact with a doctor, obtaining or bringing medicine
32
(13%)
7
(6%)*
Lending things other than money (eg. books, videos,
computer programs, diskettes, cassettes, sheet music,
clothes)
15
(6%)
19
(17%)
Helping with home repairs or work at datcha (St.
Petersburg) or moving (Helsinki)
13
(5%)
5
(5%)
Arranging useful contacts; eg. business contact,
hairdresser, lawyer
12
(5%)
-
Sending or transmitting a parcel
Arranging somebody's child a place at school
(university, sport camp)
Tutoring others' children; eg. helping colleague's child
in homework
11
8
(5%)
(3%)
3
-
(3%)
8
(3%)
1
(1%)
Giving small gifts (birthday gifts excluded); eg.
children's clothes etc.
Giving a car ride
Miscellaneous small favours or help; eg. taking the
children to or from school, sewing a button on shirt etc.
8
(3%)
6
(6%)
7
56
(3%)
(24%)
29
33
(27%)
(30%)
238
(100%)
109
(100 %)
Total Number of Exchanges
The Concept of Embeddedment: Polanyi
• according to Polanyi’s definition of economy, economy is determined in a
process of social institutions which is characterized by mutual influences
between human beings and the environment
• explains the concept of ‘embeddedness’ by three basic forms of economic
integration
• forms refer to a specific social structure:
 reciprocity to a symmetrical social structure
 redistribution to an asymmetric one (centre-periphery) social structure
 exchange to a complex social structure
• Polanyi emphasises that only in the form of exchange exist both forms in
which a market economic price is able to be effective and non-societal
mechanisms
• Forms of integration can exist next to each other, e.g. a market system next
to a redistributive system of taxation in the modern capitalism but, however,
only one form is dominant for a society
The Concept of Embeddedness: Granovetter
• Marc Granovetter (1985) distinguishes between two types of
embeddedness
 relational and structural embeddedness
 relational embeddedness refers to ‘economic actors’ and
involves personal relations with one another  following
Kloosterman (2004) who refers to Granovetter, immigrant
entrepreneurs are thus embedded in a (relatively) concrete
network of social relations with customers, suppliers, banks,
competitors, and, not to be ignored, law enforcers
 structural embeddedness relates to the broader network to
which these actors belong
Ethnic entrepreneurship, social capital and
ethnic networks
•
Immigrant and/or minority entrepreneurship studies especially focus on informal
activities as they take place outside the regular framework (Epstein, 1994;
Roberts, 1994)
• Embeddedness, however, tends to be mainly used in a rather one-sided way,
referring almost exclusively to the social and cultural characteristics of groups
that are conceived a priori to consist almost solely of co-ethnics
• but: this view on embeddedment neglect the wider economic and institutional
context in which immigrants are inevitably also inserted or embedded (cf.
Cassarino, 1997; Rath, 1997; 1999b; Rath and Kloosterman, 1998a)
• Kloosterman et al. (Kloosterman et al., 1999; Rath & Kloosterman, 2000)
therefore propose to use a more comprehensive concept of ‘mixed
embeddedness’
• this concept is much closer to the original meaning of embeddedness as
intended by Polanyi (Polanyi, 1957)
• concept of ‘mixed embeddedment’ is encompassing the crucial interplay
between the social, economic and institutional contexts (Kloosterman et al.,
1998)
 Presentation
The ‘Mixed Embeddedness Approach’
• approach takes into account the concrete embeddedness of ethnic
entrepreneurs in the social networks of their communities
• focus is on localities and the embeddedness of ethnic entrepreneurs
in their environment and/or community
• addresses the more abstract embeddedness of ethnic entrepreneurs
in the socioeconomic and politico-institutional environment at the
national level
• importance of laws, regulations, institutions and practices which
condition the way in which markets operate (Barrett et al., 2001);
(Kloosterman et al., 1999); (Kloosterman & Rath, 2001); (Kloosterman
& Rath, 2003)
Interne Faktoren:
Implementierungen:
-Gesetze
-Vorschriften
-Informelle Absprachen
 resultierende rechtliche,
wirtschaftliche, soziale
Bedingungen
- andere Unternehmer
-ethnische Beziehungsnetzwerke
(Familie, Freunde,
Herkunftsbeziehungen)
-Mitarbeiter
-Zulieferer
-Kunden
soz., kult. und ökon.
Kapitalressourcen:
-Netzwerk
-Solidarität
-Materielle Hilfe
-Geist und Innovation
Externe Faktoren:
-internationaler Markt
-nationale Volkswirtschaft
-lokale Gegebenheiten
-Banken
-kulturelle, soziale Aspekte
ökonomische Kapitalressourcen:
Kredite, Anleihen,
Subventionen,
Zuschüsse, etc.
Kleinunternehmer
-Fähigkeiten der
Nutzung von Sozialen,
kulturellen und
ökonomischen Kapital
-Einsatz von „Impression
Management“ – Strategien
und -Taktiken
Ethnic Russian Economy in Soviet Estonia
•
•
•
•
•
•
rise of the Russian economy in Estonia is connected with the occupation of the
Soviet Union and the settlement of Russians in the Estonian SSR
Russian economy in post-war Estonian Socialist Soviet Republic appeared as a
result of large Soviet investments and immigration of the Russian workforce
Soviet investment made possible to outline the Russian economy as it has been
formed by privatization (Anderson, 1998: 397)
According to Karklins (1986), Soviet authorities regard the modernization of
economic relations as an important tool in achieving the goal of the
rapprochement of nations and the erosion of ethnic differences in the Soviet
Union
At the same time, there were rational incentives (e.g. distribution of resources
between Soviet Republics) for local elites to support the process of overindustrialization, which took place in Estonia at the end of 1950s (Ahde &
Rajasalu, 1993: 71)
Non-Estonian laborforce were brought in from Pskov oblast and other Russian
regions into the most industrialized areas of Soviet Union besides St. Petersburg
Ethnic Russian Economy in Soviet Estonia
• the North East region enterprises were belonging to the militaryindustrial complex
• In Tallinn, with an approximately equal ethnic population, were not
so much top enterprises in which everything had to be hold in secret
• In contradiction, in Sillamae, these power stations which were
producing electricity, or in the big enterprises which were producing
submarines; they were generally closed for non-Russians
• in these secret economic areas, it was easier for Soviet political elite
to bring Russian labour force from the outside and it was no problem
to bring in people from all over the Soviet Union
• nevertheless, managers and ingeneurs were also brought in from
Russia what was on the other hand necessary to control the
economic and political procedures in Soviet republics
Ethnic Russian Economy in Soviet Estonia
• Power relations were central to the whole Soviet system and dominated
over economic and ethnic ones (Titma & Tuma, 1993)
• in the Soviet period, state interests of the political leaders and of the
military-industrial complex were ‘core interests’
• Soviet economy was divided into so-called ‘all-Union’ (‘rulers’ of certain
branches of economy) and ‘local’ segments (Vöörmann & Helemäe, 2003)
• division meant that networks of social relations and associative ties –
distinctive features of the socialist command economy (Stark & Bruszt,
1998) – also became separated along bureaucratic lines
• moreover, any linkage between ‘local’ and ‘all-Union’ networks practically
did not exist
• this also explains why the labour market was divided and nowadays, not
only due to the less efforts of ethic Russians to privatize and become small
or medium sized entrepreneurs is still segmented along ethnic lines
(Vöörmann & Helemäe, 2003)
Ethnic Russian Economy in Soviet Estonia
• Russian-based labour force, mostly immigrants, was
concentrated in basic industrial branches closely connected to
the industrial military complex
• Estonians were mainly concentrated in agriculture, but also in
the social services (Kala, 1992).
• as military enterprises were most powerful under the Soviet
rule, key positions were filled with all-Union authorities
• Estonians ruled so-called ‘local industry’ (mainly light
industry) enterprises
• feature of ethic separated workforce corresponded to the
‘different rules of games which were determined by very
strong bureaucracy’
Ethnic Russian Economy in Soviet Estonia
• Estonian case resembles a kind of ‘ethnic controlled economy’
• but it was embedded into an environment that differed significantly from
Western ones because it was characterized by
- absence of private ownership in the Soviet production system
- domination of power relations over economic and ethnic ones
- embeddedness of economic relations into bureaucratic ones
- separation of all-Union and local inter-firm associative networks with almost
no linkages
• While in advanced Western countries ethnicity provided resources for access
to certain kinds of economic activities, under socialism resources and
opportunities were allocated first of all through the bureaucratic channels of
all-Union ministries
• ethnic segmentation of the economy was thus a by-product of its
bureaucratic organization (Vöörmann & Helemäe, 2003)
• state interests and power relations in the socialist command economy were
dominating economic and ethnic ones.
Ethnic Russian Economy in Post-Soviet Estonia
•
•
•
•
•
•
After independence the new political elite started to transform both political
and property regimes and simultaneously cope with the political problems of
re-established state (Vöörmann & Helemäe, 2003)
these changes also invariably influenced the ‘ethnic dimension’ in the Estonian
economy
structural changes were significant: decline of output in agriculture (the
traditionally ‘Estonian’ segment of economy) and manufacturing (the ‘Russian’
segment of economy), while a rapid growth of services could be seen
non-Estonians experienced collective downward mobility and shrinking labour
market opportunities
in 1989 unemployment did not exist, in 2001 the unemployment rate of nonEstonians was 16.8 percent, while among Estonians it was 10.4 percent
in 1989, 26 percent of employed Estonians and 22 percent of employed nonEstonians were senior officials, managers and professionals; in 2001 this was
respectively 29 percent and 15 percent (Pettai, 2001)
Ethnic Russian Economy in Post-Soviet Estonia
• regional disparities have big influences on social and economic
consequences of the transformation process, but worse preconditions of
Russian minorities can not be exclusively reduced to regional factors
• rather these preconditions were determined by both Soviet heritage of big
industrial areas which were no more used and the lack of institution
transfer into this region to improve the situation
• Estonians used to higher degree opportunities of privatization than ethnic
Russians (Anderson, 1998: 397)
• it is crucial for the Estonian case that the ethnic segmentation of
workforce during the Soviet period is a heritage
• ethnic segmentation on the contemporary Estonian labour market shows
that Russian managers are mainly leaders of enterprises with a majority of
Russian employees, or to a smaller degree with equal ethnic distribution
• Russian managers have no leading authority in Estonian enterprises
Focussing on Ethnic Russian Entrepreneurs
• Vöörmann and Helemäe (2003) stress that the ‚Russian business’
in Estonia started to develop first in the secondary sector, where
the share of Russian-speaking entrepreneurs constituted almost
50 per cent of the starting business people in 1991
• Gradually their business activities shifted more into the tertiary
sector and the share of Russian-speaking entrepreneurs in it
reached one third by 1995- a similar proportion with those
employed there in comparison with all the Russian-speaking
employed (Aho et.al., 1998: 57)
• greatest opportunities for non-Estonians lie mainly in trading and
services are actively emerging, in addition to foreign capital-based
private companies continuing in the secondary sector
• Pavelson (1999) notes that Russian-speaking young people do not
want to work in the Russian-speaking enterprises representing the
former large-scale industry because they consider the working
conditions there to be unsatisfactory and the development
opportunities to be too limited
Focussing on Ethnic Russian Entrepreneurs
•
•
comparison of invest in training measures between Estonian and ethnic Russian
managers shows that Estonian enterprises invest much more than Russians
“They are in their industries, in their workplaces. They have much more harsh
relations with their workers, they have lower wages. They are producing things,
they are related to Western firms and they are keeping their Russian workforce
and you see the language issue which is for example in Estonia very crucial. It is
very favourable for Russian workers, because they do not need to speak Estonian
and have no Estonians at their workplaces. But that is a kind of slavery, because
these workers cannot find other workplaces, they are working in these Russian
management enterprises. And that is I think it is a new social problem. But that is
a thing which is not visible from the West. Because, if you have for example the
competitive salaries, we have compared Estonian and Russians workers, Estonian
workers have higher salaries. But all Russians and Westerns are arguing that this is
discrimination, but if you now look at managers, Estonian workforce mainly works
for Estonian managers and Russian workers mainly work for Russian managers.
Russian manages keep their Russian workers in much more big pressure. So, that’s
not in this sense discrimination, but it is exploitation”. (Interview in PhD)
 conclusion: typical using of ethnic strategies, e.g. exploitation
Focussing on Ethnic Russian Entrepreneurs
• According to the 2000 Census, 24 percent of non-Estonians were
entrepreneurs, compared with 34 percent among the whole
working-age population
• One out of four non-Estonian employers was active in the
secondary sector, while more than half of them were involved in
the wholesale and retail trade
• non-Estonians were not overrepresented in trade, one might
suggest that the concentration of ‘Russian business’ in this field
of activity had no relevance to cultural preferences: it was rather
forced choice
• While wholesale and retail trade is a traditional niche of ethnic
economies, the Russian-in-Estonia’s path to this niche was quite
distinct
Focussing on Ethnic Russian Entrepreneurs
• Enterprises in Estonia can be divided into three groups related to the ethnic
composition of the employees
- 43 per cent of enterprises have mostly Estonian employees
- 34 per cent have mostly Russian employees
- 23 per cent have an approximately equal number of each group
 Estonian enterprises have an almost entirely Estonia workforce, nearly 90
per cent
 in Russian enterprises, Russians constitute 58 % of the employees
 Russians are mostly employed in enterprises with a mixed ethnic
composition or with a modest majority of Russians
 among the group of managers in Estonia, 73 per cent of Russian managers
were managers of enterprises with a majority of Russian employees
 25 per cent were managers of enterprises with an ethnically equal
composition and only 4 per cent were managers of Estonian enterprises
Focussing on Ethnic Russian Entrepreneurs
• differences in East-West orientation of Russian and Estonian
mangers
• Russian managers were generally more orientated towards Russia
than towards the West, while the opposite was the case with
Estonian managers (Anderson, 1998: 397)
• orientation towards Russia was rather a result of the possibilities
which showed up in practical life, because Russian managers have
thus had difficulties with being integrated into the Estonian market
economy and utilizing the opening towards the West which has
taken place during recent years (Anderson, 1998: 398)
• ethnicity still plays an important role in post-Soviet Estonia’s
economy
• language is a crucial point  hard to start and establish business if a
person cannot speak necessary languages
"Minorities in Europe”
Session 13:
Sexual Minorities in Europe
Denis Gruber
Faculty of Sociology, St. Petersburg State University
DAAD-Lecturer for Sociology
Sexual minority
• sexual minority is a group whose sexual identity, orientation or practices
differ from the majority of the surrounding society
• term was coined most likely in the late 1960s under the influence of Lars
Ullerstam's ground breaking book "The Erotic Minorities: A Swedish View"
(Grove, 1966)
• initially the term referred primarily to lesbians and gays, bisexuals and
transgender people (LGBT)
• others referred to as "sexual minorities" include fetishists and practitioners
in of bondage and discipline, domination & submission, and/or
sadomasochism (collectively referred to as BDSM)
• term may also include asexuals and people who may be strictly
heterosexual and whose choice of actual sex acts may be vanilla, but
whose choice of partner or partners is unusual, such as swingers or people
in other nonmonogamous relationships, people who strongly prefer sex
partners of a disparate
vanilla
• vanilla sex (or conventional sex) is a description of what a culture regards
as standard or conventional sexual behaviour
• different cultures, subcultures and individuals have different ideas about
what constitutes this type of sex
• often, it is interpreted as sex which does not involve such elements as
BDSM or fetish activities
• term "vanilla" derives from the use of vanilla extract as the basic flavouring
for ice cream, and by extension, meaning "plain" or "conventional“
• term "vanilla" is sometimes used as an insult, to describe someone who is
overly conventional, or unwilling to take risks, in both sexual and nonsexual contexts
• in relationships where only one partner enjoys less conventional forms of
sexual expression, the partner who does not enjoy such activities is often
referred to as the vanilla partner
Sexual minority – problems of definition
• some LGBT people feel that the term sexual minority needlessly
reminds them about discrimination and about being a minority
• They do not want to be a distinct "minority", but an integral and
respectable part of the society
• Some other LGBT people dislike the term for being too inclusive,
including swingers, polyamorists, BDSM people and other perceived
"sexual strangers“
• These LGBT people want to make a larger distance between these
sexual practices and bisexuality/homosexuality/transgender
• some conservative groups oppose the use of the term sexual
minority for completely different reason  think or feel that the
term inherently implies some degree of legalization or protection for
those engaged in such sexual practices  groups prefer to call
people who claim to belong to sexual minorities, deviant or pervert
Perversion
• a concept describing those types of human behavior that are a
serious deviation from what is considered to be orthodox or normal
• although it can refer to varying forms of deviation, it is most often
used to describe sexual behaviors that are seen by the majority as
abnormal or repulsive
• perversion differs from deviant behavior, since the latter refers to a
recognized violation of social rules or norms
• in psychological literature the term paraphilia is used, though this
term is controversial
• concept of perversion is subjective, and its application varies
depending on culture
• as a psychological term it was originally applied especially frequently
to bisexuality, homosexual behavior
Deviance
• in a sociological context describes actions or behaviors that violate cultural
norms including formally-enacted rules (e.g., crime) as well as informal
violations of social norms (e.g., rejecting folkways)
Deviance as a violation of social norms
• without deviance, in other words, society would be stagnant
• although generally unpopular, deviance can have a telling impact; indeed, it
has the capacity eventually not to be deviant at all, but rather to become
socially acceptable, or even ultimately the norm, e.g. racial-equality
movements
• deviance can be described as a violation of norms, a failure to conform with
culturally reinforced norms
• but: social norms are different in one culture as opposed to another
Deviance as reactive construction
• Deviance is concerned with the process whereby actions, beliefs or
conditions (ABC) come to be viewed as deviant by others
Deviance Theories
•
-
sociological theories describing deviant behaviour:
structural functionalism
symbolic interactionism
labelling theory
1. Structural-Functionalism
• Social integration is the attachment to groups and institutions, while social
regulation is the adherence to the norms and values of the society
• Durkheim's strain theory attributes social deviance to extremes of the
dimensions of the social bond
• altruistic suicide (death for the good of the group)
• egoistic suicide (death for the removal of the self due to or justified by the
lack of ties to others)
• anomic suicide (death due to the confounding of self-interest and societal
norms) are the three forms of suicide that can happen due to extremes
Deviance Theories
• 1. Structural-Functionalism
Robert Merton: strain theory
• discussed deviance in terms of goals and means as part of his
strain/anomie theory
• for Durkheim anomie is the confounding of social norms, for Merton it is
the state in which social goals and the legitimate means to achieve them
do not correspond
• an individual's response to societal expectations viewed collective
action as motivated by strain, stress, or frustration in a body of individuals
that arises from a disconnection between the society's goals and the
popularly used means to achieve those goals
• non-routine collective behavior (rioting, rebellion, etc.) are two
dimensions that determine the adaptation to society according to the
cultural goals
Deviance Theories
• 1. Structural-Functionalism
Robert Merton: strain theory
•





anomie is the alienation of the self from society due to conflicting norms and interests
by describing five different types of actions that occur when personal goals and
legitimate means come into conflict with each other
conformity: when an individual accepts the goals and means together (e.g. white collar
employee who holds a job to support a family)
innovation: when an individual accepts the goals but uses illegitimate means in order to
achieve them (e.g.: drug dealer who sells drugs to support a family)
ritualism: an individual may lose faith in cultural goals but still feel obligated to work
under the routines of legitimate daily life (e.g.: white collar employee who holds a job,
but has become completely discontent with the “American Dream”)
retreatism: individuals may also reject both goals and means and fall under retreatism,
when they ignore the goals and the means of the society. (e.g.: drug addicts who have
stopped caring about the social goals and choose a drug induced reality in favour of the
socially accepted lifestyle)
rebellion: the individual rejects the cultural goals and the institutionalized means, but
seeks to redefine new values for society. (e.g.: radicals who want to repair or even
destroy the capitalist system in order to build a new social structure)
Deviance Theories
2. Symbolic interactionism
• deviance comes from the individual, who learns his deviant behaviour
• deviant may grow up alongside other deviants or may learn to give excuses
for deviance
• through interactions, individuals create the symbolic structures that make
life meaningful
• people must define things and make them meaningful in order to make
them socially real
• focus is upon the consciousness and the mind of the individual as opposed
to the institutions from where the norms come
• to understand how individuals negotiate, manipulate, and change the
structure and reality to a certain extent
Deviance Theories
3. Labeling theory:
• labeling is a process of social reaction by the "social audience," the people
in society exposed to, judging and accordingly defining (labeling)
someone's behaviour as deviant or otherwise
• the "invention, selection, manipulation of beliefs which define conduct in
a negative way and the selection of people into these categories [....]”
(Jensen 2001:88)
• deviance is caused by the deviant's being labeled as morally inferior, the
deviant's internalizing the label and finally the deviant's acting according
to that label
• dominant group has the power to decide what is deviant and acceptable,
and enjoys the power behind the labeling process
Stigma
• Erving Goffman defined stigma as, “an undesired differentness
from what we had anticipated’ (Goffman, 1963:5)
• a stigma was a sign, cut or burned into the body, indicating status
of a discredited individual (e.g. slave, traitor, criminal)
• stigma originates from the Greeks, who used the term to refer to a
branded mark on the skin that signifies something undesirable
about the bearer of the mark (Goffman, 1963)
• Goffman classifies the stigmatized into three major groups:
– abominations of the body (e.g., physically disabled)
– blemishes of individual character preceived as weak (e.g.,
alcoholism, mental illness, unemployment, homosexuality).
– tribal stigma (e.g., race, gender, religion, or nationality), and
Stigma
following Goffman (1963):
- within a society, we ‘normals’ hold notions of what it means
to be ‘normal.’
- be normal means conforming to the present standard of
behaviour or appearance within the society
- When individuals deviate from those expectations of what it
means to be normal in terms of physical attributes,
personality traits, and so forth, these individuals often are
stigmatized
- Stigma occurs when an individual is identified as deviant,
linked with negative stereotypes that engender prejudiced
attitudes, which are acted upon in discriminatory behaviour
LGBT
• LGBT (or GLBT) is an initialism referring collectively to lesbian,
gay, bisexual, and transgender people
• an adaptation of the initialism “LGB” which itself started
replacing the phrase “gay community”
• term LGBT is intended to emphasize a diversity of "sexuality
and gender identity‐based cultures"
• sometimes used to refer to anyone who is non‐heterosexual
instead of exclusively to people who are homosexual,
bisexual, or transgender
• to recognize this inclusion, a popular variant adds the letter Q
for queer and questioning (e.g., “LGBTQ”) for those not
explicitly denoted by LGBT, such as pansexuality, intersex, etc
Coming out
• Coming out of the closet, or simply coming out, is a figure of speech for
LGBT-people disclosing their sexual orientation and gender identity
• Framed and debated as a privacy issue
• coming out of the closet is described and experienced variously as:
 psychological process or journey
 decision-making
 risk-taking
 strategy
 plan
 mass or public event
 speech act
 matter of personal identity
 liberation
 emancipation from oppression
Homosexuality
Transgender
• term applied to a variety of individuals, behaviors,
and groups involving tendencies to deviate from the
normative gender roles
• does not imply any specific form of sexual
orientation
• transgender people may identify as heterosexual,
homosexual, bisexual, pansexual, polysexual, or
asexual
Transgender identities
• While people self-identify as transgender, transgender identity includes many
overlapping categories:
• cross-dresser (CD)  wearing of clothing and other accoutrement commonly
associated with the other gender within a particular society
• transvestite (TV)  refers to a person who cross-dresses; however, the word
often has additional connotations
• androgynes  a person who does not fit
cleanly into the typical masculine and feminine
gender roles of their society
• genderqueer  think of themselves as being
both man and woman, being neither man nor woman
• people who live cross-gender
 drag kings
 drag queens usually a male-bodied
person who performs as an exaggeratedly
feminine character, in heightened costuming
sometimes consisting of a showy dress, high-heeled shoes, obvious makeup