Ethnic Minorities and Political Support: An Examination of Attitudes in Three Former Soviet Republics

少数民族对他们居住的国家有多忠诚？他们对其政治制度和政治领导人的支持程度如何？如果变异存在于特定的少数群体中，那么如何解释这种个体层面的变异呢？少数民族的政治支持是一种理性的计算，还是主观的、与身份相关的因素的结果？这些是本研究调查的中心问题，将在三个前苏联共和国：白俄罗斯，哈萨克斯坦和吉尔吉斯斯坦进行。调查人员将大规模调查和焦点小组结合起来，调查少数民族，尤其是俄罗斯境外的俄罗斯族，对其居住地的依恋程度，以及他们对该国机构的支持程度。该项目解决了关于后共产主义国家态度的现有文献中的四个主要缺陷：强调俄罗斯内部的态度；汇总级数据分析的主导地位；政治支持要素的混乱；而且，在一个给定的研究中，多种方法的使用有限。这种多国、多方法的研究对少数民族“政治支持”的原因、特定民族群体内部的变化以及新独立国家与新独立国家之间的变化产生了比现在更好的理解。了解这种支持及其变化，使学者们能够理解为什么在一个后苏联国家而不是另一个国家会发生种族冲突，这将有助于理解种族民族主义的未来以及俄罗斯与其邻国之间的关系。因此，这种理解的含义包括更好地理解和预测该地区的国内和国际政治，以及更好地理解西方国家和国际组织应该在前苏联鼓励的政策和做法的类型。所产生的数据集将对有兴趣探索这一主题的学者有很大的价值。

How loyal are ethnic minorities to their state of residence? How supportive are they of its political system and political leaders? If variation exists within a given minority, what explains this variation at the individual level? Is political support by ethnic minorities a rational calculation or is it the result of subjective, identity-related factors? These are the central questions of this research investigation to be undertaken in three former Soviet republics: Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Kyrgyzstan. The investigators combine mass surveys and focus groups to examine the attachment of minorities, especially ethnic Russians outside Russia, to their state of residence and their level of support for its institutions. The project addresses four major shortcomings in the existing literature on attitudes in the post-Communist states: the emphasis on attitudes within Russia; the dominance of aggregate level data analysis; the confusion of the elements of political support; and, the limited use of multiple methods within a given study. This multi-country, multi-method study produces a better understanding than now exists of the reasons for `political support` by an ethnic minority, variation in it within a given ethnic group, and variation in it from newly independent state to newly independent state. Understanding such support and its variation enables scholars to make sense of the puzzle of why we have ethnic conflict in one post-Soviet state and not another, and it will help in understanding the future of ethnic nationalism and relations between Russia and its neighbors. The implications for this understanding thus include both a better ability to understand and predict domestic and international politics in the region and a better understanding of the types of policies and practices that Western countries and international organizations should be encouraging in the former Soviet Union. The dataset to be produced will be of great value to scholars interested in exploring this topic.