Youth Recruitment Strategies
Some international political youth wings recruit their members through large scale rallies in congested capital cities. Others may use strategic focus locations to recruit members, such as university networks, job networks, or social media. Russian youth political organizations are not much different. Current Russian President, Vladimir Putin, leads one of the largest, most influential political parties in post-Soviet era Russia: United Russia. Its youth arm for example, The Young Guard of United Russia, focuses its efforts on collecting members from outside of just Moscow and St. Petersburg by establishing nearly 83 regional branches across Russia. Young Guard recruiters rely heavily on promoting the organization as an opportunity for young people to engage in Russia’s social-political destiny. With over 160,000 members from all across Russia, the Young Guard claims its push to encourage volunteering, civic engagement, youth political discourse, and adherence to values that support both party and country are what drive recruitment numbers up year after year.
Nashi Recruitment Strategies: Societal Context
On the other-hand, Nashi recruiting strategies have been seen to mimic Young Guard of Russia’s, albeit in a somewhat unique fashion. After its founding in 2005, Nashi prided itself on representing the interests of the “sovereign democratic, anti-fascist, and anti-liberal” movement. In part, these focus points pay homage to the notion that Nashi was designed not only to enact superficial change in Russia, but to direct Russia’s political, social, and economic destiny outside of Western influence. In effect, these mission themes rung true for young Russians who, after witnessing the role Ukrainian...
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The Legacy of Russia and the Soviet Union - Authoritarian and Repressive Traditions that Refuse to Die
“The Sources of Soviet Conduct” Foreign Affairs, 1947, explains the difficulty of summarizing Soviet ideology. For more than 50 years, the Soviet concept held the Russian nations hypnotized, discontented, unhappy, and despondent confined to a very limited Czarist political order. Hence, the rebel support of a bloody Revolution, as a means to “social betterment” (Kennan, 567). Bolshevism was conceptualized as “ideological and moral, not geopolitical or strategic”. Hoover declares that… “five or six great social philosophies were struggling for ascendancy” (Leffler, The Specter of Communism, 20).
New York, Replika Press Pvt. Ltd. Deutscher, Isaac, Ed 1967. The Unfinished Revolution Russia1917-1967. U.S.A. Oxford University Press. Fitzpatrick, Sheila, Ed 1982.The Russian Revolution.
Russia in the 1930s By 1928, Stalin had ousted Trotsky and the rest of the Left opposition. In four years, Stalin had single handedly taken major steps away from Lenin’s collective leadership and free inter-party debate and replaced them with his autocratic dictatorship. Stalin began to secure predominant power over the communist party and the state by destroying passive opposition from the peasantry and former Lenin supporters. He won growing support from the working class, who were impressed with the initial five-year plan. It promised increased industrialization, which would lead to socialism in one country within their lifetime.
The transition from communism is negatively experienced by Belarus due to the recurring problems with Russia in the former Soviet Union. The historical factors that affected transition are the emergence of Belarus nationalism, which is generally credited to the Nasha Niva, a journal published in the 1906-1915 period, and the abandonment of "belorusizatiia", which was the policy of national language for each individual republic, in the 1930's (Altshuler 1998). The ethnic-national conflict, which was created roughly over the past 80 years, was not solved with the break-up of the Soviet Union. This was because of Soviet national policy and how it established "independent" states that were solely dependent on the Communist Party Central Committee (Altshuler 1998). The possible unification of Belarus and Russia is also very important because of how it is affecting transition. The un...
Bolsheviks entered the political world in 1917 with the ideas of deliberating women and making them equal to men as well as this idea of westernizing Russia. Based on the book, both ideas were closely associated. Women were seen as raw materials that can be used to transform. As a result, women who were already member of the Communists party were sent to the countryside to transform primitive women also known as babas and transformed them into Comrades, the free and knowledgeable women. These transformed women would then move to the city and work in factories and industrial workshop to westernize and industrialize Russia and that will symbolize women freedom and equality to men. Even though these women will have a much lower...
...cs should gain its value, and lastly people should vote because it is their responsibility. Moredish Conroy points out, “The traditional ruler view of women rejects the idea that femaleness and political power can coexist.” The traditional idea of what constitute leadership should be rejected. Bashevkin speaks that people must face their own internalized, often unrecognized feelings of discomfort with putting women in positions of power. This should change. Rationally, we all need to engage ourselves in politics because it contributes to our day to day activity. This book is a precondition to change because it promotes awareness by bringing change through monitoring the media, social movements, public opinions, electoral reforms, consensus building, collaboration, stronger motivation, and changing the rule of the game. This assures every citizen, every voice counts.
There is a problem with women’s view of gender identity in post communistic Eastern Europe. In the post-communism era there has been a promotion of gender difference rather than equality, where the status of women has regressed. There has been a lack of availability for economic opportunities and female representation in politics. These issues are addressed in the articles; ‘Incorporating Gendered Identities into Transition Studies,’ ‘Women in Post-Communist politics’ and ‘Feminism and Post-Communism’ and I will investigate the reasons why women are confused of their role in society post-communism.
The famine in Russia alone led the peasants to become angry and fed up with the Russian government, suggesting a future revolution. Because of the peasants’ unrest, they began to break the law by as stealing food for their families and shouting in the streets. Russia had attempted revolution before, and a fear of an uprising was feared again. Their everyday routi...
Emphasized throughout Soviet Russia, ‘vertical collectivism,’ occurs when hierarchy defines one’s rank, and submission to authority comes at the cost of self-sacrifice. “Hundreds. Thousands. Millions. Millions of what? Stomachs, and heads, and legs, and tongues, and souls. And it doesn’t even matter whether they fit together. Just millions. Just flesh. Human flesh” (Rand 403). In the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, that cost of ‘self-sacrifice’ was one’s individuality—the defining factors that allowed one human to be unique, different from the rest. “There are things in men,” Andrei Taganov argues in the face of his Party, “in the best of us, which are above...
International politics as one may imagine includes foreign affairs. This is why the topic and focus of this paper revolves around the current event within Eastern Europe. It will focus on both Russia, Ukraine, and the world, and from it, it will be analyzed by using the resources provided within class. After all it is a International Politics course, and one of the best ways to effectively put the skills and knowledge to use is to focus on an event or current event. The paper will attempt to go over in a chronological order of the events that has happened, and what is happening currently over in Ukraine. Afterwards, an analyzed input will be implemented providing reasoning behind Russia's actions, and actions of the world, and potentially some solutions.
Franklin, Simon and Emma Widdis, eds. National Identity in Russian Culture: An Introduction. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2004.
Ukraine is the largest nation to come from the former Soviet satellite states and like the rest of the former communist nations, has a large ethnic division between its citizens. To know why Ukraine is so divided and so passionate in regards to its political views we must look back to the basis of ethnic diversity throughout Ukraine’s history.
Imagine waking up one day to the thundering of blows given at the door telling you to “open up or be shot down.” It is the Serb police, and they are telling you that you and your whole family had to leave your home immediately. This is how it went for many Albanian people during what some Serb extremists called “demographic genocide.” This was the beginning of what many would call the Kosovo War, and it lasted from March to June 1999. After NATO’s intervention in Kosovo, something strange happened. Now the people being victimized were the Serbs and anyone who was “friendly” to them. In this paper, I will speak about what happened before and after the war in Kosovo.
Russia culture is very different from any other culture that I have ever read about. This is a country that is dominated by males. Males actually run the county of Russia. The men are so dominated that every Russian women dream is to be married and have a family with these men. Russia is known for its poor society. In the book Sakharov he mentions how he moved from one place to another. He first was in Moscow’s larger apartments with his family. In this apartment there were six families. With thin the six families they had to share the kitchen and the bathroom. Then he states that he moved into a very old house and in this old house there was a leaking ceiling. With in this house there were still six families that shared everything. (Sakharov 24-25)