State-region relations involve negotiations over the power to (re)constitute local spaces. While in federal states, power-sharing ostensibly gives regions a role over many space-making decisions, power asymmetries affect this role. Where centralization trends may erode regional agency, law can provide an important tool by which regions can assert influence. We examine a case where, in response to a proposed Russian federal law highly unpopular with a regional population, the region's government sought to ameliorate its potential impacts by using opportunities to coproduce the law, amending regional legislation, and strategically implementing other federal and regional laws to protect its territory.

Every spring, riverine communities throughout the Arctic face flood risk. As the river ice begins to thaw and break up, ice jams-accumulation of chunks and sheets of ice in the river channel, force melt water and ice floes to back up for dozens of kilometers and flood vulnerable communities upstream. Via a comparative analysis between two flood-prone communities in Alaska and Yakutia (Siberia), this study examines key components of flood risk-hazards, exposure, and vulnerability, and existing practices in flood risk reduction in rural Arctic. The research sites are two rural communities-Galena (Yukon River) and Edeytsy (Lena River), which sustained major ice-jam floods in May 2013. The data was acquired through a combination of direct observations on site, review of documents and archives, focus group discussions, and surveys. Five focus groups with US and Russian representatives from disaster management agencies revealed a few similar patterns as well as significant differences in flood risk reduction strategies. The main differences included higher reliance on mechanical and short-term ice jam and flood mitigation efforts (e.g., ice-jam demolition) in the Russian Arctic, and lack of a centralized flood management model in the US. Surveys conducted among population at risk during the site visits to Edeytsy (November 2015) and Galena (March 2016) revealed higher satisfaction levels with the existing flood risk reduction efforts among Edeytsy residents. Survey respondents in Galena indicated the lack of ice jam removal and other flood prevention measures as the key drawback in the existing flood management. Historical analysis, conducted via the disaster Pressure and Release (PAR) model, revealed that springtime flood risk in both regions results from complex interactions among a series of natural processes that generate conditions of hazard, and human actions that generate conditions of communities' exposure and vulnerability. The analysis revealed colonial heritage, top-down governance, and limited inclusion of local communities in the decision-making as the driving forces of vulnerability in both regions. Seasonal weather patterns and regional river channel morphology determine the location, severity, and duration of floods. The analysis also revealed the importance of continuous communication between all stakeholders in timely and effective flood risk management in both regions.

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This paper aims to identify details of interaction and mutual influence of tourism and transport infrastructure development using a combination of sociological and statistical methods. For the analysis, five key sites were selected in several parts of Siberia, differing in natural, socio-economic, and ethnocultural quality, but possessing the presence of compact indigenous communities that reproduce traditional forms of both cultural life and economic activity. While each community has its own unique culture and resources for development, several similar characteristics were revealed. It has been revealed that tourists themselves and workers of the tourism sector, including local residents, are unequivocal supporters of transportation system development. A significant part of the population, recognizing the need and advantages of having a well-functioning transport infrastructure, expresses a negative attitude towards easy accessibility of the territory for outsiders who violate the rules and regime for usage of natural resources and augment economic and cultural competition for the local population. Understanding key processes of interrelations, both explicit and hidden, concomitant to socioeconomic development of remote indigenous communities, with the simultaneous development of tourism and transport, allows the authors to propose a model outline of attitudes of local communities towards tourist and transport perspectives in the territory of their residence.

Indigenous northerners’ rights in the Russian Federation are legally protected at a range of levels (federal, regional, municipal), and by a diversity of types of legal acts (laws, decrees, orders, provisions). Within the complex structure of Russian federalism, the country’s regional governments elaborate upon federal laws in diverse ways and at different times. This article explores regional approaches to legislating one law on Indigenous rights, that of “Territory of Traditional Nature-Use” (territoriya traditsionnogo prirodopol’zovaniya) (TTP), identified by Indigenous leaders as the most important legal-territorial designation for protecting Indigenous livelihoods and cultures. While it is well known that legal strategies of the Russian state toward Indigenous territorial rights differ markedly from those of other Circumpolar countries, less appreciated are the ways in which these vary across space within Russia. We assert that the spatial informs the legal, documenting several illustrative approaches that regions have taken in legislating TTPs. In doing so, we demonstrate how a federal law initiative is interpreted and reimagined in place, giving rise to the potential for substantively different spatial outcomes for Indigenous persons and peoples seeking to actualize their rights to territory.

Transport provision in remote territories is one of the most important factors in maintaining the sustainability of socio-economic and ecological systems. Indigenous peoples of Siberia have always been mobile using diverse traditional ways across the taiga. During the Soviet period, the transition to settled life, along with technological development and the emergence of new modes of transport, such as off-road cars, snowmobiles, and motor boats, significantly affected the level of population mobility, including remote areas where people are engaged in traditional nature management. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, there were significant changes and reductions in the subsidies of transportation systems for remote terrains that made them isolated. Transport connectivity has been realized through rare plane flights (once a month or less) or by cars on dirt roads (actually off-road) that take several days of travel. Siberian territories rich with natural resources, low population density, and weak infrastructure might be attractive for mining companies. Being difficult to access not only for the local population, but also for industrial companies, the territories imply the allocation of a significant share of road construction and transport costs in the cost items of miners and processors. The problems of sustainability and resilience of the indigenous peoples of Siberia require special attention when restructuring transport communications, but they have practically not been studied before. Methods of in-depth and group interviews with local residents were used. Based on comparative geographic and statistical analysis and generalization of data, network and problem approaches applied for various sources and field materials (including in-depth and group interviews), the factors of sustainability and resilience, which the indigenous communities of three remote Siberian territories pin their hopes on in the context of the transformation of transportation infrastructure, have been identified. If geographic remoteness remains an unchanged fact, the expansion of desired transport accessibility (mainly due to investments by industrial companies) is associated by locals with the possibility of additional income related to provision of services, the emergence of new types of employment of the population that have not been observed before, and the implementation of new transport modes to support traditional activities.

In this article authors analyse natural and cultural landscapes for scientific tourism. Central Yakutia with the unique permafrost landscapes is a rich and large territory of sites of interest for the development of "scientific tourism" for explorers, researchers or eco-natural-tourists. There are three types of scientific tourism relevant for Central Yakutia: the aim of which is scientific research; the aim of which is practical training and education of students of educational institutions; the aim of which is introducing the history of scientific research, unique natural resources, historical and cultural heritage to a wide range of people. The objects of interest of scientific tourism-landscapes of Khangalassky regionare classified according the selected types of scientific tourism using methods of secondary sources analysis and field research. The study showed that scientific tourism on the territory of Central Yakutia is quite feasible and has great prospects due to the unique landscapes. It can also give impetus for the new scientific discoveries. In one of these new areas the research is being conducted within the framework of the project RSF 15-18-20047, which justifies the application of the concept of identifying the ontological characteristics of the landscapes with the use of linguistic and mental representation of it. The determination and description of cultural landscapes, collection of field materials and mapping of the cultural and landscape zoning of Khangalassky region was funded by the RSF (Russian Science Foundation).