The Adoption of Language Policies in the Republics of Post-Soviet Russia: Actors, Debates, Decisions

Abstract

In the early 1990s, political actors in Russia’s republics proposed alternative, and sometimes mutually exclusive, solutions to language issues for their adoption as a public policy. The purpose of this paper is to understand how and why it was still possible, despite the conflicting interests, to build a coalition and adopt the policy in the republics. I use the method of discourse analysis of official documents and political debates. I analyse the data on the circumstances of the policy adoption in republics in order to understand the general trends in what and how compromises were reached. The official designation of state languages came to Russia’s republics as the main policy devised “from above”, the central authorities, but it had to be specified and adapted locally. From an instrumentalist perspective, some Russian scholars have argued that the adoption of such a language policy of designating state languages compulsory for use should be seen as a milestone in power struggle. Yet, I argue in this paper that a much wider range of issues were on the table and the compromise had to be reached on what the designation of state languages meant in different contexts. The fi ndings of the study should contribute to the debate about the role of language in politics during the USSR disintegration and the early national-state building in Russia and its republics. When at some point in the future Russia enters another circle of political transformation, the issues in focus would again become highly topical on the political agenda.

Language Policy in Kazakhstan in the Context of World Practice

“…Therefore, researchers, based on the experience of decades of integration of refugees and migrants in developed countries, insist on a more holistic and family-based approach to language policy (Smith-Christmas, Bergroth, and Bezcioğlu-Göktolga 2019; De . In post-Soviet countries, the dominant trend in the national language policy has been proclaiming the language of the titular nation the only state language, with the obligatory preservation of the study of Russian at school and developed academic centers for the study of Russian language and literature (Zamyatin 2020). At the same time, at the legislative level, all these countries proclaim and support all languages of national minorities and communities and offer them rights and opportunities for local development and preservation (Zamyatin 2020;Fierman 2021).…”

“…In post-Soviet countries, the dominant trend in the national language policy has been proclaiming the language of the titular nation the only state language, with the obligatory preservation of the study of Russian at school and developed academic centers for the study of Russian language and literature (Zamyatin 2020). At the same time, at the legislative level, all these countries proclaim and support all languages of national minorities and communities and offer them rights and opportunities for local development and preservation (Zamyatin 2020;Fierman 2021). The Baltic countries (Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia), in which the population structure threatened the preservation of the national state, actively limited the spread and use of Russian and adopted strict language laws supporting the dominance of the Latvian, Lithuanian, and Estonian in administration, education, science, and other areas (Dabašinskienė 2022).…”