Ethnic and social stability and the politicization of ethnicity in the region (by a case study of the Republic of Buryatia)

The study deals with the politicization of ethnicity in the Republic of Buryatia based on expert survey data. According to the results of a social research, the ethnic mobilization has an ad hoc nature, is applied as a tool of electoral technologies and is an indicator of social, ethnic and cultural problems. The paper defines the factors of ethnic and social stability in the region and its causes leading to the interethnic conflicts in the Republic of Buryatia. They include the economic reorganization, the competition among social groups, the employment segregation, the low level of social and economic development, and the lack of acculturation of rural inhabitants to the urban environment. According to the interviewed experts, the state role in the regulation of interethnic communication, in particular, in the educational environment, is decreased. The politicization of ethnicity in the Republic of Buryatia reflects the revival of archaic processes in a global world and the Russian politics that impede the human capital development and civil society improvement and lead to the enhancement of social self-protection measures in religious and other demodernization terms.