Russians of the neighboring countries in the post-Soviet period: geodemographic, ethno-social, sociocultural aspects

The following review article analyzes an array of scientific studies dedicated to the Russian population of the neighboring countries. This article considers the works dealing with quantitative, spatial, and settlement dynamics of Russian communities; scale and direction of migration; shifts in indicators of natural reproduction and sex-age structure. Analysis of the scientific literature shows a widespread trend of depopulation, reduction in geography, a noticeable gender imbalance and increase in the average age among Russians across the entire near abroad. But there are also significant cross-country differences in these trends. This article also identifies main directions of research on the ethno-social dynamics of the Russian population, including analysis of the problems of its ethnic self-identification and interethnic marriage, the related assimilation processes, which, depending on the country and region, could contribute to both replenishment of Russian communities, or growth of their demographic losses. The studies dedicated to sociocultural processes, to position of the Russian language and Russian culture in the post-Soviet space, show multidirectional nature of the changes. A significant reduction in the scale of Russian-language education and other spheres of sociocultural infrastructure was combined in the post-Soviet space with dominance of the Russian-speaking Internet and keeping Russian as the language of interethnic communication. The scientific literature also reveal significant differences in the strategies of the Russian people themselves, in some regions of the neighboring countries they are predominantly focused on complex socio-cultural integration, in the others - on preservation of their cultural and linguistic specifics.