The main urban concentration east of the Urals is in the Kuznetsk Basin (Kuzbass), which is a centre for mining and industry. Majorcitiesalsooccuratwidely separa ted points along the length of the Trans-Siberian Railway, including, from west to east, Omsk, Novosibirsk, Krasnoyarsk, Irkutsk, Ulan-Ude, Chita, Khabarovsk, and Vladivostok. A few very isolated cities are located in the far north, notably the ports of Murmansk and Arkhangelsk, and mining centres such as Vorkuta and Norilsk. Resort towns are a feature of the North Caucasus region, including Sochi (on the Black Sea), Pyatigorsk, and Mineralnye Vody. Elsewhere, the capitals of provinces and other administrative divisions are the main towns, having grown to considerable size as the organizing centres for their territories.
During the 1990s Russia began experiencing a negative population growth rate. A primary reason for this was a decline in the fertility rate (particularly of ethnic Russians) similar to that in Japan and in many western European countries. There was also a steep drop in life expectancy beginning in the early 1990s, a result of inadequacies in the health-care system and poor nutrition; high smoking and alcoholism rates and environmental pollution were also considered contributing factors. Declines in life expectancy were more pronounced among men and resulted in a growing gap between the number of men and women in the country.
Until the 1990s migration from the European sector to Siberia was the primary cause of regional variations in population growth rates. For example, in the 1980s, when Russia's population increased by about 7 per cent, growth exceeded 15 per cent in much of Siberia but was less than 2 per cent in parts of western Russia. During the 1990s, however, eastern Siberia (at least according to official statistics) suffered a dramatic population decline, a result of substantial outmigrations caused by the phase-out of heavy government subsidies, upon which it was heavily dependent.
The long-declining Russian birth rate has led to a progressive aging of the population. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, for example, less than one-fifth of the population of Russia was below the age of 15, while the proportion of those aged 60 and above was approaching one-fifth. (The proportion of children was generally higher, and that of the elderly lower, among the non-Russian ethnic groups, which have maintained a somewhat higher birth rate.) Russia's aging population and overall drop in fertility rates have led many demographers to foresee a long-term labour shortage in the country.
PART 2
HISTORY
2
RUSSIA BEFORE AND AFTER THE REVOLUTION
Russia from Its Beginnings
The Russian state has its origins in Kievan Rus (tenth to thirteenth centuries), the first Slavic state, which included the cities of Kiev, Novgorod, and Smolensk. It was crushed by the invading Tatars (Mongols) in 1237-40, and a new ccntrc grew at Moscow, The Grand Principality of Moscow, or Muscovy, a medieval principality under the leadership of a line of princes known as the Rurik dynasty, was transformed from a small settlement into the dominant political unit in north-eastern Russia. Its grand princes included Ivan III (Ivan the Great) and Ivan IV (the Terrible), in 1547 first of the rulers of Moscow to be crowned tsar of all Russia. The rule of the Rurik dynasty came to an end in the late sixteenth century.
Following the reign of Boris Godunov (tsar of Russia 15981605) and the 15 chaotic years known as the Time of Troubles (1598-1613), the first of the Romanov line of tsars came to power. They ruled for three centuries, during which time Russia rose to
IVAN III, KNOWN AS IVAN THE GREAT (1440-1505)
Grand prince of Moscow (1462-1505)
Ivan led successful military campaigns against the Tatars in the south (1458) and east (1467-9), He subdued Novgorod (1478) and gained control of most of the remainder of the Russian lands by 1485. He also renounced Moscow's subjection to the khan of the Golden Horde (1480) and won a final victory over the khan's sons in 1502, Stripping the boyars (a closed aristocratic class that ruled alongside the grand prince at that time) of much of their authority, he laid the administrative foundations of a centralized Russian state.
become one of the most powerful states in Europe. The dynasty included Peter the Great, Catherine the Great, and Alexander II. Russia remained under autocratic control until 1917, when the Russian Revolution ousted Nicholas II, the last tsar. A Russian republic was established, which in 1922 became a union republic.
The Nineteenth Century
Some time in the middle of the nineteenth century, Russia entered a phase of internal crisis that in 1917 would culminate in revolution. Its causes were not so much economic as political and cultural. There were three main players in the political arena: the tsar, the peasantry (which, excluding the working class, its subdivision, made up some 80 per cent of the empire's population), and the intelligentsia.
The tsar was absolute and unlimited in his authority.
IVAN IV, KNOWN AS IVAN THE TERRIBLE (1530-84)
Grand prince of Moscow (1533—84) and first tsar of Russia (1547-84)
Ivan IV, grandson of Ivan III, was crowned tsar in 1547 after a long regency (1533-46). He embarked on wide- ranging reforms, including a centralized administration, church councils that systematized the church's affairs, and the first national assembly (1549). He also instituted reforms to limit the powers of the boyars. After conquering Kazan (1552) and Astrakhan (1556), he engaged in an unsuccessful war to control Livonia, fighting against Sweden and Poland (1558-83). After the defeat and the suspected treason of several Russian boyars, Ivan formed an oprichnina, a territory separate from the rest of the state and under his personal control. With a large bodyguard, he withdrew into his own entourage and left Russia's management to others. At the same time, he instituted a reign of terror, executing thousands of boyars and ravaging the city of Novgorod. During the I 570s he married five wives in nine years, and, in a fit of rage, he murdered his son Ivan, his only viable heir, in 1581.
Effectively shutting out the population from participation in government, he was subject to neither constitutional restraints nor parliamentary institutions: he was above the law and the army, one of whose main tasks was maintaining internal order. Imperial Russia developed to a greater extent than any contemporary country a powerful and ubiquitous security police. It was a crime to question the existing system or to organize for any purpose whatsoever without government permission.
BORIS GODUNOV (e. 1551-1605) Tsar of Russia (IS98-I60S)
After serving in the court of Ivan IV, Godunov was named guardian to Ivan's mentally and physically infirm son Fyodor 1, and became the virtual ruler of Russia as Fyodor's chief adviser from 1584. When Fyodor's young brother Dmitry died mysteriously in 1591, Godunov was suspected of having had him put to death. When Fyodor died without heirs in I $98, an assembly of clergy and gentry elected Godunov tsar. A capable ruler, he instituted many reforms, but continuing boyar opposition and a general famine (1601-3) eroded his popularity. A pretender known as the False Dmitry led an army into Russia, and on Boris's sudden death, resistance broke down. The country lapsed into the Time of Troubles (1606-13), a period of political crisis that lasted until Michael Romanov was elected tsar.