University of Glasgow

Ethnicity, Nationalism and Conflict in and after the Soviet Union: The Mind Aflame byValery TishkovReview by: Jeremy SmithEurope-Asia Studies, Vol. 49, No. 8 (Dec., 1997), pp. 1543-1544Published by: Taylor & Francis, Ltd.Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/154031 .

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REVIEWS REVIEWS

that offended the Soviet Union. The book's description of the GDR as a 'separate nation-state' (p. 89) is untenable, given that even Ulbricht described the country as a 'socialist state of the German nation'.

Every chapter of the book is well researched and highly informative. The discussion is taken right up to the present, with interesting and well balanced analysis of developments since unification. Its comprehensive treatment of the issues and its vast amount of useful data make this book an important contribution to recent scholarship on Germany.

Magdalen College PETER GRIEDER

Valery Tishkov, Ethnicity, Nationalism and Conflict in and after the Soviet Union: The Mind Aflame. London: Sage, 1997, xv + 334 pp., ?14.95.

SINCE THE EXPLOSION OF NATIONAL UNREST under glasnost' and the collapse of communism, a number of works have attempted to analyse the nature of national particularism and ethnic conflict in the former Soviet Union. Most have done so by taking a broadly historical-cultural approach which assumes that the nationalism and aspirations of national elites are deeply imbedded in the population as a whole. It therefore comes as a massive relief to encounter a work which sets out methodically and empirically to explore the nature of nationalism in the region and the causes of ethnic conflict as a particular chain of events rather than a historical inevitability.

Tishkov opens his book with a demolition of the more extreme Russian theorists of the inevitability of nationalism and ethnic conflict, the so-called primordial account of nations, whereby each 'ethnos' has its own distinct characteristics either genetically programmed or evolved in Darwinian fashion over centuries of historical development. Lest we should think such theories are not worthy of our attention, Tishkov illustrates how they have been given official blessing and lie at the core of government policy in many of the successor states. While he does not go so far as accusing more respectable Western scholars of reaching the same conclusions as the primordialists, he is scarcely less scathing in his attacks on them, criticising our methodology as much as our preconceptions and prejudices and concluding that Russia is 'unlucky with its "outside" expertise' (p. 295). It is inaccurate to describe the break-up of the Soviet Union and the growing assertiveness of its nationalities as the 'triumph of nations', a la Carrere d'Encausse. It is rather a small layer of political and intellectual elites who set themselves up as the representatives of the nation and formulate national demands, with little or no pressure from or consultation with the mass of the people, in order to fulfil their own agendas. The highest item on these agendas, in Tishkov's account, is the use of a personal jet. This may be stretching the point, as is the observation attributed to a leading Chechen official that 'some major decisions may be taken because of an extra drink the night before or the lack of rassol [the Russian Alka Seltzer] in the morning' (p. 294). But one thing this book does is to remind us in no uncertain terms that the major actors in politics of any sort are individuals with their own private agendas and motivations. Much of the book is devoted to illustrating how the course of events has been influenced by personalities and accidents of history rather than the unstoppable forces of national entities.

Tishkov is well placed to provide such analysis. Although an academic by background, he served as Minister of Nationalities in El'tsin's government for a period from 1992, and was a participant in discussions at the highest level in the Kremlin as well as in negotiations over Tatarstan and Chechnya. From this viewpoint it might be tempting to exaggerate the extent to

that offended the Soviet Union. The book's description of the GDR as a 'separate nation-state' (p. 89) is untenable, given that even Ulbricht described the country as a 'socialist state of the German nation'.

Every chapter of the book is well researched and highly informative. The discussion is taken right up to the present, with interesting and well balanced analysis of developments since unification. Its comprehensive treatment of the issues and its vast amount of useful data make this book an important contribution to recent scholarship on Germany.

Magdalen College PETER GRIEDER

Valery Tishkov, Ethnicity, Nationalism and Conflict in and after the Soviet Union: The Mind Aflame. London: Sage, 1997, xv + 334 pp., ?14.95.

SINCE THE EXPLOSION OF NATIONAL UNREST under glasnost' and the collapse of communism, a number of works have attempted to analyse the nature of national particularism and ethnic conflict in the former Soviet Union. Most have done so by taking a broadly historical-cultural approach which assumes that the nationalism and aspirations of national elites are deeply imbedded in the population as a whole. It therefore comes as a massive relief to encounter a work which sets out methodically and empirically to explore the nature of nationalism in the region and the causes of ethnic conflict as a particular chain of events rather than a historical inevitability.

Tishkov opens his book with a demolition of the more extreme Russian theorists of the inevitability of nationalism and ethnic conflict, the so-called primordial account of nations, whereby each 'ethnos' has its own distinct characteristics either genetically programmed or evolved in Darwinian fashion over centuries of historical development. Lest we should think such theories are not worthy of our attention, Tishkov illustrates how they have been given official blessing and lie at the core of government policy in many of the successor states. While he does not go so far as accusing more respectable Western scholars of reaching the same conclusions as the primordialists, he is scarcely less scathing in his attacks on them, criticising our methodology as much as our preconceptions and prejudices and concluding that Russia is 'unlucky with its "outside" expertise' (p. 295). It is inaccurate to describe the break-up of the Soviet Union and the growing assertiveness of its nationalities as the 'triumph of nations', a la Carrere d'Encausse. It is rather a small layer of political and intellectual elites who set themselves up as the representatives of the nation and formulate national demands, with little or no pressure from or consultation with the mass of the people, in order to fulfil their own agendas. The highest item on these agendas, in Tishkov's account, is the use of a personal jet. This may be stretching the point, as is the observation attributed to a leading Chechen official that 'some major decisions may be taken because of an extra drink the night before or the lack of rassol [the Russian Alka Seltzer] in the morning' (p. 294). But one thing this book does is to remind us in no uncertain terms that the major actors in politics of any sort are individuals with their own private agendas and motivations. Much of the book is devoted to illustrating how the course of events has been influenced by personalities and accidents of history rather than the unstoppable forces of national entities.

Tishkov is well placed to provide such analysis. Although an academic by background, he served as Minister of Nationalities in El'tsin's government for a period from 1992, and was a participant in discussions at the highest level in the Kremlin as well as in negotiations over Tatarstan and Chechnya. From this viewpoint it might be tempting to exaggerate the extent to

1543 1543

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REVIEWS

which the course of history and the future of whole nations has been decided in the committee room, but the author's experience provides insights which would not be available in docu- mented form and which tell us a great deal about the motivations of the individuals involved-for instance, the revelation that at the height of negotiations between Russia and Tatarstan the head of the Tatar delegation, Vice President of the republic Vasilii Likhachev, asked Tishkov to enquire of Gennadii Burbulis about the possibility of getting a Russian ambassadorial post in Europe (p. 45). Or that El'tsin considered out loud a cynical divide-and- rule strategy in the North Caucasus by applying special privileges to Daghestan (p. 63). Such gems are littered throughout the text, but this is not to say that Tishkov's evidence is purely anecdotal. In the second part of the book, titled 'Case Studies', he makes extensive use of the numerous detailed surveys carried out at the Russian Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology under his direction. At every point of the text the argument is backed up by firm evidence of one sort or another, be it a personal experience, a detailed sociological survey or, in the case of his account of the Osh conflict between Kirghiz and Uzbeks in Kirghizia, his own analysis of the trial records of 48 participants in the violence.

In the latter case, the focus is on the perpetrators as individuals, rather than an attempt to explain the phenomenon of inter-ethnic violence on a mass scale. This is where Tishkov's account of nationalism is deficient. In identifying elites as both the inventors and propagators of nationalism, he perhaps goes too far in dismissing the 'nation' as a meaningless category in academic discourse; however false its foundations, however much it is a tool of political elites, nationalism can be a powerful mobilising force and the issue of the connection between elite scheming and mass mobilisations is inadequately dealt with. In fact it is not discussed on a general theoretical level until p. 274, where it is covered in a single paragraph of unconvincing argument. Thus the account of the Chechen conflict is the weakest part of the book; while Tishkov succeeds in illustrating how the conflict could have been avoided, he provides no explanation for the willingness and ability of large portions of the Chechen population to endure enormous self-sacrifice and overcome huge military odds in the name of the Chechen nation. But this omission does not invalidate Tishkov's theory-it leaves a hole, but one which surely could be filled.

Overall, Tishkov's analysis of the causes of ethnic violence in the former Soviet Union is entirely convincing. The book concludes with his own prescriptions for avoiding such conflicts in the future. Here we are on shakier ground, raising more questions than answers-having condemned Soviet federalism and national autonomy for promoting ethnic particularism, Tishkov now suggests further federalisation along ethnic lines for Kazakhstan, Kirghizia, Azerbaijan and Estonia (p. 277), while most of the responsibility for dealing with potential and actual instances of ethnic violence lies with police forces whose impartiality and sensitivity to ethnic issues is beyond doubt-and if such a police force exists anywhere in the world, it is surely not to be found in any of the former Soviet republics. But one part of Tishkov's solution deserves especial attention. This is to promote the feeling of a civic nation (as opposed to an ethnic one), as embodied in the notion of Rossiya, by which citizens identify with the state regardless of ethnicity. This is not an original proposition, but in Tishkov's hands it is less idealistic than presented elsewhere; in the first place Tishkov refers to extensive survey data to show that such a non-ethnic identity is possible; indeed, that important elements of it exist already in the public consciousness. In the second place, he proposes a number of practical measures for the promotion of Rossiya other than pure wishful thinking. Such an approach is at any rate preferable by far to the acceptance of nationalism and its attendant conflicts as inevitable, an acceptance which dominates discourse at the academic and, more significantly and often tragically, as Tishkov illustrates, at the political level.

Edge Hill University College

1544

JEREMY SMITH

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