53. Problems of the Public Status of the Polycultural Republic of the Northern Caucasus: An Example of the Nogai Ethnos
Authors: Denisova, Galina Sergeevna; Konovalov, Valeri Nikolaevich kwn@ns.rnd.runnet.ru
Abstract: Assessing minority rights and problems
Region/Country: Northern Caucasus/Russia
Minorities: Nogai
Problems: Participation, representation, socio-economic empowering
Keywords: Managing interethnic relations, Human rights
Practices: representation of minorities in local governance, financing minority initiatives, organization of economic activity of minority
Actors: Local government, local NGOs, private institution or enterprise
Target Groups: local minority, minority groups
Full Text Case Study: in English and in Russian
Summary:
The sovereign KCHR (1990) has aggravated the problem of the different socio-economic ethnic community statuses united within one republic. Nogais is one of the KCHR minorities. According to the population census in 1989, they were estimated at thirteen thousand people, approximately 3.1% of the republic’s population.
On the basis of the steps undertaken by Birlik it became possible to organize formal and informal local governance. Concerning the formal governance by the village administrations, these were elected. Informal local governance is conducted by the Foremen Councils, which function in every village with consultative right to vote. In areas with a mixed ethic structure, where Nogais are close neighbors of Cherkesses, the problem of optimum combination of life traditions of Nogais and Cherkesses is urgent.
The absence of the right to territorial autonomy for compact settlements of ethnic minorities in the Northern Caucasus region, coupled with its lack of land resources and absence of the right to private property, does not allow ethnic minorities to carry out active measures to develop economic activity.
One of the main problems concerns the ownership of state enterprises (in particular, a sugar factory, constructed at the end of the 1980s that is one of most powerful in former Soviet Union). On a more practical level the local government, together with the public movement “Birlik,” have undertaken economic steps to reconstruct traditional ethnic forms of economic activity (sheep breeding and horse breeding), and traditional art works (products from felt and felt carpets). Another example is a joint-stock agricultural enterprise, the former state farm, together with the adjoining village’s administration have implemented vigorous actions to create a social infrastructure for Nogai villages (construction of asphalt roads, realization of gas pipelines, etc.) However, these conditions for minority peoples, often being at a traditional stage of development, destroy the ecology of the nation, for natural conditions balance the economic activity of the people. The Nogais local government has actively joined an environmental preservation.
Because of the settled historical tradition Nogais in KCHR are, most of them, village population and are engaged mainly in agrarian manufacture system (grains and vegetables). During the whole period of Soviet authority Nogais were practically debarred from the management system. By virtue of these reasons the transformation of the Russian economic system on the principles of a private property has resulted that the Nogais, versus the Cherkesses or Karachaevs, could not get the initial starting capital for the development of economic activity. That is why creation of legal conditions for private economic initiative development has deepened the gap between the economic positions of the Nogais and dominant nations in the republic, to which Karachevs and Cherkesses concern.
The proportional representation in the authority structures and on the republican level does not allow the Nogais community to effectively assert and realize its interests. This principle of political representation makes ethnic minorities the hostage of numerically dominant title nations interests. In addition, insignificant economic resources, particularly for the minority, do not allow their intelligencia to carry out active cultural politics in the conditions of market relations.
All these lessons show the narrowness of the principle of proportional representation of the small and numerically dominant majority peoples in polyethnic republics. They also testify to the necessity of changing the relationship between the minorities and republican authority bodies. The transformation of the settled system in Karachaevo-Cherkessiya has two options:
A) Creation of national territorial Nogai region on the Adige-Hablski region base with a compact Nogai population (over 50% of the region population are the Nogais).
B)To give the status of the aboriginal nation falling under the action off the international Convention about Aboriginal Peoples and Nations Conducting Tribe Lifestyle in Independent Countries (1989).
The Nogais have historically lived on KCHR territory (in a separation from the main Nogai nation, divided between the various subjects of Russian Federation) yet have no state organization anywhere. According to the article of Constitution (Art. 14) the appropriate nations have rights of property and owning land which they traditionally occupy, and also the right on natural resources concerning their lands.(Art.15)
The elaboration of optimum conditions of interaction of the aboriginal minorities with republican authority bodies is a very topical problem for different republics, territories and regions of Northern Caucasus. All Russian Federation subjects in the given region are polyethnic with stripe patterns of settlement that make administrative repartition of republics essentially impossible. The majority of the Northern Caucasus nations are those with traditional development strongly connecting people and land. Territory provides for the preservation of culture, spiritual values and even physical being. At the same time, there is no Northern Caucasus republic where the rights of the people are supplied at a legal level. This is due to a conscious attempt to disregard the law giving jurisdiction to ethnic representatives. The proper implantation of the Convention about Aboriginal Peoples and Nations Conducting Tribe Lifestyle in Independent Countries requires scientific monitoring of its realization in order to ensure this necessary aspect of socio-economic and cultural development of minorities.