A New Russian Heartland: The Demographic and
Economic Dimension
Andrei Treivish1
Abstract: One of Russia’s leading geographers provides a detailed assessment of the demographic and economic dimensions of the new Russian Heartland, supplementing and extending the analysis provided in the preceding paper in this issue (Bradshaw and Prendergrast,
2005). He presents intriguing comparisons of Russia’s place in the world relative to other
global powers for benchmark years during the 20th and early 21st centuries, before examining spatial shifts in key indicators of Russia’s population distribution and economic activity
over the same period. Subsequent sections of the paper address Russia’s shrinking “effective
territory” during the 1990s, and by extension the “overpopulation” of its northern regions.
Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: F02, O10, O57. 16 figures, 8 tables,
79 references. Key words: Russian Heartland, effective territory, regional change, per capita
temperature, depopulation.
INTRODUCTION
S
ome one hundred years ago Sir Halford Mackinder (1904) anticipated the geopolitical
environment that prevailed in the mid-20th century. He foresaw the conflict over the
World Island and the eventual consolidation of the heartland, creating Eurasia’s “red belt”
(from the Elbe to the Mekong Delta) surrounded by opposing alliances in the rimlands.2
Later David Hooson (1964) provided a geoeconomic analysis of the Soviet industrial shift
eastward. Hooson’s judgement concerning the industrial extension to the east and the reinforcement of the heartland also has been confirmed by history, even though his analysis
pre-dated the opening of the Tyumen’ oil fields in West Siberia.
Writing just before the Russian revolution, a contemporary of Mackinder’s, Benyamin
Semenov-Tyan’-Shanskiy (1915) distinguished three forms of empire: circular (the Roman
Empire), “patchy” (the British Empire, or other overseas colonization), and compact “from
sea to sea” (the United States and Russia). For much of the subsequent Soviet era, however,
further Russian work on geopolitics was dismissed by those controlling the heartland as
aggressively imperialist and reactionary pseudo-science.3 However, if the phantom of
Mackinder still roams the political corridors of Washington, the phantom of Genghis Khan
1Leading Researcher, Institute of Geography, Russian Academy of Sciences, 29 Sytaromonetnyy pereulok,
109017 Moscow, Russia.
2The term “rimland” was used originally by Nikolas Spykman (1944) to denote states that surrounded the
heartland.
3Throughout the Soviet period, geopolitical thinking was developed by Soviet émigrés known as Eurasianists,
whose works were published in their homeland some 70 years later (Savitskiy, 1997). The research presented in this
article was funded by the UK’s Economic and Social Research Council, award number: RES-223-25-0039.
123
Eurasian Geography and Economics, 2005, 46, No. 2, pp. 123-155.
Copyright © 2005 by V. H. Winston & Son, Inc. All rights reserved.
124
EURASIAN GEOGRAPHY AND ECONOMICS
Fig. 1. An improbable forecast of the country’s future (1992, from Boris Khorev).
has recently (since 1991) been revived among Russia’s right-wing intellectuals, reinvigorating centuries-old scenarios (e.g., see Fig. 1). In such a context, the predictable response of the
new ultra-right “Eurasianists” to the reduced competitiveness of the Russian Federation
following the Soviet collapse, to depopulation and a shrinking “effective territory,” and to
hostility to both Islam and China, is once again to propose old answers—centralism and
isolationism (Dugin, 1997).
In Russia, the demo-economic dimension is a key arena of current geopolitical concern.
Economic factors have always determined the heartland’s dimensions. During the 16th and
17th centuries, Russian trapper-explorers advanced from the Urals to the Pacific Ocean in
search of fur. In the Soviet era, oil, gas, nickel, aluminium, and diamonds were the riches
plundered from the east. Accompanying such advances were negative changes: the development of a huge, backward, and technologically poor economy; a tragic legacy of forced
migration and labor (the GULAG); and the disconnection of populated islands floating in an
“ocean of land.”4 These cold northern lands have often incited discussions of the geographical challenges that face Russia, most recently from Parshev (2001) and Hill and Gaddy
(2003).
In his analysis, Hooson (1964, p. 117) saw an aura of permanence in the heartland
theory, while suggesting that it was not possible to consider location on the globe as absolute
and unchangeable. He viewed the heartland in relation to other parts of the world, so that its
significance would change as did theirs. The relevance and contours of the heartland therefore would need to be constantly reassessed. And in fact a number of major changes have
affected the heartland over the last century: (1) the development of missile weaponry, which
deprived the heartland of its natural defensive strength (which Hooson understood); (2) the
unification of Europe, the strengthening of the U.S. and China, and the growth of Russia’s
competitors on the world periphery, in the form of the “Asian Tigers” (whose significance
4This
image of Russia is from Il’yin (1991).
ANDREI TREIVISH
125
Mackinder’s Eurocentric analysis underestimated); and (3) the shift toward the electronic/
information age, especially after the oil crisis of the 1970s.5
At the height of the Second World War, Mackinder wrote that “the Heartland is the
greatest natural fortress on earth. For the first time in history it is manned by a garrison sufficient both in number and quality” (see Hooson, 1964, p. 120). Today, many consider the
heartland’s garrison either insufficient, particularly when compared to the European or East
Asiatic rimlands, or excessive if its severe natural conditions and economic efficiency are
taken into account.6 The section that follows considers the USSR/Russia’s position among
the world’s leading countries of the 20th century. A second section then explores significant
ways in which Russia differs from these countries, followed by sections examining spatial
shifts in the distribution of population and economic activity (as well as shifts over time in
the mean temperature experienced by the “average” Russian) and the shrinking of Russia’s
“effective territory” during the transitional recession of the 1990s and population decline that
continues at present. A concluding section presents divergent appraisals of the heartland’s
future prospects, building the case that redevelopment must proceed outward from “islands”
of population and modernity.
RUSSIA AMONG THE GIANTS OF THE
TWENTIETH CENTURY
The World Bank (2003) identifies a country’s basic characteristics as its area,7 population, and GDP.8 In each criterion, the leaders stand out noticeably (Fig. 2). In territorial
terms, although not comparable to the British Empire, which encompassed a quarter of the
world’s landmass in 1913, the Russian Federation still claims one-eighth of the world’s landmass. China ranks first with respect to population, whereas the United States does so in terms
of GDP, with each claiming a 21–22 percent share of their respective leading parameter.
However, while in terms of population China may have to contend with India, which is
catching up with 17 percent of the world’s population, the U.S. has no close competitors with
5This has not completely devalued the significance of the heartland’s natural resources, but it made them more
peripheral and diminished their importance.
6 Grigoriy Agranat (2001, 2004) defends the first position, whereas the second is ascribed to Margaret
Thatcher, who allegedly stated that no more than 15 million people would be living in the Soviet Union on an economically justifiable basis (Parshev, 2001, p. 5, no precise reference given). Fiona Hill and Clifford Gaddy (2003,
pp. 72-100) have described the development of Siberia as a “monumental error of the Soviet system” and argue that
Russia needs to “shrink” itself in terms of its economic and population geography, as its present dimensions impede
the mobility of capital investment and of population.Gritsai et al. (1991, p. 38) and Pivovarov (1996) were concerned with the reduction of Russia’s effective space and the impact of transition on the development of new regions
and the modernization of old ones.
7Problems with such data may arise where, for example, a country’s territory may or may not include its inner
seas. For example, the addition of the USA’s water surfaces to its “dry land” during the 20th century gives the
impression that it “grew” by some 300,000 km2, which is equivalent to the area of Poland. Different standards may
be adopted for different countries in this regard. The main data problem arises from growth in the number of countries from 50 or 60 to nearly 200 today. Often retrospective data are provided that take into account new boundaries
(Maddison, 2001; see also the U.S. Census Bureau, n.d.) or to assist in determining the size of former empires and
colonies. Here such adjustments are avoided and figures relate to boundaries contemporaneous with the data set,
although Canada, Australia, and the other British dominions that enjoyed equal relations with Britain since 1931
have been considered independent, and Hong Kong and Macao are included as parts of China.
8GDP data from 1913 to 2001 are those reported by Maddison (1995/1999, 2001), with recent 2001 supplements.
126
EURASIAN GEOGRAPHY AND ECONOMICS
Fig. 2. Top 20 states in 1913 and 2001, ranked by area, population, and GDP (circular or “dot”
symbols indicate position of the Russian Empire/Russian Federation).
respect to GDP: China’s GDP measures just half that of America’s, Japan’s only a third, and
Russia’s a tenth.
Table 1 incorporates a simple summary of these three key indicators in the form of
an average size index (ASI) that is calculated for each country. A country’s percentage shares
of the world total in terms of gross domestic product (GDP), population (P), and territory
(T) are added and the sum is then divided by three (percent global T + percent global P +
percent global GDP/3). Table 1 also shows each country’s ranking in area, population, and
GDP, as well as the sum of these three indicators (the lower the number the stronger the
country).
In 1913, the “patchy” British Empire’s ASI was 22.6 percent.9 Although it included
many of the world’s poorest regions and had an average per capita income even below that of
the Russian Empire, the British Empire’s final ASI score still was between 2–4 times higher
than that of Russia, China, the United States, France, or Germany (including their respective
colonies). These six were the giants in 1913, categorized respectively as supergiants (ASI >
10 percent), giants (7–10 percent), and subgiants (5–7 percent). Together they accounted for
78 percent of the global landmass, 84 percent of the world’s population and 86 percent of
global GDP.
The 1950s were dominated by the “from ocean to ocean” American and Soviet superpowers. Yet in 1950, China lay second in ASI terms, largely due to its highest population
ranking, despite declines in other parameters. In 1950 the U.S. led economically (after two
world wars had weakened Europe), with some 30 percent of the world’s GDP. In summed
positions, however, it was overtaken by the Soviet Union. At the same time, the European
colonial empires were breaking apart and Britain’s former colony India emerged. Two other
former British colonies, Canada and Australia, claimed top-10 rankings from the divided
Germany and dismantled Austro-Hungarian Empire, while Japan brought up the rear. In
1950, the top 10 claimed just 70 percent of the global land area, 64 percent of the global
population, and 76 percent of global GDP.
9In terms of area and GDP, the British Empire ranked first in 1913. With regard to population, it was second
only to China, which had some 14 million more citizens (just one percent of the world’s total at the time), although
this included people living in Tibet, Mongolia, and Manchuria, which only formally were among China’s “possessions.”
2
1
1
4
—
—
5
6
11
8
—
—
7
10
—
—
—
2
5
—
—
3
7
6
26
—
—
25
11
—
—
—
11.8
10.8
—
—
6.5
5.5
2.9
2.9
—
—
2.6
2.4
—
82.6
—
P
1
4
T
T
Positions
GDP summed
ASI
5
2
—
—
6
4
14
7
—
—
8
9
—
—
—
1
3
10
13
—
—
14
17
31
41
—
—
40
30
—
—
—
4
8
11.3
14.4
—
—
6.2
17
3.4
—
3.3
2.4
2.3
—
—
71.6
—
7.2
13.9
1
5
—
—
2
—
7
—
4
8
35
—
—
—
—
3
6
3
4
—
—
6
—
10
—
29
40
8
—
—
—
—
5
1
P
T
2
1
—
—
5
—
11
—
10
15
9
—
—
—
—
3
4
6
10
—
—
13
—
28
—
43
63
52
—
—
—
—
11
11
1
3
10
7
62
5
2
6
59
15
—
—
2.1
4
3.3
2.4
3.2
2.2
55.6
61.1
4
5.7
11.2
7.6
8.5
—
13.1
4
—
—
7
52
10
12
5
6
3
3
2
1
P
Position
ASI
Position
Positions
GDP summed
Position
22.6
14.7
ASI
15
—
—
11
16
3
5
9
10
1
2
4
2
34
—
—
20
74
72
79
19
13
7
15
13
7
Positions
GDP summed
aAuthor’s calculations based on Western and Russian statistical sources, including but not limited to UNDP, 2003; Goskomstat Rossii, 2003, and U.S. Census Bureau, n.d. ASI =
average size index. Items underlined and in boldface indicate supergiants (ASI ≥ 10); items in boldface giants (ASI = 7–10); and underlined items subgiants (ASI 5–7). Italicized
entries show the two alternative versions of European countries: the subgiant EU-11 or Germany alone outside the EU framework. Abbreviations: ASI = average size index; T =
territory; P = population; GDP = gross domestic product.
Britain
China
Russian Empire/USSR/Russian
Federation
United States
EU-11
India
France
Germany
Brazil
Austro-Hungary
Canada
Australia
Japan
Italy
Indonesia
Top 10 countries
Top 9 plus EU-11
Country
2001
1950
1913
Table 1. Top Ten Countries in 1913, 1950, and 2001a
ANDREI TREIVISH
127
128
EURASIAN GEOGRAPHY AND ECONOMICS
By 2001, China gained first place in the ASI rankings, and had drawn even with the
United States in terms of summed positions (both on seven). These two now form the class of
supergiants, while Russia has been relegated to the position of a subgiant following the
collapse of the Soviet Union. The Euro and Schengen countries took their place in the table
as the European Union-11,10 a giant ranking fourth in terms of summed positions and second
(to the U.S.) in terms of GDP. In aggregate the top 10 “country” units in 2001 could claim
overall global shares of 51–52 percent in terms of area, 55–59 percent in terms of population,
and 62–73 percent of GDP.11
All these indices are relative and conceal certain details regarding these basic characteristics. The volumetric representations in Figure 3 reflect the actual proportions of each
parameter (the x axis is scaled according to territory, the y axis by population, and the z axis
by GDP) for key countries. Taller (vertically) bars depict densely populated territories,
whereas the flatter ones (width, horizontally) show the opposite. Slender “walls” represent
less productive economies and deeper walls, rich economies.12 In 1913, thin horizontal forms
(such as Russia) clearly dominated. By 2001, an Indian column rose south of China’s wall,
while Brazil emerged in Latin America as a giant of the Russian type; Japan displayed a high
slanting wall and Canada a thin flattened plane. The Russian heartland of the 21st century
still “lies” on the map, but between the high and growing walls of its more prosperous western and more populous eastern neighbors.
In order to assess future dynamics, one must examine forecasts of the basic indicators.
Of these, demographic indicators are more reliable than the others and readily available
(Haub, 2003; UNPD, 2003; U.S. Census Bureau, n.d.). The forecasts suggest that China,
India, and the United States will not soon face competition. Although the Soviet Union
had ranked third in population, Russia now drops lower every year, declining from sixth
place in 2001 to seventh in 2002, eighth in 2003, and to ninth (after Nigeria) in 2004. Japan
too, while retaining its tenth position, has been declining in demographic terms, whereas
Mexico’s population has been growing at a rate of more than one million per year and should
overtake the Russian Federation by 2030.13 Such calculations, of course, relate to the current
territorial formations, changes to which are difficult to anticipate. It is possible, however, to
examine the dynamics of past giants within their present-day borders. Table 2 shows changes
over time in the rankings of the ASI for the world’s largest countries within their current
borders. It demonstrates that steady growth rarely happens; almost all major countries, at
some time or another in their history, grew quite rapidly.14 Both the United States and the
10The EU-11 consists of the countries in the European Union that both use the euro as a currency and have
acceeded to the Schengen treaty (1995), which established a zone of free movement among participating states by
lowering their shared internal borders while concurrently strengthening controls along their external borders. The
EU-11 thus includes Austria, Belgium, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Portugal,
and Spain. However, despite integrative initiatives undertaken on many fronts, the EU member states clearly do not
constitute a single country, and face major problems with political integration. Some 71 percent of Europeans questioned in 2003 in seven countries now consider that the EU must become a superpower, with some 20 percent agreeing that in order to achieve this objective it must be “as one” like the United States (Murphy and Johnson, 2004).
11The latter number in each range includes the EU-11 as a country, the former number only Germany.
12The shading in Figure 3 depicts a measure of the combined aggregate of size, which is the product of the ASI
and ASRI (the ratio of the ASI to a country’s average share) divided by the summed positions of the given country.
The division of countries into supergiant, giant, and subgiant entities is based on this combined measure.
13International forecasts for Russia are more optimistic than domestic ones. The former tend to anticipate
around 136–137 million people by 2005 and 118–129 million by 2050, whereas the median estimate domestically
has been only 124 million in 2005 and 98 million in 2050 (see Naseleniye, 2002, p. 182).
14Brazil represents the main exception here with Indonesia to a lesser degree.
ANDREI TREIVISH
Fig. 3. Giant countries in 1913 and 2001.
129
130
EURASIAN GEOGRAPHY AND ECONOMICS
Table 2. Dynamics of ASI in the World’s Largest Countries within Their
Current Bordersa
Country
China
United States
EU-11
Russian Federation
India
Brazil
Canada
Japan
Australia
Indonesia
Germany
France
Great Britain
1913
1950
1973
2001
14.2
10.4
11.6
7.5
7.3
2.9
3.0
2.0
2.2
1.6
4.1
2.5
3.7
12.1
14.4
10.0
7.6
7.2
3.4
3.3
2.3
2.4
2.1
3.0
2.2
3.1
12.0
11.3
9.3
7.0
6.8
3.8
3.3
3.4
2.3
2.0
2.8
2.0
1.9
13.1
11.2
7.6
5.7
8.5
4.0
3.3
3.2
2.4
2.2
—
—
1.5
= average size index. Items underlined and in boldface indicate supergiants (ASI ≥ 10);
items in boldface type indicates giants (ASI = 7–10); and underlined items subgiants (ASI 5–
7). Italicized entries show the alternative versions of European countries: the subgiant EU-11
or Germany and France, respectively, alone outside the EU framework.
Source: Author’s calculations based on Western and Russian statistical sources, including but
not limited to UNDP, 2003; Goskomstat Rossii, 2003, and U.S. Census Bureau, n.d.
aASI
Russian Federation have passed their peaks of gigantism. Russia’s ASI grew little in the first
half of the 20th century. The economic decline and demographic slowdown of the 1970s and
1980s eroded Russia’s global position well before the collapse of the Soviet Union.
For a long time Russia’s weight depended primarily on territory as the bearer of natural
resources.15 Today, economics and technology have become more important. While “size of
territory equals power” was a 19th century axiom, today it has changed to “size of the economy equals power,” with a fairly limited correlation between the two. Hill and Gaddy (2003,
pp. 10-11) have argued that where such a correlation does exist, it is negative, as in Russia’s
case. However, this author’s calculations indicate that a positive correlation between territorial extent and size of GDP does exist r = 0.46 for 185 countries in 2001).16 Hill and Gaddy’s
thesis resembles that of Turovskiy (1999, p. 109); that “ . . . gigantic territory itself gives little
to the state. The flip-side of territorial growth is a complexity of problems, connected with
inaccessibility and the diversity of territories.”
15Indeed Frederick Ratzel (1897) claimed that a mature state must have a territory of at least 5 million km2.
Neither Japan, Germany, nor the EU (even after its expansion) is that large. Moreover, considering that there are
more than 5,000 ethnic groups (most with aspirations of establishing their own state), a fixed amount of land, and
annual global population growth, it can be suggested that the number of countries may increase by as much as 25
times, that the average size of a state may decrease from 680,000 km2 to 25,000–30,000 km2, and that the average
population size will decrease from 30 million to 2–2.5 million.
16For population and GDP, the correlation coefficient was stronger (r = 0.52), while for population and size of
territory it declined to 0.38. What is correct for entire countries seems to be true of their regions as well. In 2002,
correlations between territory and GDP in Russia’s regions (n = 88), while very low, were nonetheless positive (r =
0.13); the correlation between GDP and population was much higher (r = 0.76)
ANDREI TREIVISH
131
Russia now remains a “giant” only in terms of landmass, although hopes remain for economic recovery and post-Soviet integration (the CIS or Eurasian Economic Community).
However, these hopes raise the question of whether stable economic growth is possible in
tandem with a rapidly declining population. If current trends persist, labor may well become
the most deficient resource in Russia. And while this poor and unstable country already
attracts substantial numbers of foreign workers, they face living conditions and attitudes that
are inferior and less friendly than in the West (Vishnevskiy et al., 2003).
Overall, a typological portrait of contemporary Russia looks roughly as follows:
• Demographically it is part of the West, inasmuch as its low birth rate reflects the
completion of the demographic transition (although the death rate is high and life
expectancy is significantly lower than in the West).
• Socio-economically it is indisputably part of the world’s semi-periphery, and
more precisely a part of the Eastern European group of emerging-market countries.
• Geographically it is a giant country, partly resembling the U.S. and Canada, partly
Brazil, and even partly China (for example, in terms of the number of neighboring
countries).
• Politically it is relatively isolated, having disagreements with many post-Soviet
countries while still including them within its sphere of influence.
While post-Soviet Russia has retained all of its borders with its developed neighbors in
Europe and Asia, its borders with the newly independent states of Central Asia and the Caucasus have replaced those with the developing countries in South Asia. Russia also retains its
borders with Mongolia and China, so that the country now has more international borders to
maintain and possibly defend.
WHY RUSSIA IS NOT AMERICA
This simplistic but provocative title is taken from the bestseller by A. P. Parshev (2001).
Parshev’s central arguments are summarized below.
1. Russia built its state “where no one lives.” Only one-third of its territory is “efficient
for life,”17 and the country’s severe climate exacerbates its long distances.
2. The additional expenditures required to make Russia’s settlements habitable in winter
(e.g., heating) and to sustain the transportation of goods across long distances severely
hinders Russia’s ability to compete with countries with milder climates and lower transportation costs. Accordingly, it will continue to be very difficult for Russia to attract capital
investment.
3. In view of the above, market reforms can only destroy Russia. Her markets should
not have been opened to the world and should be closed immediately before all Russia’s
resources are depleted and her capital flows abroad.
17Parshev refers to the Nouvelle goegraphie universelle of Reclus, defining an “efficient” area as one that
should be situated below an elevation of 2000 meters above sea level and whose mean annual temperatures should
exceed –2°C.
132
EURASIAN GEOGRAPHY AND ECONOMICS
Table 3. Selected Characteristics of the “Northerliness” of Climate
and Its Severity for Territory and Population in Canada, Russia,
and Swedena
Indicator
Russia
European
Total
Canada
Sweden
Rounded mean latitude, ° N. L.
Territory
Population
58
54
60
54
55
47
62
60
-4.4
5.8
2.2
5.2
208
125
138
94
Average annual temperature, °C
Territory
Population
2.2
4.3
-5.5
2.8
Stable frost days (< 0°C)
Territory
Population
155
133
205
143
Sum of active temperatures (>10°C)
Territory
Population
1759
2153
1073
2020
903
1685
1347
1819
aAverage for the second half of the 20th century
Sources: Calculated by the author from data for 106 Russian, 47 Canadian, and 27
Swedish territorial units (oblasts, provinces, and sometimes their parts, islands,
etc.) on the basis of data in NOAA-Cires, n.d. and World Gazetteer, n.d. TPA and
TPC in the United States are respectively +8°C and +12°C, and in both EU-15 and
EU-11 and Japan they are respectively both around +10°C (although “cold”
Finland, with its +2°C and +4°C, respectively, is a member of the EU-11).
Despite Parshev’s scathing criticism of liberal reformers (who should have understood
the inevitable consequences of their policies) and even talk of a CIA-led conspiracy against
Russia, the author’s first basic thesis has some merit: Russia’s geography does impose a cost
on economic development. However, as Hill and Gaddy (2003), and the current author
(Treivish, 2002a), have recognized, the main problem is not that Russia is too cold but rather
how it is settled. Climatic parameters scaled according to area and population, such as average annual temperature per unit area and per capita provide an indication of the coldness of
the land itself and of its typical inhabitant.18 Table 3 compares these parameters for three
northern countries.
It is not just latitude, but also distance from the Atlantic and the pattern of settlement that
determines the “coldness” of the heartland. At the end of the 20th century the difference
18Gaddy and Hill calculated a measure of average temperature for the population, referring to it as temperature
per capita (TPC). Following this terminology, a measure of average temperature for a territory is called is temperature per area (TPA). The weighted mean parameters are calculated as follows: TPC = Σ Sp t = Σ p t /P; TPA = Σ Sa
t = Σ at/A, where Sp is the local (regional) share of national population; t is the local (regional) annual (January)
temperature, p is local (regional) population; P is total country population; Sa is the local (regional) territorial share;
a is local (regional) territorial size, and A the national (country’s) size. In principle, other characteristics of the climate might be taken into consideration instead of temperature and other parameters instead of population and areal
size could be utilized.
ANDREI TREIVISH
133
between Russia’s average annual temperature (–5.5°C) and “per capita” temperature
(+2.8°C) was 8.3°C. In European Russia and in Sweden this difference is 2.2°C, although a
Swede is 1°C warmer, and in Canada the difference exceeds 10°C. An average Canadian
winter lasts some 125 days, compared to 143 days for Russians, and 94 days for Swedes (the
latter equating to a fairly “normal” three winter months). Both Canada and Russia have mild
winters in their southwestern regions, in Vancouver and the North Caucasus respectively,
where around 13 percent and 9 percent of their populations live, respectively. In Canada
some 73 percent of the territory experiences winter19 for six months or longer per year,
whereas in Russia the comparable figure is 69 percent. In Canada this territory is home to
just 2.5 percent of the population, whereas in Russia it is 8.5 percent.
Thus, although the Russian and Canadian territories are nearly equally as cold, the
Canadian Arctic is sparsely populated and overall Canada has its settlements concentrated
along the southern border of the country. In the heartland, although its continental climate
accounts for Russia’s higher “sum of active vegetative temperatures” (over 10°C) and allows
agriculture to advance farther north, the combination of heat and humidity is nonetheless not
as favorable, the growing season shorter, and harvests lower, albeit not entirely for natural
reasons (Field, 1968; Nefedova, 2003). Both Parshev and Hill and Gaddy offer harsh appraisals of the Russian climate. Yet the economic basis for the assessment of Russia's climate as
“horrible” is questionable in the both the Parshev and Hill and Gaddy books. Parshev (2001)
refers to Soviet construction norms and questionable (in his opinion) structures of costs for
the production of a single product in different countries (pp. 53, 118). Hill and Gaddy (2003,
pp. 40-50) use U.S. data on the influence of cold weather on labor, economy, and daily life,
but they themselves are doubtful as to whether these findings are relevant in the Russian
context.20 This question clearly requires further investigation, as does that of the cost of
excessive heat in tropical and subtropical countries.
In their analysis, Hill and Gaddy (p. 38) found that average “per capita” January temperature between 1930 and 1990 exhibited a different pattern of change in Russia (decline of
1°C) than in Canada (increase of 1°C), and stressed Russia’s dominance in terms of having
the world’s coldest cities. However, their conclusion regarding the lack of a “rise in temperature” during the 1990s (p. 131) is erroneous. Figure 4 demonstrates that such a rise in
temperature in fact did occur, but less of one than they had hoped to see. The rise in temperature was muted not only because of the low mobility of Russia’s marginalized population and
the effects of housing shortages but also because the main Russian “sun belt,” primarily the
North Caucasus, is relatively small, poor, and socially unstable. Since 1991, this region has
nonetheless received roughly a million migrants from conflict zones and the CIS countries,
not to mention an unknown number of illegal immigrants.
Following a pre-Soviet “cold snap” and a rise in city temperatures toward the start of the
20th century, the main trend had been toward colder per capita temperatures until the onset of
stabilization followed by a period of warming, beginning in the 1960s and 1970s. Given this
19Winter
in this context refers to a period of mean daily temperatures of 0°C or lower.
Canada and the United States, when the temperature drops from 0° to –25°C, the standard completion time
for each manual task would have to be multiplied by 1.6, and for each machine task by about 1.3. At –30° C, these
ratios rise to over 2.1 and 1.6, correspondingly. The U.S. is estimated to suffer 16,000 excess deaths per degree of
cold. An incomplete estimation of expenditures on adaptation to coldness in Canada circa.1990 came to some 11.7
billion Canadian dollars. Most probably while the cold in Russia slows down operations in the same way, Russian
prices and tariffs are lower, and so the impact on the economy as a whole or a family in particular will differ substantially. For example, natural gas, petroleum, and electric power are all only a fraction of the cost in the West, making
the cost of the cold comparably lower.
20In
134
EURASIAN GEOGRAPHY AND ECONOMICS
Fig. 4. Changes in per capita average annual and January temperatures (°C) in Russia and its 10
largest cities, 1987–2002.
pattern, communist planners, whom Hill and Gaddy sharply criticize for their failure to recognize the “costs of cold,” are not the sole cause of the shift to the east. Rather movement to
the north and east (the heartland becomes colder to the east as a result of the continent’s
climatic asymmetry, reinforced by the northeastern mountain ranges) was a Russian idée fixé
even before 1917.
THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE HEARTLAND:
MOTIVES AND RESULTS
Vast and harsh environments can be found in many parts of the planet, but few states
have put so much hope and energy into the development of their remote regions as Russia.
The 18th century scientist, Mikhail Lomonosov, promised that Russia’s power would
increase due to Siberia. In the early 20th century Dmitriy Mendeleyev (1907, p. 131), predicted that the center of population would drift “towards the plentiful south and the
land-abundant east.”21 Finally, Semenov-Tyan’-Shanskiy (1915), essentially for geopolitical
reasons, called for the development of mid-Russian Eurasia between the Volga and the
Yenisey (a region very similar in form to Hooson’s Volga-Baikal zone) in order to move the
cultural center of the state nearer to the geographical one.
Stalin’s 1925 forced industrialization began to turn these dreams into five-year plans,
accompanied by an official industrial growth rate of 13–19 percent per year between 1928
and 1940 and of 10–13 percent through the 1950s.22 Even more realistic appraisals of Soviet
industrial growth during this period estimate an annual growth rate of 8–10 percent (similar
at the time to Japan’s), making the Soviet Union the second-largest industrial country in the
world (Khanin, 1991; Vishnevsky, 1998; Krasilschikov, 1998; Treivish, 2002b). During the
21Mendeleyev considered the main attraction of the heartland to be its land. As a proponent of industrialization, he was able to include in this the idea of the land’s “depth” (mineral resources) and forests, but understood that
agrarian interests would motivate a peasant country. Sergey Vitte (1964, p. 505) wrote that “the issue of industrial
importance in Russia has not been understood properly yet. It was only our great scientist Mendeleyev . . . who tried
to enlighten the Russian people in this regard.” Mendeleyev believed that Russia was rich with raw materials, but
also believed in utilizing them wisely.
22Stalin (1928/1949) explained his motives openly: “We are 50–100 years behind the leading countries. We
must run this distance in 10 years. Either we will do this or we will be crushed.” He viewed heavy industry to be
some 50 years behind the “standard wave,” with other branches of economy even farther behind. Stalin in fact had
correctly guessed the amount of time available before World War II. The external threat neither justifies the awful
mistakes made, nor the number of victims, but does explain the need for haste.
ANDREI TREIVISH
135
Table 4. Spatial Distribution of Industrial Production and Industrial Employment in Russia,
1900–2000
Indicator/region
1900
1925
1950
37
579
1975
2000
Production
Absolute value of output for Russia, bill. rubles in
2000 prices
22
4705
4759
68
27
5
42
38
20
32
40
28
10.8
21.4
13.3
42
39
19
40
41
19
33
47
20
Regional percentages of total production, current prices
industriala
Old
European Russia without old industrial
Asiatic Russia
50
33
17
65
31
4
Employment
Number of workers, millions
1.9
2.2
Regional percentages of total employment
Old industriala
European Russia without old industrial
Asiatic Russia
64
30
6
61
33
6
aComprises St. Petersburg and surrounding area, the industrial center (including Nizhniy Novgorod), and the
mid-Urals.
Sources: Compiled by author from numerous sources, including Statisticheskiye, 1903, pp. 71-106; SemenovTyan’-Shanskiy, 1910, various pages; Rossiya, 2002, pp. 217-218; Varzar and Kafengauz, 1929, various pages;
Sotsialisticheskoye, 1936, pp. 57-69; RSFSR, 1958; Narkhoz/Goskomstat Rossii, various years and pages, 1956–
2000, Voronkova et al., 1992; Promyshlennost’, 2002, pp.49-51, 119-121.
1960s Khrushchev’s plan to “surpass America” did not seem that utopian, particularly given
Soviet nuclear and space achievements.
Industrialization was responsible for the rapid movement of the frontier to the east and
for the creation of “reserve bases” deep in the heartland. The growing labor force (and
increased capital investment) however, did not increase the heartland’s share of overall
industrial production until mid-century (Table 4).23 Industry grew in Siberia in absolute
terms, but the region’s percentage contribution to total output fell in the early post-war period
before stagnating at ca. 19–20 percent during 1960–1990. Raw material and fuel prices rarely
increased, whereas price rises for goods manufactured in the European USSR were more
common. Only when market forces altered the price structure of the economy in the 1990s
was the true value of Siberia resource production revealed. This, accompanied by the decline
in manufacturing caused by the transitional recession, increased the relative contribution of
Siberia’s resource industries to Russia’s economy.
Consequently, although geographical inertia for a long time withstood the pressures
exerted by both planning and ideology, in the end the western regions have given way to the
23The early five-year plans allocated more than 50 percent of centralized investment to the new regions, made
possible by expropriating wealth from the rural countryside as well as the population in general. However, it took a
long time before the new infrastructure was in place, with the eastern projects long absorbing resources without generating returns. However, their potential was apparent, especially during the war, although the most useful facilities
were located near the front, for example in the Volga-Ural zone, where 58 percent of factories evacuated from the
western USSR were relocated (Planirovaniye, 1985, p. 194).
136
EURASIAN GEOGRAPHY AND ECONOMICS
Fig. 5. Profiles of industrial production in economic regions (percent of Russian total at current
prices).
following N-S axis in middle Russia: Taymyr-Yamal-Urals-Volga-Don-Kuban/Black Sea
ports (Fig. 5). In the 1990s this axis provided some 45 percent of Russia’s industrial production and exports, primarily in the form of fuel and raw materials.
Aleksey Mints (1974) first demythologized both the geography of the first fiveyear-plan and descriptions of how uniform investment boosted new and backward
regions and created cities “from scratch.” The reality was more prosaic, with the opening of
eastern raw material resources being combined with the development of manufacturing
industries in western regions of the Soviet Union.24 The shift eastward, Mints observed,
occurred (primarily) within the European USSR. The centers of heavy industry did move
toward the Volga and Urals, but that process remained completed at the start of World War II.
A way of gauging the extent of the shift is to trace the movement of population and other
centroids across the USSR over time. The Soviet population centroid crossed the Volga during the 1920s, then the border of Kazakhstan in the 1960s, and in the 1980s, dragged eastward by the Central Asian population, passed over the crest of the Urals (Fig. 6).25 The
population centroid for Russia proper, although moving over 600 km (from 47º to 56º E.
24See
for example, Shabad (1979)—Ed., EGE.
calculations in this paper are based on Boris Veynberg’s formulas for a spheroid (the simplification of
the shape of the Earth is not significant): L = Σpl/P; D = Σpl/(P cos l), where L and D are latitude and longitude of
the center of the initial masses, l and d are co-ordinates of single points, p are values of the single masses, and P is
the cumulative mass of the phenomena (see Veynberg, 1915). Here the “single masses” are the populations of either
regions or cities, and single points of the former are their population’s centroids, counted separately or estimated
visually for smaller regions.
25The
ANDREI TREIVISH
137
Fig. 6. Soviet and Russian population centroids, 1897–2002.
Long.), nonetheless remained within the European part of the country. Russia’s urban
population centroid lagged farther behind initially, but during the 1930s shot ahead, moving
some 900 km eastward, where for 40 years it was located at Ufa (the present capital of
Bashkortostan); however, neither it nor Russia’s rural centroid could “ford” the Belaya River.
Now, in the post-Soviet era, all the centroids are moving back toward the west and away
from Russia’s territorial center (the Evenki Okrug, some 2,500 km to the east), as the population flows out of northern and eastern regions. The centroid of the population living in
Russian cities of one million or more population (the so-called “millionaire cities”) moved
roughly 450 km eastward before turning back at the western border of the Chuvash republic.
The larger cities with higher population densities now tend to be located closer to the historical European nucleus of the heartland where a more dense settlement network has evolved.
The eastward movement of population and industry over the Soviet period is reflected as
well in the positioning of major cities in the so-called basic “framework” of urban settlement,
which has been analyzed by a number of scholars (Baransky, 1946; Lappo, 1978; Polyan,
1988; Kudryavtsev, 1985). The average distance between any of the 272 large or 45 very
large Soviet cities to their nearest similarly sized neighbor was around half that anticipated by
a theoretical uniform distribution. The same ratio held for the 10 (very largest) major urban
centers in the USSR, although when taking into account only settled territory it increased to
about three-fourths of the theoretical level (Table 5). For the Russian Federation taken separately, the deviation from a uniform distribution increases (a ratio of around one-third overall,
or one-half if only settled areas are considered); its profile of city concentration is similar to
138
EURASIAN GEOGRAPHY AND ECONOMICS
Table 5. Average Distance between Top Ten Cities and from the Cities to State Borders in
Selected Countries or Areasa
Russian
Federa- USSRb EU-11
tion
Distance
Actual inter-city distance,
in km
390
799
365
India
China
350
319
United
Canada Brazil
States
285
372
478
37
69
55
72
Inter-city distance as a percentage of the theoretical distribution
For total area
For populated area onlyc
30
53
53
76
64
61
33
36
29
37
Average population-weighted distance of top 10 cities to:
In km
As percentage of RRd
793
34
609
23
Open sea
165
18
326
32
350
20
213
12
544
31
124
8
284
16
126
7
118
7
124
8
State borders (land or sea)
In km
As percentage of RRd
309
13
333
12
100
11
159
16
aIncluded in the calculations are the cities within their official boundaries, as well as the surrounding urban
agglomerations. State boundaries reflect those in place at the beginning of the 21st century.
bIn 1989.
cWhere there is more than one person per km2 and indicated only where the difference is significant.
dRR= Reducted radius, the radius of a circle the area of which is equal to the size of the given country.
Source: Calculated by the author from numerous sources, including World-Gazetteer, n.d.; Atlas SSSR, 1983;
Goskomstat SSSR, 1989, pp. 31-37; CIA, 2000.
that of China or the United States, both of which have their urban centers concentrated in the
east.26 The remoteness of the heartland’s centers, and especially their distance from open
seas, contributes to the asymmetrical internal geography of the region, a pattern that is typical
of large countries. The Russian Federation’s 10 biggest agglomerations are more distant from
the nearest sea than even the top 10 Soviet cities, not to mention those in Europe. Using a
symbolic mean radius as a measure of internal distances (i.e., the so-called “reducted radius”
in Table 5), both Canada and India are similar to Russia, although the mean population
weighted distance from Russia’s 10 largest centers to its land (sea) borders is longer.
Chauncy Harris (1970, pp. 1-5) referred to the Soviet Union as a land of large cities,
which were more numerous than in the United States. However, at present the majority of
Russian cities appear to have exhausted their growth potential, with the transitional recession
(arguably) in some cases interrupting the process of urbanization and development before its
natural completion.27 A variety of factors point to divergent trends in demography and city
26Canadian cities are concentrated as well, although they lie along the southern border (with the U.S.) and
Brazil’s cities are concentrated along the Atlantic coastline.
27This issue is discussed in more detail elsewhere (Medvedkov and Medvedkov, 1999; Gorod i derevnya,
2001; Treivish and Nefedova, 2003), the basis for which is suggested by the following comparison. In 2004, Russia
had 15 urban agglomerations of one million population or greater, with a total population of 35.4 million people
(24 percent of it’s population), while the U.S. had 43 such agglomerations accounting for 158.6 million people
(54 percent), China had 49 with 139 million people, and India 36 with 120 million people (World-Gazetteer, n.d.).
ANDREI TREIVISH
139
Fig. 7. Latitudinal (west-east) cross-sections of population density for four giant countries in 2004.
Missing terms along horizontal axis for Canada represent water interval (Gulf of St. Lawrence)
between New Brunswick and Newfoundland.
network development in the Russian and European models. Notably, Russia never established a strong “pole” alongside the Pacific Ocean. The development “waves” often broke
before reaching this region. Widely spaced cities represented an archipelago of urban centers
scattered across an ocean of periphery, although the shift eastward and settlement of the
heartland helped to smooth this asymmetry, in the process amplifying the country’s continentality.
The level of asymmetry is unrelated to population density. Although Russia’s population
density overall is approximately one-seventieth that of China, the degree of latitudinal differentiation in the two countries is almost the same. In both countries the asymmetry flows in
one direction, whereas in the U.S. and Canada, there are two peaks (Fig. 7).28 Standard measurements of population distribution over 10–12 major regions in these countries (Table 6)
show that the contrasts in Russia are not actually that great. Russians are not that unevenly
spread across their ocean of land, although the level unevenness, unlike in other countries, is
now increasing.
The north-south, rather than west-east axis, is responsible for at least some of the
“spreading” of Russia’s cities and population. The northerners of the heartland number some
nine million people, while some 95 million live in the southern heartland regions (the CIS
28Such profiles may, however, can give a deceptive impression of the unevenness of settlement, in particular in
the case of Russia and China. Other cross-sections (e.g., not traced along a parallel of latitude), might present a different picture.
2003
2.8
5.8
59
2.5
5.1
49
144
3.6
14.9
1989
8.1
28.5
13.3
37.1
1989
12b
Russia
11a
195
4.0
15.3
2003
283
4.6
115
1986
8.7
20.0
12c
2004
278
4.8
109
China
137
3.4
26.5
1985
4.6
13.0
10d
145
3.3
24.2
2002
United States
2235
14.7
366
1986
1313
16.8
422
2004
4.5
36.0
12f
Canada
9.4
55.3
11e
economic regions (Kaliningrad Oblast included in the Northwest region).
regional division east of the Urals (instead of West Siberia, East Siberia, and the Far East): North Siberia, Northwest, South Siberia, and Trans-Baikal regions.
cSo-called “cooperative regions,” or a more detailed system of economic regions (Beijing, Hebei, Shaanxi, Inner Mongolia, Shandong, Shanghai, Central, South, Sichuan, Yunnan, Guizhou, and Tibet; see Ekonomicheskaya, 1988, p. 195).
dCensus Bureau regions (with Alaska and Hawaii grouped together).
eProvinces (Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island grouped together), and Yukon and Northwest Territories
fSame macroregions as in table note “e,” including the new territory of Nunavut (formerly part of Northwest Territories).
Sources: Compiled by the author from World-Gazetteer, n.d. and various national statistical publications.
bAlternative
aMajor
Coefficient of variation
Maximum-minimum ratio
Population density
Maximum-minimum ratio
Population
Number of macroregions
Area
Coefficient of variation
Maximum-minimum ratio
Indicator
Table 6. Selected Indicators of Uneven Population Settlement by Macroregions in Russia, China, the United States, and Canada, 1980s–2004
140
EURASIAN GEOGRAPHY AND ECONOMICS
ANDREI TREIVISH
141
Fig. 8. Population of Russia (in millions) distributed along four axes of settlement, 1987–1999.
areas from Odessa to Bishkek included). The Canadian North and Alaska have only 0.8 million residents. Population density in the largely Inuit-inhabited Nunavut territory of Canada
is less than 1.5 people per 100 km2, whereas in the least-populated Russian region, the
Evenki Okrug, there are some 2.3 persons per 100 km2, in the Taimyr Okrug (discounting
Noril’sk) some 4.5, and in the Sakha Republic 30.5 people.
Figure 8 shows changes in the distribution of population along four alternative axes
(Treivish, 2001).29 Along the north-south axis, in each year depicted, the greatest number of
people lived in the Non-Chernozem zone, although the Taiga zone gained ground around
1951, tipping the graph toward the north and causing it to lose its pyramidal symmetry and
acute peak of 1897. The profile of the west-east axis by contrast, barely changes over the 100
years examined, except for some concentration in the Central and Pechora-Volga regions.
The center-periphery axis depicts the more rapid growth of capital cities and semi-peripheral
regions (where urbanization and industrialization attracted some migrants from peripheral
zones), and of the remote periphery.30 The ethnic axis shows the role of the “Russian megacore,” although the non-Russian peripheries (the Islamic regions in particular) grew more
rapidly in the late 20th century.
29In each case, the country is divided into seven zones with stable (axis 1 and 2) and partly variable (axis 3 and
4) components.
30“Center-periphery” contrasts in Russia are connected with its centralism and the “lagged” character of development (Gritsai et al., 1991). However, the root causes are deeper, and are only partly depicted in Figure 8, as the
polarization of Russian space is more noticeable within regions.
142
EURASIAN GEOGRAPHY AND ECONOMICS
Thus a predominantly northward shift, and to a lesser extent to an eastward and
semi-peripheral one, caused the “spreading” of the population, most notably under the aegis
of industrialization and the GULAG; Hill and Gaddy therefore are correct in many respects.
Today, inertia still plays a role as well. Just as the pre-revolution population profile of
Russia’s space was not broken fully by the Soviet experience, similarly the current profile
still retains its Soviet form even after the collapse of Communism.31
Although Russia’s population centroid reversed its eastward movement after 1989 (see
Fig. 6), railway traffic continued to “stretch” in the post-Soviet era, due mostly to increasing
raw materials exports, in particular to the Far Abroad.32 This problem of long distances, common for all giant countries, at times was particularly acute in the heartland. In the 1830s, for
example, no rail network existed in Russia, although in Europe railways were already working to shrink distances. By the 20th century the gap had closed, but today it has again
widened, not so much in terms of the distances per se, but in the means of overcoming
them.33
Historical differences also are apparent in the sphere of communications. Table 7 shows
that the telegram-based communications lead of Great Britain in 1913 had, by 1950, given
way to U.S. dominance, as the telephone became the major means of mass communication.
By 1999 the United States was some distance ahead in terms of Internet usage, while the
Asian countries often lagged behind even Russia, despite their electronics production.34
Access to the Internet and cellphones alone, however, will not overcome all of Russia’s
natural and economic barriers, particularly as its economy continues to be highly materialsintensive. Pessimistic geodeterminism might well lead to the conclusion that “running in
place” is the Russian heartland’s best-case scenario.
THE HEARTLAND TODAY:
SHRINKING “EFFECTIVE” TERRITORY
Soviet-era concepts of gross and net social (material) product have now been
replaced by the universally accepted GDP and GRP.35 The changes in concepts over time,
31Kaganskiy
(2001) has gone so far as to refer to the post-Soviet Russian space as “neo-Soviet” in character.
mean distance a ton of rail cargo was hauled in Russia increased from 663 km in 1926, through 833 km
in 1950, to 1179 km in 1990. The corresponding mean distance for 2002 grew to 1393 km. The share of non-CIS
states as recipients of Russia’s exports has more than doubled over the last 10 years, so that in 2003 they accounted
for 84 percent of Russia’s exports and 80 percent of imports. In this sense the “Far Abroad” is nearer than the “Near
Abroad.”
33Russia remains burdened by slow and expensive trains. In the 1990s overall freight volume fell to only onesixth of its late Soviet levels, and passengers by half. Express trains only ran on the Moscow to St. Petersburg line,
where technology permitted speeds of up to 300 km per hour. While it takes three to three and a half hours to get to
London, Amsterdam, Köln, Frankfurt, Geneva, or Marseilles from Paris, covering up to 750 km, seven hours on an
overnight train is needed to reach the closest “millionaire” city to Moscow—Nizhniy Novgorod (450 km distant).
An MGU student, Dmitriy Malinovskiy, has compared the fares charged for train travel between Moscow and the
provinces with regional incomes in 1985 and in 2001. He concluded that the country has become closer for “rich
Muscovites,” whereas for those living in the provinces the trip to Moscow has become as much as 1.5-3.5 times
more expensive.
34Russia is about five years behind the West in this sphere. Inequality of access is significant, with a few large
cities standing out in terms of computer and Internet usage levels (Perfilyev, 2003).
35A “productive determinism” or bias affected Soviet ideology. All consumer goods were considered to have
been produced by the material (productive) sector, and were only re-distributed by the service sectors. Therefore, the
cost of services was not factored into gross product, even though trade and transport turnover were taken into
account.
32The
ANDREI TREIVISH
143
Table 7. Mass Communication Technology in Eight Major Countries, 1913, 1950, and 1999
1913
1950
1999
Country
No. of telegrams
receiveda
No. of telephones installed
for general usea
No. of Internet
connectionsa
Great Britain
United States
Germany
France
USSR
Japan
India
China
182
119
77
111
28
49
n.d.d
n.d.
11.5
28.5
5.2b
6.0
0.8
2.1
0.01
0.01
27.1
150.9
17.4
11.1
1.3c
16.4
0.02
0.05
aPer
1,000 inhabitants.
Republic of Germany.
cRussian Federation.
dn.d. = no data.
Sources: Compiled by the author from Mironov, 1999, pp. 411-412; Strany, 2001.
bFederal
runaway inflation, and a partial reorganization of regional statistics36 make analyzing
temporal economic changes difficult. In this paper, comparisons between 1990 and 1996 are
based on Soviet-era measures and methods, and those for 1996 and 2002 using the postSoviet GRP.
The old methodology incorporated data from 73 single territories (including estimates
for the then–autonomous oblasts). Figure 9 shows remarkably strong differences in their
level of per capita output between 1990 and 1996. Data relating to the current methodologies
(79 regions) show even stronger disparities, which have increased slightly between 1996 and
2002 (in real prices). The clear GRP leader in all cases is oil-and-gas-producing Tyumen’
Oblast (including the Yamal-Nenets and Khanty-Mansi okrugs), while the negative outliers
are all southern republics: Kalmykia in 1990, and Dagestan and Ingushetia in 1996 and
2002.37 The macroregional rankings have remained relatively steady, with West Siberia and
the Central regions in the lead, and the North Caucasus bringing up the rear.
If we define “effective” regions as those with per capita output exceeding 75 percent of
the Russian average, some three quarters of Russia’s regions “made the cut” in 1990. By
2002 this proportion had fallen to just two in every five and in southwestern Russia of the
country there were almost none (Fig. 10). The “effective” zone had drifted to the north and
east. The number of highly and super-effective regions (defined as those with per capita output of 125–250 percent and over 250 percent of the Russian average, respectively) did not
increase.38 In demographic terms, however, both Moscow and Tyumen’, as well as the North
Caucasus regions, increased their populations between the censuses of 1989 and 2002;
36In the USSR, regional product volumes were not reported for the autonomous oblasts and okrugs, thus inflating the output attributed to their “parent” regions. Until 2001, GRP data were not available for the 10 autonomous
okrugs within the Russian Federation either.
37Data are no longer available for Chechnya.
38These regions include the capital, Moscow, and those regions that were able to extract and export natural
resources such as oil, gas, diamonds, gold, and fish.
144
EURASIAN GEOGRAPHY AND ECONOMICS
Fig. 9. Regional and macroregional differences in net material product and gross regional product
in corresponding years’ prices (percentage of Russian average). Each horizontal bar in the figure represents an individual region within a macroregion. Vertical lines show the entire range of values within a
macroregion and diamond symbol represents the macroregional mean.
conversely, the populations of St. Petersburg and other strong and “effective” regions
declined in size. The farther east or north the location, the more rapid the decrease, with
demographic losses ranging from one-fifth of the population in the Komi Republic to twothirds in Chukotka.
The character of the spatial shift in economic activity differs by sector. Between 1990
and 1997 industry rushed toward the natural resources of the northeast, located mainly in the
Siberian zone of the heartland, before turning westward (Fig. 11). The centroid of retail trade
drifted more slowly, following the population flow, gravitating around Ufa before catapulting
some 300 kilometres west toward Moscow, Russia’s distribution supercenter. Only recently
has it come more or less to a standstill, as the capital’s share of turnover has decreased again
marginally (from 29 percent in 2000 to 26 percent in 2003, i.e., back to the 1997 level).
The economy of much of Russia’s heartland remains mainly industrial (Fig. 12). In
2001, the contribution of industry and construction to GRP in Siberia amounted to
54 percent, in the European North and Far East to 49–50 percent and in the Central region
ANDREI TREIVISH
145
Fig. 10. Net material product per capita (1990) and gross regional product per capita (2002) for
Russian regions. Russian average = 100.
25 percent.39 In the South, industry and construction accounted for 33 percent, while the
rural economy accounted for 17 percent, though absolute agricultural output was higher in
the Volga-Urals zone. Moscow and St. Petersburg, where the tertiary branch accounted for
55 percent and 37 percent of GRP respectively in 2001, as well as the sea ports and southern
resorts, represented post-industrial islands in an otherwise agro-industrial ocean.
By 2004 Russia’s industry, after changes in its structure, had returned to two-thirds of its
pre-crisis output volume (Fig. 13). Accompanying the recovery was the increasing concentration of particular forms of activity in particular regions and cities (Table 8). Brewing is an
39Industry
and construction now account for less than 15 percent of Moscow’s GRP.
146
EURASIAN GEOGRAPHY AND ECONOMICS
Fig. 11. Centroids of population and of industrial and retail trade output, 1960–2002.
Fig. 12. Composition of gross regional product in main Russian zones in 2001, billions of rubles.
ANDREI TREIVISH
147
Fig. 13. Changes in the structure of Russian industrial production, as estimated in 1999 comparable prices.
Table 8. Spatial Concentration of Three Selected Products in Main Production Regions of
Russia, 1990 and 2002 (RF = 100)
Product
2002 output as
percentage of
1990
Business cycle
Electric power
Textiles
Beer
82.4
32.9
209.2
Recessiona
Severe recessionb
Rapid growthc
10 main regions
20 main regions
1990
2002
1990
2002
42.6
76.4
39.7
45.6
87.9
69.1
67.2
90.3
60.7
69.3
96.4
84.0
aCombined
with stagnation.
crisis.
cEconomic boom.
Source: Compiled by the author from Promyshlennost’, 2002, pp. 165-167, 276-277, 308-309; Goskomstat
Rossii, 2003, pp. 400-566.
bEconomic
example of an activity that has grown rapidly overall, although its recent growth now is concentrated in a small number of locations. Moscow yielded to St Petersburg as Russia’s beer
capital, but the former leader, when taken together with its neighboring oblasts, remains
Russia’s primary producer of beer. The volume of textile production fell sharply during the
transitional recession, with current output only a fraction of its former level; what recovery in
output has occurred has been concentrated in the old centers of production, most typically in
Ivanovo Oblast, dubbed the “Russian Manchester.”40 Finally, in the (electric) power industry,
which has not yet returned to pre-recession levels of production, Irkutsk and Sverdlovsk
oblasts, the Khanty-Mansi AO, Krasnoyarsk Kray, and Moscow remain the dominant
regions.
Although there has been a general reduction of employment in industry, even in large
cities of the central heartland, most Russian cities continue to exhibit high shares of overall
employment in industry. In Yaroslavl, Nizhniy Novgorod, Perm’, and Omsk oblasts, for
40Ivanovo’s share of total textile production had been decreasing during the late Soviet period, but between
1990 and 2002 grew from 24 percent to 57 percent of the total, as the overall contribution of this depressed industry
to the Russian economy declined from 1.5 percent to 0.3 percent.
148
EURASIAN GEOGRAPHY AND ECONOMICS
example, the share of employment in industry has now stabilized at around 30-40 percent of
the total regional workforce level. In a number of small cities in central Russia and the Urals
(two old industrial “platforms” of the heartland), given a measure of economic recovery, this
share has again reached 80–90 percent (Goskomstat Rossii, 2002).41
In the Soviet period, once cities reached a size of of 250,000–300,000 inhabitants, they
continued to grow almost without exception.42 Post-Soviet fertility rates now typically no
longer compensate for aging populations, and cities must attract in-migrants if they are to
continue to grow. Furthermore, new market barriers, such as the cost of housing, food, and
other essentials combine with the old bureaucratic barriers (such as the continued use of
residency permits in Moscow) to migration. For these reasons many migrants from the
North, from conflict zones, and from CIS countries have had to opt for destinations that were
both poor and cheap. However, neither the crisis nor the reforms have been able to reverse
the link between economics and demography, nor the influence of the north-south and centerperiphery gradients. The correlation between the size of a city and its status remains high,
and is complex (Nefedova and Treivish, 1998). In industrial cities wages are often higher, but
those with diversified economies and administrative functions may enjoy higher per capita
levels of retail trade and services provision (affording an example of the different spaces utilized for material production and consumption). Non-industrial centers are more attractive to
migrants, and consequently their populations continue to grow while those of industrial
centers decline.
Overall it turns out that “effective territory” differs depending on whether it is viewed in
relation to the economy or the population, yet it should be remembered that in only 2 of the
11 economic macroregions—the Central (including Moscow) and West Siberian (thanks
mainly to Tyumen)—does the regional share of GDP markedly exceed its share of the
Russian population. Moreover these two poles of the contemporary Russian economy are
separated by some 2000 km.
In the Soviet Union, living conditions for the “average” inhabitant were geographically
estimated according to 30 natural parameters (Nazarevskiy, 1974). Some 91.4 percent of the
population lived in the areas designated either as “comfortable” or “very comfortable,” these
regions accounting for just 38.4 percent of the Soviet territory. Similar proportions exist in
contemporary Russia. In the 1980s, 7.7 million km2 of Russian territory was considered
inhabited (Dmitriyev et al., 1988, p. 57). This figure has fallen to 6.5–7 million km2, but
accounts for some 39 percent of Russia’s territory.43 Almost all of Russia’s population lives
within this space, with an average population density of 21.5 people per km2, compared to
only 8.5 per km2 when the whole of the country’s territory is included. The European North,
Siberia, and the Far East all account for much higher shares of Russia’s populated territory
than they do of the country’s total population and total economic production (Fig. 14).
Almost 1.7 million km2 of this inhabited land, however, is deemed unsuitable for habitation.
41In central Russia and the Urals, many areas are depressed and/or are oriented toward a single branch of production, or even dependent on a single industrial enterprise (e.g., see Monoprofil'nyye goroda, 2000). According to
our estimates (Nefedova and Treivish, 1998), in 1996 seven percent of cities in these regions, as measured by seven
main indices of economic and social well-being, were in the worst condition, and a further 19 percent could be classified as “unhealthy.” No “healthy” cities were in Ivanovo Oblast. It is not mere coincidence that German architects
(Oswalt et al., 2003) recently included Ivanovo and neighboring urban centers—along with Detroit, Manchester, and
Leipzig—in their “shrinking cities” project.
42The failure of a Soviet city to grow was unusual, usually signaling some type of problem (Rowland, 1996).
43Author’s recent calculations.
ANDREI TREIVISH
149
Fig. 14. Selected basic indicators in Russia’s major regions in 2001 (percent of total).
By subtracting this area from the total area of inhabited land, one comes up with ca. 5.1 million km2 of land that is “inhabited and habitable.”
By contrast some habitable regions are insufficiently populated. These can be classified
as under- and scarcely populated regions according to levels of population density.44 The latter categories combined encompass 3.4 million km2—that is, two-thirds of all the “inhabited
and habitable” land in Russia. Around 1.6 million km2 (roughly one-third) of the “inhabited
and habitable” land is categorized as scarcely populated.
Profiles of Russia’s seven federal districts (Fig. 15) show that a substantial amount of
unsuitable land is nonetheless settled in both the northern and eastern Russia, whereas in the
Center and South this category of land does not exist. Between the Volga and Amur, “comfortable” lands are often sparsely populated, and the southern part of the Siberian district
provides a vast inhabitable land reserve with a notable shortage of inhabitants. “Sufficient”
levels of agricultural population are seldom found east of the Volga district.45 The Central
Federal District, on the whole, leads the way in terms of areas that are sufficiently populated,
just slightly outranking the Southern and Volga Federal Districts.
In order to increase, to the Russian average, population density in inhabited but underpopulated regions, and to bring severely lagging regions to even underpopulated levels,
Russia needs some 21 million additional people. In European Russia alone (west of the Urals
district) the population deficit is calculated at some five million people. Each year these
figures must be adjusted further upward, as the population declines in the majority of
Russia’s regions. Migration (internal and international) no longer assists in equalizing the
spatial distribution of the population, since flows are toward already more populated, wellsettled zones.
44Underpopulated regions are defined as those with a population density of less than 35 people per km_ in total
and less than 10 per km2 in rural areas. Scarcely populated areas have densities at half this level or less, whereas
areas with at least one person per km2 are considered “inhabited.” The underpopulated threshold is based on a “standard” rayon unit (2,000 km2 and 50,000 inhabitants, including one medium-sized or several small towns and 20,000
rural inhabitants). The scarcely populated threshold has been revealed empirically as the minimum for successful
commodity farming (Ioffe and Nefedova, 2000, p. 300; Nefedova, 2003).
45It should be noted that this district is much larger than the traditional economic region with the same name,
and includes the oblasts and the republics of the western Urals, which were not usually associated with it.
150
EURASIAN GEOGRAPHY AND ECONOMICS
Fig. 15. Effectiveness of population in sufficiently and insufficiently populated areas in the federal
districts of Russia. The figure shows the area of land falling within each category of settlement/population density in each federal district.
Fig. 16. Population density in northern Eurasia, 1900–2000. Asterisk symbol (*) indicates Far
North excluded.
The dramatic demographic situation is amplified by trans-borders gradients. Figure 16
depicts the pronounced downward slope of population density across northwestern Eurasia
into Russia, reaching its nadir in the eastern reaches of Eurasia, before rocketing to new
peaks in China, Korea, and Japan. The growing “demographic wall” presented by China,
Korea, and Japan (Fig. 16) alarms Russians. The population of Harbin alone equals that of a
ANDREI TREIVISH
151
dozen Russian regional capitals to the east of Lake Baykal. Some 112 million people live in
three Chinese provinces that border Russia (Jilin, Heilongjiang, Nei Mongol Autonomous
Region), a figure that is expected to rise to 130 million over the next quarter century. In contrast, some 26 million people inhabit southern Siberia, a figure that can only be expected to
decrease in the future. Yet it is difficult to see from where Russia’s required labor resources
will come, if not from these feared neighbors.
CONCLUSIONS: WHITHER THE RUSSIAN HEARTLAND?
By the end of the 20th century, the early optimism that resulted from the opening and
settlement of the Russian heartland had been replaced by disappointment and scepticism.
The eastward population shift has ceased, and its resumption seems unlikely. In any event,
the centroid of overall production never advanced farther than the Urals, although the center
of oil production has, for a long time, been located on the Ob’ River, the center of coal mining in the Kuznetsk Basin, and so on.
The literature offers divergent appraisals of the heartland’s potential and future. Dmitriy
L’vov (2001) wrote of two prevailing economic images of Russia—that of a hopelessly
bankrupt country and that of a country growing rich from its natural resources.46 However,
there are many in Russia today who do not believe that raw materials are the key to prosperity. The exportation of natural resources and simple mass-produced goods is viewed as a
Third World economic development model, into which Russia does not fit neatly. Such a
model also would serve to aggravate Russia’s already substantial environmental problems.
An alternative model, based on Russia’s rich culture and educated workforce, is to develop
an internationally competitive, knowledge-intensive, post-industrial economy.
In reality, Russia needs both a resource-based and knowledge-intensive economy. Therefore, it is difficult to agree with all of either Parshev’s or Hill and Gaddy’s prescriptions.
Even if all of Russia’s population returned to European Russia, and population density there
matched that of the United States (35 people/km2) the land would still not be as warm as, for
example, Scandinavia. Furthermore, under such a redistribution Russia would be deprived of
her oil and natural gas and a considerable share of electrical energy, coal, and forest products
that are both necessary for survival in the severe climate and essential to export activity.
The heartland’s climate, location, and resource distribution have made it what it is, while
at the same time the dispersal of its population in an “ocean of land” has resulted in the concentration of both the population and advanced economic activity closer to the archipelagos
of large but widely dispersed cities. In today’s Russia, major urban centers appear to some as
foreign implants; they constitute the country’s “spatial elite,” just as the upper class forms the
“social elite” that resides within them. To the new anti-globalists these cities are alien and
unjustified, maintaining their cosmopolitan character and innovative functions (their raison
d’ètre), but doing little to improve conditions in the outlying areas. As Leonid Vardomskiy
(2003, p. 86) has observed, “the periphery, deprived of the resources for its economic development, today appears to be Russia's central problem.” In the absence of the demographic or
financial resources needed for the heartland’s expansion, or to create new urban centers, use
must be made of what exists already. It is easier to provide new support to old structures. But
where to start and how to proceed?
46According to L’vov, resource rent accounts for three quarters of the total net profit accruing to Russian economy. This is the basis for typical appeals for the redistribution of resource rent in favor of consumption and accumulation to support economic modernization.
152
EURASIAN GEOGRAPHY AND ECONOMICS
Here geography really does echo history: skipping over space is equally as dangerous as
leapfrogging in time. To continue with the analogy of an archipelago of centers in an ocean
of periphery, and assuming that the ocean is immense because the islands are small and
weak, it is necessary first and foremost to strengthen the islands. The best way to reanimate
the heartland would be through its “shelf zones”—through the suburbs and satellite-islands
of the major conurbations—but such appeals to regional policy as yet have little contemporary resonance in Russia. Thus, the current situation is somewhat different from Hooson’s
Soviet heartland of the 1960s, and the vast spaces of Mackinder’s geographical pivot are now
more a source of weakness than security.
REFERENCES
Agranat, G. A., “Nuzhny li Rossii yeye prostory? (Does Russia Need Its Spaces?),” Geografiya,
35:3-7, 37: 3-6, 2001.
Agranat, G. A. “Rossiyskiy Sever v opasnosti: nado ispravlyat’ gosudarstvennyyu politiku (The
Russian North Is in Danger: State Policy Must be Corrected),” Geografiya, 1:3-7, 2:25-30,
3:10-13, 2004.
Atlas SSSR (Atlas of the USSR). Moscow, USSR: Glavnoye upravleniye geodezii i kartografii pri
Sovete Ministrov SSSR), 1983.
Baranskiy, N. N., “Ob ekonomiko-geograficheskom izuchenii gorodov (On Economic-Geographic
Study of Cities),” Voprosy geografii, 2, 1946, 19-62.
Bradshaw, Michael and Jessica Prendergrast, “The Russian Heartland Revisited: An Assessment of
Russia’s Transformation,” Eurasian Geography and Economics, 46, 2:83-122, 2005.
CIA (U.S. Central Intelligence Agency), CIA World Fact Book 2000. Washington, DC, 2000.
Dmitriyev, A. V., A. M. Lola, and M. N. Mezhevich, Gde zhivyet sovetskiy chelovek: sotsial’nyye
problemy upravleniya rasseleniyem (Where does Soviet Man Live: Social Problems in the
Management of Settlement). Moscow, USSR: Mysl’, 1988.
Dugin, A. G., Osnovy geopolitiki. Geopoliticheskoye budushcheye Rossii (Principles of Geopolitics.
Geopolitical Future of Russia). Moscow, Russia: Arktogeya, 1997.
Ekonomicheskaya, Ekonomicheskaya geografiya zarubezhnykh sotsialisticheskikh stran (Economic
Geography of Foreign Socialist Countries). Moscow, USSR: Moscow State University, 1988.
Field, N., “Environmental Quality and Land Productivity: A Comparison of the Landbase of the USSR
and North America,” Canadian Geographer, 1:6-12, 1968.
Gorod i derevnya, Gorod i derevnya v Evropeyskoy Rossii: sto let peremen (Town and Countryside in
European Russia: One Hundred Years of Change). Moscow, Russia: OGI, 2001.
Goskomstat Rossii, Pasporta sotsial’no-ekonomicheskogo polozheniya gorodov Rossiyskoy Federatsii
(Passports of Socio-Economic Condition of the Cities of the Russian Federation). Moscow,
Russia: Goskomstat Rossii, 2002.
Goskomstat Rossii, Regiony Rossii: Sotsial’no-ekonomicheskiye pokazately 2003 (Russia’s Regions:
Socio-Economic Indicators in 2003). Moscow, Russia: Goskomstat Rossii, 2003.
Goskomstat SSSR, Naseleniye SSSR. Statisticheskiy yezhegodnik (Population of the USSR. Statistical
Yearbook). Moscow, USSR: Finansy i statistika, 1989.
Gritsay, O. V., G. V. Ioffe, and A. I. Treivish, Tsentr i periferiya v regional’nom razvitii (Center and
Periphery in Regional Development). Moscow, USSR: Nauka, 1991.
Harris, C. D., Cities of the Soviet Union. Studies in their Functions, Size, Density, and Growth.
Chicago, IL: Rand McNally, 1970.
Haub, C., World Population Data Sheet. Washington, DC: Population Reference Bureau, 2003 [http://
www.prb.org].
Hill, F. and C. Gaddy, The Siberian Curse: How Communist Planners Left Russia Out in the Cold.
Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2003.
Hooson, D., A New Soviet Heartland. London/Toronto/New York: D. Van Nostrand Co., Inc., 1964.
ANDREI TREIVISH
153
Il’yin, I. A., O Rossii (About Russia). Moscow, USSR: Studia TRITE–The Russian Archive, 1991.
Ioffe, G. and T. Nefedova, The Environs of Russian Cities. Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen Press, 2000.
Kaganskiy, V., Kul’turnyy landshaft i sovetskoye obotayemoye prostranstvo (The Cultural Landscape
and Soviet Inhabited Space). Moscow, Russia: Novoye Literaturnoye Obozreniye, 2001.
Khanin, G. I., Dinamika ekonomicheskogo razvitiya SSSR (Dynamics of the Economic Development of
the USSR). Novosibirsk, USSR: Nauka, Sibirskoye otdeleniye, 1991.
Khorev, B. S., Ocherki geoglobalistiki i geopolitiki (Essays in Geo-globalism and Geo-politics).
Moscow, Russia, 1997.
Krasilshchikov, V. A., Vdogonku za proshedshim vekom: razvitiye Rossii v XX veke s tochki zreniya
mirovykh modernizatsiy (In Pursuit for the Past Century: Development of Russia in the 20th Century in the Perspective of Global Modernizations). Moscow, Russia: ROSSPEN, 1998.
Kudryavtsev, O. K., Rasseleniye i planirovochnaya struktura krupnykh gorodov-aglomeratsiy (Settlement and the Structure of Large Cities-Agglomerations). Moscow, USSR: Stroyizdat, 1985.
Lappo, G. M., Opornyy karkas territorial’noy struktury narodnogo khozyaystva (Basic Framework of
the Territorial Structure of the National Economy) in Territorial'naya organizatsiya proizvoditel'nykh sil SSSR (Territorial Organization of Productive Forces of the USSR). Moscow, USSR:
USSR Geographical Society, Moscow Branch, 1978, 3-25.
L’vov, D. S., “Rossiya i sovremennyy mir (Russia and the Contemporary World),” in Postsotsialisticheskiye strany v usloviyakh globalizatsii (Post-Socialist Countries in the Conditions of
Globalization). Moscow, Russia: A. Melnikov, 2001, 16-35.
Mackinder, H. J., “The Geographical Pivot of History,” Geographical Journal, 23, 1904, 421-437.
Maddison, A., Monitoring the World Economy, 1820–1992. Paris, France: OECD, Centre for Development Studies, 1995/1999.
Maddison, A., The World Economy: A Millennial Perspective. Paris, France: OECD, 2001.
Medvedkov, Yu. and O. Medvedkov, “Turning Points and Trends in Russia’s Urbanization,” in Population under Duress: The Geodemography of Post-Soviet Russia. Boulder, CO: Westview Press,
1999, 201-230.
Mendeleyev, D. I., K poznaniyu Rossii (On Discerning Russia). St. Petersburg, Russia: A.S. Suvorin,
1907.
Mints, A. A., “Prognoznaya gipoteza razvitiya narodnogo khozyaystva Yevropeyskoy chasti SSSR (A
Forecast Hypothesis of the National Economy Development in the European USSR),” in Resursy,
sreda, rasseleniye (Resources, Environment, Settlement). Moscow, USSR: Nauka, 1974, 20-54.
Mironov, B. N., Sotsial’naya istoriya Rossii perioda imperii (A Social History of Russia during the
Period of Empire). St. Petersburg, Russia: Dmitriy Bulanin, 1999.
Monoprofil’nyye goroda, Monoprofil’nyye goroda i gradoobrazyyushchiye predpriyatiya (Monoprofile Cities and Town-Developing Enterprises). Moscow, Russia: Khroniker, 2000.
Murphy, A. B. and C. M. Johnson, “German Geopolitics in Transition,” Eurasian Geography and
Economics, 45, 1:1-17, 2004.
Narkhoz/Goskomstat Rossii, Narodnoye khozyaystvo RSFSR (National Economy of the RSFSR) [later
Rossiyskiy statisticheskiy yezhegodnik (Russian Statistical Yearbook)]. Moscow, USSR/Russia:
Statisticheskoye upravleniye RSFSR/Goskomstat Russia, 1956–2000 (various years).
Naseleniye, Naseleniye Rossii 2001. Devyatyy yezhegodnyy demograficheskiy doklad (The Population
of Russia 2001. Ninth Annual Demographic Report). Moscow, Russia: Knizhnyy Dom Universitet, 2002.
Nazarevskiy, O. R., Karta otsenki prirodnykh usloviy zhizni naseleniya SSSR (A Map Evaluating the
Impact of Nature on the Living Conditions of the Population of the USSR). Moscow, USSR:
Resursy, sreda, rasseleniye, 1974, 189-198.
Nefedova, T. G., Sel’skaya Rossiya na pereput’ye: geograficheskie ocherki (Rural Russia at the
Cross-Roads: Geographical Essays). Moscow, Russia: Novoye Izdatel’stvo, 2003.
Nefedova, T. G. and A. I. Treivish, “‘Silnyye’ i ‘slabyye’ goroda Rossii (‘Strong’ and ‘Weak’ Cities
of Russia),” in Polyusa i tsentry rosta v regional’nom razvitii (Poles and Centers of Growth in
154
EURASIAN GEOGRAPHY AND ECONOMICS
Regional Development). Moscow, Russia: Institute of Geography, Russian Academy of Sciences,
1998, 135-143.
NOAA-CIRES, NOAA-CIRES Climate Diagnostic Center, n.d. [http://www.cdc.noaa.gov].
Oswalt, Ph. et al., Shrinking cities, 2003 [http://www.shrinkingcities.com].
Parshev, A. P., Pochemu Rossiya ne Amerika (Why Russia Is Not America). Moscow, Russia: Krymsky
Most-9D/Forum, 2001.
Perfilyev, Yu., Rossiyskoye Internet-prostranstvo: razvitie i struktura (The Russian Internet-Space:
Development and Structure). Moscow, Russia: Gardariki, 2003.
Pivovarov, Yu., “Al’ternativnaya kontseptsiya makroregial’nogo razvitiya Rossii (An Alternative
Strategy for the Macroregional Development of Russia),” Mir Rossii, 2:63-74, 1996.
Planirovaniye rezmeshcheniya, Planirovaniye rezmeshcheniya proizvoditel'nykh sil: osushchestvleiye
politiki KPSS na etapakh sotsialisticheskogo stroitel’stva. Chast’ 1 (Planning for the Dislocation
of the Labor Force: Realization of the CPSU’s Policies on the stages of Socialist Development.
Part 1). Moscow, USSR: Ekonomika, 1985.
Polyan, P. M., Metodika vydeleniya i analiza opornogo karkasa rasseleniya (A Methodology for
Distinguishing and Analyzing the Main Framework of Settlement). Moscow, USSR: Institute of
Geography, Russian Academy of Sciences, 1988.
Promyshlennost’, Promyshlennost Rossii 2002. Statisticheskiy sbornik (Industry of Russia 2002. A
Statistical Handbook). Moscow, Russia: Goskomstat Rossii, 2002.
Ratzel, F., Politische Geographie, oder die Geographie der Staaten, der Verkehrs, und der Krieges.
Munich and Berlin, Germany: R. Oldenbourg, 1897.
Rossiya, Rossiya v okruzhayushchem mire: 2002 (Analiticheskiy yezhegodnik) (Russia in the Surrounding World: 2002 [Analytical Yearbook]). Moscow, Russia: MNEPU, 2002.
Rowland, R. H. “Russia’s Disappearing Towns: New Evidence of Urban Decline, 1979–1994,”
Post-Soviet Geography, 37, 2:63-87, 1996.
RSFSR, RSFSR za 40 let: Statisticheskiy sbornik (The RSFSR for 40 Years: A Statistical Handbook).
Moscow, USSR: Sovetskaya Rossiya, 1958, 223 pp.
Savitskiy, P., Kontinent Yevrazia (The Continent Eurasia). Moscow, Russia: GRAF, 1997.
Shabad, Theodore, “Soviet Regional Policy and CMEA Integration,” Soviet Geography: Review and
Translation, 20, 4:230-254, April 1979.
Semenov-Tyan’-Shanskiy, V., “Gorod i derevnya v Yevropeyskoy Rossii. Ocherk po ekonomicheskoy
geografii (City and Village in European Russia. An Essay on Economic Geography),” Zapiski
Imperatorskgo russkogo Geograficheskogo obshchestva po otdeleniyu statistiki, 10, 2. St. Petersburg, Russia, 1910, 212 pp.
Semenov-Tyan’-Shanskiy, V., “O mogushchestvennnom territorial’nom vladenii primenitel’no k
Rossii (ocherki po politicheskoy geografii) (On Russia’s Mighty Territorial Possessions [Essays
on Political Geography]. Petrograd, Russia: V. Stasulevich, 1915.
Sotsialisticheskoye, Sotsialisticheskoye stroitel’stvo SSSR: Statisticheskiy yezhegodnik (Socialist
Development of the USSR: A Statistical Yearbook). Moscow, USSR: TSUNKHU Gosplana SSR–
V/O Soyuzorguchet, 1936.
Spykman, N. The Geography of the Peace. New York, NY: Harcourt Brace, 1944.
Stalin, I. V., “Ob industrializatsii strany i o pravom uklone v VKP(b). Rech’ na plenume TS.K. VKP(b)
19 noyabrya 1928 g. (On Industrialization of the Country and on the Right Deviation in the
All-Union Communist Party [Bolsheviks]. Speech at the Plenary Meeting of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) 19 November 1928),” in Sochineniya, Tom 11
(1928–mart 1929) (Writings, Volume 11 [1928–March 1929]). Moscow, USSR: Gosudarstvennoye izdatel’stvo politicheskoy literatury, 1949, 245-261.
Statisticheskiye, Statisticheskiye svedeniya o fabrikakh i zavodakh po proizvodstvan, ne oblozhennym
aktsizom, za 1990 god (Statistical Information on Factories according to Products Not Subject to
Excise Tax for the Year 1900). St. Petersburg, Russia, 1903.
Strany, Strany i regiony 2000. Spravochnik Vsemirnogo Banka (Countries and Regions 2000. World
Bank Data Book). Moscow, Russia: Ves’ Mir, 2001.
ANDREI TREIVISH
155
Treivish, A. I., “Regional’noye razvitiye and regionalizatsiya Rossii: spetsifika, dilemmy i tsikly
(Regional Development and Regionalization of Russia: Specifics, Dilemmas, and cycles),” in
Regionalizatsiya v razvitii Rossii: geograficheskiye protsessy i problemy. Moscow, Russia: URSS,
2001, 39-66.
Treivish, A. I., “Ogranicheniya v razvitii Rossii: Novyy geodeterminizm (Limitations on Development
of Russia: A New Geo-determinism),” in Tretyy sokraticheskiye chtenia po geografii. Rossiya v
sovremennom mire: poisk intellektual’nykh podkhodov (Third Condensed Readings in Geography.
Russia in the Contemporary World. A Search for Intellectual Approaches). Moscow, Russia:
Sputnik and Co., 2002a, 126-144.
Treivish, A. I., “Promyshlennost’ Rossii za sto let (Industry of Russia during the last 100 years),” in
Rossiya v okruzhayushchem mire (Analiticheskiy yezhegodnik). Moscow, Russia: MNEPU, 2002b,
11-38.
Treivish, A. and T. Nefedova, “Differential Urbanisation in Russia,” Tijdschrift voor economische en
sociale geografie, 94, 1:75-88, 2003.
Turovskiy, R. F., Politicheskaya geografiya (Political Geography). Moscow/Smolensk, Russia: SGY
Publishing, 1999.
U.S. Census Bureau, [http://www//census.gov], n.d.
UNDP (United Nations Population Division), “World population projections to 2150—The 2002
Revision, 2003 [http://esa.un.org/unpp].
Vardomskiy, L. B., “Krupneyeshiye goroda v regional’nom razvitii Rossii (Largest Cities in the
Regional Development of Russia),” Krupnyye goroda i vyzovy globalizatsii (Large Cities and
Challenges of Globalization). Smolensk, Russia: Oykumena, 2003, 81-86.
Varzar, V. E. and L. B. Kafengauz, eds., Dinamika rossiyskoy I sovetskoy promyshlennosti za sorok
let (1887–1926). Tom 1. Svod statisticheskikh dannykh po fabrichno-zavodskoy promyshlennosti s
1887 do 1926 god (Dynamics of Russian and Soviet Industry for 40 Years (1887–1926). Volume 1.
Statistical Data for Industry from 1887 to 1926). Moscow-Leningrad, USSR, 1929, 420 pp.
Veynberg, B. P., “Polozheniya tsentra poverkhnosti Rossii ot nachal knyazhestva Moskovskogo do
nastoyashchego vremeni. Polozheniya tsentra naselennosti Rossii s 1613 po 1913 g. (Locations of
the Center of Russia’s Surface from the Beginning of the Principality of Moscow to the Present.
Locations of the Center of Russia’s Population from 1916 to 1913),” Izvestiya Imperatorskogo
Russkogo Geograficheskogo Obshestva, 6: 365-408, 1915.
Vishnevskiy, A. G., Serp i rubl’: Konservativnaya modernizatsiya v SSSR (Sickle and Ruble: Conservative Modernization in the USSR). Moscow, Russia: OGI, 1998.
Vishnevskiy, A. G., E. M. Andreyev, and A. I. Treivish, Perspektivy razvitiya Rossii: rol’
demograficheskogo faktora (Perspectives on the Development of Russia: The Role of the Demographic Factor). Moscow, Russia, Institut ekonomiki perekhodnogo perioda, 2003.
Vitte, S. Yu., Vospominaniya (Memoirs), Vol. 2. Moscow, USSR, 1964.
Voronkova, S. V. et al., eds., Promyshlennost’ Rossii na rubezhe XIX-XX vv. (Industry of Russia at the
Turn of the XIX-XX Centuries). Moscow, Russia: Rossiyskiy otkrytyy universitet, 1992, 199 pp.
World Bank, 2002 World Development Indicators. Washington DC: The World Bank, 2003.
World-Gazetteer, [http://www.world-gazetteer.com/home.htm], n.d.