Ethnic Enclaves Spreading Across Russia, Intensifying Xenophobia and Alarming Moscow

Executive Summary:

• Xenophobia toward immigrants and ethnic minorities in Russia has reached nearly its highest level in decades, prompting some groups to form ethnic enclaves, which, in turn, has exacerbated hostility toward these groups.
• Both immigrants and ethnic minorities, as well as Russian nationalists who do not like them, are arming themselves, raising the specter of clashes, especially as veterans of Russia’s war against Ukraine return home and join them.
• Moscow has managed to control any escalations in violence up to now, but officials worry this combination of developments threatens national security, prompting them to think about draconian responses that would likely prove counterproductive.

Xenophobia among Russians against immigrants and related indigenous ethnic groups has reached some of its highest levels in many years. This rise is the result of media campaigns against these minorities. The media campaigns have prompted ever more minority groups to intensify the formation of ethnic enclaves in order to defend their communities (Telegram/systemasystema, discussed at Meduza, March 21; Meduza, April 4). Many Russian officials, including former President Dmitry Medvedev and members of the Russian Security Council, see these enclaves as breeding grounds for extremism and terrorism, and thus a threat to national security (Natsional’nyy Aktsent, December 27, 2024; MK.ru, March 31; Window on Eurasia, April 3). As a result, both residents of these enclaves, which are found in almost every major Russian city and some rural areas, as well as ethnic Russians living around them, are increasingly taking up arms (Politsovet, March 31). This trend means any clashes that do occur will likely turn violent and even deadly (Window on Eurasia, December 2, 2024). Such a scenario is ever more likely as veterans of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war against Ukraine return home in large numbers and show themselves ready to use the weapons they have acquired for one side or the other (see EDM,  September 24, October 15, 2024, February 25; Window on Eurasia, March 29; Breg, April 4). Until now, Moscow has been able to deploy enough force to restrict violence in and around these enclaves, lest anyone doubt that it can, but many of the most senior officials fear this will not be true for much longer unless strong actions are taken. Such officials are currently calling for draconian steps that may make the situation even worse by simultaneously alarming migrants and indigenous non-Russians and simultaneously empowering and infuriating the ethnic Russian majority (Kommersant, July 10, 2023; Natsional’nyy Aktsent, March 31).

There were few ghettos in the Soviet Union due to the Soviet propiska (прописка) registration system. This system allowed officials to determine where people lived in the Soviet Union. Since 1991, Moscow officials have insisted that there are no ghettos in the Russian Federation. As more non-Russians, especially migrant workers, have flooded into traditionally Russian cities, regions where such groups dominate have emerged, either because the price of housing was lower or because such regions were close to where the migrants or non-Russians found work. As a result, some Russian scholars and officials, while continuing to deny that there are any ghettos in Russia, now concede that there are “ethnic enclaves” (Window on Eurasia, August 11, 2022, February 3, 2023). Recently, they insisted on calling these places “closed migrant enclaves” in an effort to downplay their significance.

At the end of March, Aleksandr Grebenkin, deputy secretary of the Russian Security Council, explained the term “closed migrant enclaves” and why it alarms the Kremlin. According to Grebenkin, “closed migrant enclaves” are appearing across Russia and are becoming places “where Russian laws do not operate … where radical religious trends and anti-social ideas are propagandized,” and where members of these communities hide out after their permitted stay in the Russian Federation has run out (MK.ru, March 31). Countering their existence is critical, he said, because “unfriendly governments continue to try to use the migration factor to harm the interests of Russia.” He also said that the Kremlin would succeed in this, although he did not say what it planned to do except use more force (MK.ru, March 31). That combination of warning about a problem without offering a solution has led others to suggest ways forward. These solutions range from restoring the Soviet propiska system to regulate where all residents of the Russian Federation can live, a deeply unpopular idea, to blocking immigrant children who do not know Russian from attending school, an idea experts say is more likely to reinforce the existence of enclaves than do anything to reduce their number and size (Nakanune.ru, April 1; Bereg, April 4).

There has already been violence in and around several ethnic enclaves in the Russian Federation, most prominently in a Roma community in Korkino, the southern part of the country (Window on Eurasia, December 2, 2024). This violence is especially worrisome as far as Moscow and the non-Russian communities are concerned because it involved indigenous Russian citizens rather than migrant foreigners. Leaders of Russia’s non-Russian republics and poorer regions were so worried that they sent an open letter to Moscow saying that the Russian government must intervene to protect all minorities lest attacks on migrants become attacks on the non-Russian third of the population (Indigenous Russia, March 30, 2024, discussed at Window on Eurasia, April 3, 2024).

Even more worrisome is the prospect of what will happen to the country’s ethno-political situation when veterans from Putin’s war against Ukraine return en masse if and when the conflict winds down (see EDM, April 3). Many of these veterans will face difficulties in fitting into civilian life, experts say, and thus may use the firearms they have to support crime or political causes of one kind or another (see EDM,  September 24, October 15, 2024, February 25). Among those especially likely are those who are anti-migrant and anti-minority, given the messages they have imbibed about other ethnic groups during their time in Ukraine. There are already many groups, such as the Russian Community and the neo-Nazi fringe, who are more than ready to welcome them. Consequently, what may appear to some as a marginal problem now could quickly become a central issue in Russia and even shake the foundations of the Putin regime (see EDM, October 15, 2024; Window on Eurasia, March 29; Bereg, April 4).

The Putin government certainly has enough force at hand to crush a few such conflicts. It is unclear, however, if the regime has enough force to counter these conflicts if a larger proportion of the enclaves become sites of fighting between migrants and other non-Russians, on the one hand, and Russian nationalists, on the other. Unsurprisingly, some officials are now talking about suppressing ethnic enclaves altogether, either by sending their residents home or by dispersing them throughout the country. Sending migrants home, however, is not something the Kremlin can currently afford if it wants to keep economic activity at its current level. Dispersing migrants would likely infuriate  ethnic Russians who may not like the idea of ethnic enclaves but do not want their members to live next door to them. This development would mean the Kremlin would be eliminating what is currently a relatively small problem and replacing it with a much larger one. After all, senior Russian officials have played up what they say is the higher crime rate among migrants and minorities, a message that makes few Russians happy about having them become neighbors (Natsional’nyy Aktsent; Golos Regionov, April 4).

Moscow currently has few good options regarding how it will handle ethnic enclaves, and even those are likely to decline in number as Russian veterans return home. Consequently, while Russian officials may still take pride in the notion that their country does not have the kind of ghettos other countries do, they may be compelled to recognize that closed ethnic enclaves may represent an even larger problem for Russia’s future.