REPLY TO THE SOVIET REVIEW OF RADICAL GEOGRAPHY

A Norwegian geographer and Deputy Head of the International Northern Sea Route Programme (INSROP) Secretariat surveys past, present, and potential future Northern Sea Route (NSR) cargo flows. The route's economic potential and importance, both as an international transit route and as a transport corridor to and from the Russian Arctic regions, are discussed. An overview of the main NSR infrastructure components (icebreakers, ice-class cargo vessels, ports) also is made, with estimates of future capacity. Based on the survey of future cargo potential, future infrastructure requirements are calculated and compared with estimated capacity in order to identify possible future bottlenecks for NSR operations. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: L90, O18, R40. 1 figure, 4 tables, 76 references.     

Crisis Amid Plenty Revisited: Comments on the Problematic Potential of Russian Oil

Two economic geographers specializing in the mineral resources of the former Soviet Union and Russia discuss a paper on Russian oil published in this journal by a seasoned oberserver of this critical subject since the early 1970s. The authors comment on the behavior of Russian oil companies such as Yukos, Russian economic policy in mid-2004, and the role of foreign companies, capital, and advanced technology. Recalling mistaken estimates of declining Soviet oil output in the late 1970s, they outline factors that suggest a somewhat more optimistic outcome could be possible, but note that the drift toward government control, which runs counter to the oil industry's efficiency, is not a positive sign. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: L71, O13, O18, 27 references.     

Russia’s Natural Resources in the World Economy: history,review and reassessment

Abstract

Russia’s role in the global economic system today, and the Soviet Union’s in the past, is dominated by the export of natural resources, particularly oil and gas. The rents earned from these exports are both a source of strength and weakness, as they link the fortunes of Russia’s domestic economy to the volatility of global resource markets. This paper returns to a major research project conducted through the offices of the Association of American Geographers that resulted in Soviet Natural Resources in the World Economy, published in 1983. The project was first conceived in the aftermath of the resource crisis in the 1970s and concluded in the early 1980s as the Soviet Union sought to increase resource exports to support a failing domestic economy. This paper examines the origins, evolution, and management of this seminal work and presents a re-reading of the book in a contemporary context. We develop some of the key themes of the original project and conclude that it has contemporary relevance, as a reliance upon the resource sector remains a defining characteristic of Russia’s political economy and continues to shape Russia’s role in the global economy. We find that the regional dimension that was so important in the original project remains critical as Russia seeks to extend the resource frontier into new regions in the Arctic and the East and, at the same time, reduce its reliance on European markets – that are both stagnant and hostile – by developing new markets in Asia.     

SOVIET TERRITORIAL CLAIMS IN THE ARCTIC AND THEIR ECONOMIC AND POLITICAL IMPLICATIONS

The increasing importance of the Soviet Arctic for navigation in connection with a northward shift of resource development and the strengthening of the Soviet icebreaker fleet with nuclear-powered icebreakers and modern conventional icebreakers has focused attention on the issue of freedom of navigation in the Soviet sector of the Arctic. The Soviet sector, defined in a 1926 decree as extending from the mainland to the North Pole, comprises the Northern Sea Route, which the Soviet Union regards as an internal shipping route, and seas of the Arctic Ocean that it views as historic waters. Because of differences in the interpretation of international law, there is ambiguity regarding the right of innocent passage through the Soviet Arctic by vessels of other nations. The growing significance of Arctic shipping operations raises the timeliness of the issue.     

Railroad Freight Traffic of the USSR

Nikol'skiy's book on the geography of transportation of the USSR contains the most detailed freight-flow maps published by the Soviet Union since the 1930's. These maps are reproduced here with appropriate textual excerpts.     

Corporate advertising,public relations and popular exhibits: The case of du pont

Abstract

After recapitulating and re‐evaluating the principal early signals that the Soviet Union was planning to launch an artificial earth satellite (Sputnik 1) in 1957, which have long been familiar to space historians, this article presents some additional pre‐sputnik material from Radio, the Soviet government's monthly magazine for radio amateurs, and from other sources, which has not previously been identified by western scholars. The preparations of the Soviet radio amateurs for satellite tracking are also described. The fact that western radio amateurs were no more successful in discovering Soviet intentions, at the time, than the scientists or the intelligence agencies, is documented and discussed. To complete the picture, contemporary assessments of the scientific value of amateur radio observations of the early satellites are surveyed. The article concludes by discussing the surprise aspect of the first sputniks in the light of the fresh information presented, and by noting some still unanswered historical questions.     

The Russian Copper Industry and the Noril'sk Joint-Stock Company in the Mid-1990s

An American resource geographer examines current production in one of the world's major copper industries, with special emphasis on the Noril'sk Nickel Joint-Stock Company—the world's most important producer of platinum-group metals, a leader in nickel and cobalt output, and the leading Russian producer of copper as well. The author documents and analyzes changes in operating procedures and raw material supplies in the industry during the 1990s, focusing on adjustments (such as tolling arrangements and imports of concentrate in the raw-material-deficient Urals and efforts to introduce cost economies in resource-rich Noril'sk) prompted by the severing of industry production linkages of the Soviet period and their partial reintegration under new corporate structures. In addition to restructuring, likened to similar adjustments in the American copper industry, the investigation covers exploration and new mine development at various Russian locations as well as the economics of producing copper and other exportable metals at Arctic production centers. 1 figure, 4 tables, 103 references. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: L61, L72, Q32.     

“We're not a paper for working women,but of and by them”: Australian communist party womens’ papers 1930–1939

Historical studies of the radical left in Australia have, until recently, been neglectful of the contribution of female activists. The specific problems and issues faced by these women have been largely ignored. For instance, the principal academic history of the CPA mentions in passing only a handful of prominent women members and alludes to no issues which were of specific concern to the female membership of the CPA (Davidson, 1969). However, despite a ’line’ which opposed separate womens’ organisations, the CPA was sufficiently mindful of the specificity of a range of issues facing women to establish a separate national women's journal in 1930. This journal was called Working Woman, and continued in publication until 1936, when it was succeeded by a new journal entitled Woman Today, which went out of existence in 1939.     

Mental hygiene for geniuses: psychiatry in the early Soviet years

In this paper, I deal with one episode from the early history of Soviet psychiatry, the project of the Institute of Genius. Though the project never materialized, the idea was characteristic of the very beginning of the Soviet era, when the wildest experiments in the human sciences seemed possible. The author of the project, the psychiatrist Grigorii Vladimirovich Segalin (1878-1960), followed in the steps of another prominent psychiatrist, the architect of the Soviet mental health care system, Lev Markovich Rozenshtein (1884-1934). Rozenshtein, a proponent of social medicine, introduced a new system of psychiatric help that, by contrast with the prerevolutionary one, was preventive and based on outpatient units - neuropsychiatric dispensaries. In a similar way, Segalin planned dispensaries for geniuses, where these otherwise "socially ill adapted" people would receive professional help and care. Having failed to establish such an institution, he founded a journal, the Clinical Archive of Genius and Talent (of Europathology), where he and his like-minded colleagues discussed the supposed pathological origins of talent and published pathographies of outstanding figures. The article traces Segalin's project till its end in the early 1930s.     

Indigenous minorities of Siberia and Russian sociolinguistics of the 1920s: A life apart?

ABSTRACT

In the 1920s, two strong intellectual trends were simultaneously developing in Russia: the studies of languages and cultures of the indigenous population of Siberia and the Far North (led by Vladimir Bogoras, Leo Shternberg, and others), and sociolinguistic studies (led by Evgeniy Polivanov, Afanasiy Selischev, Rosaliya Shor, and others). Sociolinguistics as a new and fashionable branch of knowledge included many topics (sociolinguistic theory, social dialectology, influence of rapid social changes on language), but there never were attempts to study sociolinguistically the languages of indigenous “Northern” minorities. In 1929 Roman Jakobson and Nikolai Trubetskoy, who by that time were both living abroad, launched a project called “Languages of the USSR.” The project could have united the two trends, but it was soon terminated because of the Great Depression in the West and a sharp turn in Stalin's policy in 1929 when many Russian scholars were prosecuted, academia became split in a fight over who represented “the true Marxism”, and international collaboration became dangerous for Russian scholars. Another reason for the lack of interest in sociolinguistic studies of indigenous minority languages was the evolutionist paradigm of Siberianist cultural anthropology of the time. As a result, the Soviet language planning for Northern indigenous minority languages in the1930s and later did not sufficiently take into account the sociolinguistic aspect of the problem; this may be responsible for its many failures and inconsistencies.     

Pre‐Soviet pasts of reindeer‐herding collectives: Ethnographies of transition in Murmansk region

This article summarizes observations from field studies with reindeer herders in northwest Russia (Murmansk Region) carried out between 1994 and 1999. The work has been done by living with reindeer‐herding crews at their seasonal tundra camps.

For a large majority of the herders and their families, the concept and practices of the Soviet State Farm (.sovkhoz) tend to represent not only the most desirable form of livelihood, but indeed the only conceivable, although now seriously shattered, reality. In the face of a grim present, new reinterpretations of the sovkhoz are constantly being tried out. The pool of options is found in pre‐Soviet traditions and tends to reveal links between the Sami pogost (siji) social organisation and practices and those of the Soviet and post‐Soviet reindeer‐herding crew (brigadd).The article pursues these connections and discusses the sovkhoz not as destroying all previous tradition, but as drawing from and incorporating pre‐Soviet pasts. The underlying continuity with such pasts may explain the tenacity of the sovkhoz concept in this particular Arctic setting and, possibly, in a variety of others.     

Contested landscapes of Soviet Central Asia: an ethnoarchaeological case study from Kazakhstan

A group of rectangular and circular enclosures in southwest Kazakhstan, originally thought to be prehistoric or early historical, has turned out to date from the 1950s and 1960s. They were built as livestock pens (kora) to protect rice paddies from free-grazing cattle. Rice cultivation had been introduced to the region east of the Aral Sea by deported ethnic Koreans from the Soviet Far East after the native pastoral nomadism had been destroyed by forced collectivisation in the early 1930s. This had resulted in the Great Famine of 1931–33, evidence for which is provided by refugees’ burials found on archaeological sites in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. The case study illustrates an approach to the study of twentieth century contested landscapes using evidence from archaeology, ethnography, and oral history.     

Petsamo: bringing modernity to Finland’s Arctic Ocean shore 1920–1939

In the Peace Treaty of Tartu 1920 Finland was given a corridor to the Arctic Sea. This area of 10,000 km² called Petsamo, was situated along the eastern side of the present Russo-Norwegian border. For many Finns Petsamo was seen as part of a Greater Finland expansionist ideology. Petsamo remained part of Finland until 1944, and during that time tourism was intensified to this new Arctic Ocean part of Finland. However, the most significant single project for bringing modernity and the young Republic of Finland to Petsamo was the Kolosjoki nickel mine. Kolosjoki was a piece in a larger international struggle for natural resources to be used for economic and political gains both in times of war and peace. The Kolosjoki mine can be compared with other similar mining communities in the Arctic and Siberia. When compared with the Soviet Russian Piramid mining community on Svalbard, differences in architectural style also become a signifier. The Kolosjoki mining village was built in a functionalistic style that was eagerly adopted by Scandinavia and Finland at that time. An Arctic dimension, connected explicitly to the Arctic Ocean presence of Finland at that time, is mostly lacking in later Finnish collective history culture.     

The Iron and Steel Industry of the Lipetsk Industrial Node

The Lipetsk iron and steel industry, in existence since 1899, began a major expansion program in the middle 1950's, designed to make it one of the principal steel producers of the Soviet Union. The status of the expansion program as of 1969–70 is analyzed in detail, including a rundown of ore, flux and coke sources. The use of sintered ore from near-by deposits of the Kursk Magnetic Anomaly, high-temperature oxygen-enriched air blasts in the blast furnaces, large-capacity blast furnaces and steelmaking oxygen converters are expected to reduce the costs of production below existing levels in the Soviet iron and steel industry and to foster an efficient operation based on modern, automated equipment. (See also Shabad, Basic Industrial Resources of the USSR, pp. 98–101; maps, pp. 40, 96; News Notes, Soviet Geography, February 1970, p. 143; June 1972, pp. 409–410; June 1973, p. 407.)     

Fiasco: The Anglo-Franco-Soviet Alliance That Never Was and the Unpublished British White Paper, 1939–1940

This article is about the Anglo-Franco-Soviet negotiations in 1939 for an alliance against Nazi Germany and about how the British government later tried to represent those negotiations to public opinion. The first part of the essay presents the Soviet point of view on the negotiations and how the British and French governments, though mainly the British, reacted to Soviet alliance proposals. It is a fresh representation of the Soviet perspective from published and unpublished Russian language sources.

The second part of the essay focuses on how the British sought to represent the abortive negotiations through a white paper, placing the blame for failure on the Soviet Union. France opposed publication because, however carefully prepared, the white paper showed that the Soviet side had made serious alliance proposals with precise, reciprocal undertakings which the British government was reticent to entertain. The French were all the more annoyed because the white paper omitted to underline that they had been more receptive to Soviet proposals.

The trilingual, multi-archival evidence presented in the first part of the essay effectively supports the French perception of the white paper and more generally of the failed tripartite negotiations.     

Overview of Contributions in Geographical Analysis: Waldo Tobler

The academic contributions of Waldo Tobler are noteworthy and significant, spanning essentially all disciplines that involve the study of geographic phenomena. While much attention has been given to his observations of the first law of geography, there is much more substance to his larger body of research. It is especially fitting that this commemorative special issue is appearing in Geographical Analysis as Tobler published extensively in the journal, beginning in the first volume in 1969 up to volume 42 in 2010, making important contributions to quantitative theoretical geography. His research helped to build and sustain the journal, laying the foundation for what is the premier quantitative geography outlet today. This article reviews his publication activity in Geographical Analysis.     

Chemists,engineers and entrepreneurs the chemical institute of sarrià's impact on Spanish industry (1916–1992)

This paper analyzes the influence the Chemical Institute of Sarrià (IQS) ‐a private institution devoted both to the education of chemists and chemical engineers and to applied research‐ has had on Spain's chemical industry from 1916 onwards. The research reported is based upon three data sources (articles on industrial chemistry published by the IQS’ journal Afinidad and M. Se. theses; IQS graduates’ industrial activities; and technical services carried out by the Institute's staff for several companies). The main conclusion is that the IQS has had a remarkable impact on Catalan and Spanish industry. Although there are no other similar studies on Spanish scientific and technical institutions, the IQS case confirms that technical education and institutionalized research have a positive impact on the economic and industrial development of “latecomers” like Spain.     

Geography at the exhibition of Scottish educational work for Paris exposition, 1900

EUROPE.

Scotland: The Ancient Kingdom. By Donald A. Mackenzie. London: Blackie and Son Ltd., 1930. Price 15s.

The Arrow of Glenlyon: The Life of Alasdair Macgregor of Glenstrae. By A. A. W. Ramsay, M.A., Phil.D. London: John Murray, 1930. Price 6s.

Hill Birds of Scotland. By Seton Gordon, F.Z.S., M.B.O.U. London: Edward Arnold and Co. Ltd., 1930. Price 7s. 6d.

Let's See the Lowlands. By A. A. Thomson. London: Herbert Jenkins Ltd., 1930. Price 7s. 6d.

Holidays in Sweden. By J. B. Philip, M.A. London: Skeffington and Son Ltd. Price 6s.

Green Fields of England: a Booh of Footpath Travels. By Clare Cameron. With nine drawings in pencil by Edmond L. Warre. London: Constable and Co. Ltd., 1930. Price 12s. 6d.

Tyrol under the Axe of Italian Fascism. By Dr. Eduard Reut‐Nicolussi. Translated by K. L. Montgomery. London: George Allen and Unwin Ltd., 1930. Price 12s. 6d.

Paris. By Moma Clarke. London: The Medici Society, n.d. Price 7s. 6d.

The Country round Paris. By Edmond Pilon. London: The Medici Society, n.d. Price 7s. 6d.

A Guide to French Fêtes. By E. I. Robson. London: Methuen and Co. Ltd., 1930. Price 7s. 6d.

Down the Tiber and Up to Rome. By H. D. Eberlein, G. J. Marks, and F. A. Wallis. London: J. B. Lippincott Co., 1930. Price 15s.

Across Iceland: The Land of Frost and Fire. By Olive Murray Chapman. London: John Lane (The Bodley Head Ltd.), 1930. Price 15s.

The Balkan Road. By Archibald Lyall. London: Methuen and Co. Ltd., 1930. Price 12s. 6d.

Corsica the Beautiful. By Major A. Radclyffe Dugmore, F.R.G.S. London: Hurst and Blackett, n.d. Price 18s.

ASIA.

Moscow Unmasked. By Joseph Douillet. London: The Pilot Press, 1930. Price 8s. 6d.

Red Star in Samarkand. By Anna Louise Strong. London: Williams and Norgate Ltd., 1930. Price 15s.

Plant Collecting on the Edge of the World. By F. Kingdon Ward. London: Victor Gollancz Ltd., 1930. Price 21s.

Four Months’ Camping in the Himalayas. By Dr. W. G. N. Van Der Sleen. Translated by M. W. Hoper. London: Philip Allan and Co. Ltd., 1929. Price 21s.

Arabian Peak and Desert: Travels in Al‐Yaman. By Ameen Rihani. London: Constable and Co. Ltd., 1930. Price 21s.

Arabia. By H. St. J. B. Philby. London: Ernest Benn Ltd., 1930. Price 18s.

The Lands of the Eastern Caliphate: Mesopotamia, Persia, and Central Asia, from the Moslem Conquest to the Time of Timur. By G. Le Strange. Cambridge: University Press, 1930. Price 21s.

Crusader's Coast. By Edward Thompson. London: Ernest Benn Ltd., 1929. Price 10s. 6d. net.

Turkey and Syria Reborn. By Harold Armstrong. London: John Lane (The Bodley Head Ltd.), 1930. Price 15s. net.

The Assyrians and their Neighbours. By the Rev. W. A. Wigram. London: G. Bell and Sons Ltd., 1929. Price 15s. net.

AFRICA.

Mysterious Sahara. By Count Byron Khun de Prorok, F.R.G.S. London: John Murray, 1930. Price 21s. net.

Sudan Sand: Filming the Baggara Tribes. By Stella Court Treatt, F.R.G.S. London: George Harrap and Co. Ltd., 1930. Price 15s. net.

AMERICA.

In the Shadow of the Rockies. By C. M. MacInnes, M.A. London: Rivington and Co., 1930. Price 18s.

Amazon and Andes. By Kenneth G. Grubb. London: Methuen and Co. Ltd., 1930. Price 18s.

South America. By Clarence F. Jones. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1930. Price $6.

Jorullo: The History of the Volcano of Jorullo and the Reclamation of the Devastated District by Plants and Animals. By Hans Gadow, F.R.S. London: Cambridge University Press, 1930. Price 7s. 6d.

AUSTRALASIA.

Isles of Adventure. By Beatrice Grimshaw. London: Herbert Jenkins Ltd., 1930. Price 15s. net.

OCEANIA.

The Pacific Basin. By Gordon L. Wood. Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1930. Price 10s.

GENERAL.

The Ancient Explorers. By M. Caey, D.Litt., and E. H. Warmington, M.A. London: Methuen and Co. Ltd., 1930. Price 12s. 6d.

The Long Trek. By Richard L. Sutton. London: Henry Kimpton, 1930. Price 21s.

Wind and Water. By Manfred Curry. London: Country Life Ltd., 1930. Price 25s.

A Vagabond Journey round the World. By Harry A. Franck. New York: The Century Company. Price $4.

Tinker, Tailor_____: Being an Account of a Journey round the World for a Wager. By “Greenhorn.” London: John Lane (The Bodley Head Ltd.), 1930. Price 8s. 6d.

The Voyages of the Cabots and the English Discoveries of North America under Henry VII. and Henry VIII. By James A. Williamson, D.Litt. Illustrated with thirteen Maps. London: The Argonaut Press, 1929. Price 38s.

EDUCATIONAL.

The Geographical Interpretation of Topographical Maps, including an Atlas separately bound. By Alice Garnett, B.A. London: George G. Harrap and Co. Ltd., 1930. Price 7s. 6d. ‐Atlas 5s.     

LET US REMEMBER THEM WITH A KIND WORD

The octogenarian former Deputy Director of the Institute of Geography, Moscow, chronicles the achievements of three prominent Soviet geographers who perished or saw their careers interrupted during the Stalin years: Yakov S. Edel'shteyn, a founding father of Soviet geomorphology, explorer-geologist, and glaciologist, who died in prison in 1952; Boris L. Lichkov, physical geographer and gifted theoretician, sent to a labor camp and then exile in the 1930s and 1940s; and Sergey N. Matveyev, a process geomorphologist pioneering the study of mass movements in mountain areas of the USSR, who died in a labor camp in 1955. Translated by Larry Richardson, Glendale, CA 91202 from: Izvestiya Akademii Nauk SSSR, seriya geograficheskaya, 1990, No. 1, pp. 125-136.     

VOPROSY GEOGRAFII: ACCOMPLISHMENTS,PROBLEMS, AND PROSPECTS

The current Chairman of the Editorial Board of Voprosy geografii [Problems of Geography], a respected Soviet periodical whose issues are devoted to special themes, surveys the publication's early history and future challenges. Analyzed are changes over the years in the journal's content, structure, duration of publication schedule, and frequency. Not only are volumes now smaller and published less frequently than before, but many contain articles which appear to be too small adequately to address their topics. Measures to address these problems and to increase the circulation in order to produce greater profitability are described, as are themes of forthcoming issues (translated by Jay K. Mitchell, PlanEcon, Inc., Washington, DC 20005).