SPATIAL PATTERNS OF HIGHER EDUCATION IN THE SOVIET UNION

Analysis of spatial patterns of attained educational levels is helpful in understanding the cultural geography of an area, perhaps especially in the Soviet Union, with its many ethnic groups and stated aim of providing equality of education regardless of ethnicity or sex. The proportion of the population that had completed a higher education was mapped at oblast level from 1970 census data. High rates are found in certain urban areas, Estonia and Latvia, Georgia, and certain sparsely populated areas of the Far North, Siberia, and the Far East. There are regional patterns of disparity between male and female rates of completed higher education and between rural and urban rates, despite Soviet attempts to reduce these inequalities. The distribution of Soviet higher educational institutions conforms generally to the distribution of population, although access to higher education opportunities appears to be geographically limited in some regions. (Maps by Joann L. Krupa, George Mason University.)     

COMPARATIVE GEOGRAPHY OF HIGHER EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES AND THE USSR: AN INITIAL INVESTIGATION

Several aspects of the distribution of institutions of higher education and their graduates are compared for the Soviet Union and the United States. The concentration of institutions and students is found to be greater in the USSR. Differences in regional enrollment rates relative to the location of institutions and students may be partly explained by differences in the curriculum structure of American and Soviet institutions of higher education and the greater degree of local control over higher education in the United States. A direct relationship exists in both countries between the percentage of graduates in a region and percentage urban and per capita income. Regional inequality in the percentage of graduates in urban versus rural areas is much greater in the USSR while regional inequality in the percentage of male and female graduates was only somewhat greater in the United States. Level of urbanization, migration of students and graduates, economic opportunity and economic structure are seen as important factors helping explain regional variation in the distribution of graduates.     

THE CHANGING GEOGRAPHY OF HIGHER MEDICAL EDUCATION IN THE USSR, 1917-1985

During the Soviet period the network of medical schools expanded from one essentially limited to the European part of the country to a widely dispersed system covering the entire territory except for the far north. Analysis of the locational factors of Soviet medical school establishment shows that, like other higher education institutions, these medical schools were located primarily by city population size. Many peripheral regions received schools, despite having only lower-order population centers, and those places where schools were established fared much better in retaining physicians than those where they were not.     

REGIONAL PATTERNS OF MEDICAL CARE AVAILABILITY IN THE FORMER SOVIET UNION

This paper analyzes patterns of change in the regional availability of medical care resources in the former Soviet Union for selected years from 1940 to 1989 by examining the relationships among the supplies of physicians, mid-level medical personnel, and hospital beds. Data from economic handbooks, the 1989 health handbook, and unpublished Goskomstat USSR statistics are used to construct composite (ratio) indices of medical care availability for oblast-level units. Maps of these indices reveal that distinct medical resources regions existed in the former Soviet Union in 1989.     

Scientific Results of the Trip of the Delegation of Soviet Geographers to the United States

A report of the Soviet delegation on research by government agencies, universities, and other institutions on the use and development of natural resources and on practical application of such research. The Soviet Union is found to be ahead in some theoretical aspects, but the author calls for detailed study of some of the practical applications of resource research in the United States for possible use in similar Soviet work.     

THE PROGRAM OF INTEGRATED DEVELOPMENT OF AGRICULTURE IN THE NONCHERNOZEM ZONE

A Soviet economic planner discusses the ambitious long-term program to help upgrade the agriculture of the Nonchernozem zone of the RSFSR. This vast region in northern and central European Russia has suffered from a decline of farm employment and has lagged behind other regions of the Soviet Union in farm modernization. The development program envisages reclamation projects to drain many of the waterlogged areas in the zone; intensive fertilizer application and liming to improve the poor, acidic soils; the development of vegetable farms around the region's large urban centers; and the construction of centralized livestock raising establishments using industrial techniques.     

SOCIAL INFRASTRUCTURE LEVELS IN THE LARGEST CITIES OF THE USSR: A MEASURE OF THE QUALITY OF LIFE

An attempt is made to measure the quality of life in the largest cities of the USSR on the basis of the development of various types of social infrastructure. The study set of cities consists of the cities over one million population and any republic capitals below that population level (republic capitals in the Soviet Union are given priority in development regardless of population size). Point scores are assigned to a variety of infrastructure categories, including housing stock, public transportation, retailing, public health, education, culture, water supply, sewage, greenery and air pollution, and physical setting. Although Moscow and Leningrad top the list in overall scores, even these two cities require improvements in some infrastructure areas.     

THE LOCATION OF METAL-INTENSIVE AND LABOR-INTENSIVE INDUSTRIES IN THE EASTERN REGIONS

The author argues against the widespread view (stated in several articles in Soviet Geography) that labor-intensive industries should be kept out of Siberia because of the shortage of labor resources in that region. Taking the specific example of labor-intensive machinery industry such as instrument-making, as opposed to steel-intensive industry, he points out that labor-intensive plants, by virtue of their smaller size, usually have smaller labor requirements than large heavy-machinery manufacturing plants. Moreover, he argues, location must not be based on total population or total labor resources of a region, but on the availability of so-called free (nonemployed) labor resources, which consist largely of women and of young people just entering upon a career. This category of labor resources happens to be greater in the eastern regions than in the western regions of the Soviet Union. In fact, one reason for the net out-migration from Siberia, according to the author, is that second and third members of households find it difficult to obtain jobs in a regional economy that is largely oriented toward male employment (in extractive industry, timber felling, etc.). The introduction of labor-intensive industries into existing Siberian industrial complexes would thus help provide employment to other household members and eliminate one reason for out-migration.     

俄罗斯的亚太战略与政策探析

俄罗斯作为苏联解体后的当然继承国,成为当今世界政治经济格局多极化发展趋势中重要的一极。目前俄罗斯承袭了苏联后期的亚太战略,并在某种程度上使其有所发展。本文在分析苏联后期实施亚太战略与政策的基础上,着重探讨了俄罗斯目前实施亚太政治经济战略的新东方政策与措施,并对其远东同亚太各国的经济联系的近期态势进行了实证分析;论述了中俄关系对实施其亚太战略的重要性;指出中俄建立面向21世纪的战略协作伙伴关系完全符合两国各自的地缘经济利益。     

TERRITORIAL CONCENTRATION OF ECONOMY AND POPULATION IN THE EUROPEAN PART OF THE USSR (GEOGRAPHIC FACTORS,SPATIAL FORMS AND NATURE-CONSERVATION ISSUES)

A review article of Soviet research in the 1970s and early 1980s focuses on the factors that continue to make the European part of the USSR the leading macroregion of the Soviet Union. The review assumes particular timeliness under the new administration of Mikhail S. Gorbachev, whose spatial policies, such as intensification of the economy, recycling of resources, applications of science and technology, appear to favor continued development of the existing economic, science and technology potential of the European USSR. The article reviews the geographic factors that continue to keep the focus on the European part of the country, the spatial forms of economy and population that distinguish this development, and some of the environmental protection issues of such development. (The responsible editor of the article on the Soviet side is O. A. Kibal'chich of the Institute of Geography in Moscow.)     

论地缘战略的主体间性——兼论中国地缘战略抉择

主体间性一词是20世纪西方哲学凸显出来的一个重要概念,对这一问题的研究有助于解决本体论、认识论和伦理学等多方面的问题。简单来说,主体间性就是主体之间的交互作用。主体间性具有物质性、实践性、历史性和社会性,其存在于集体主体之中,可以通过"教化"获得。据此,本文通过对四个经典地缘政治理论,即国家有机体论、海权论、陆权论和边缘地带论的历史分析,挖掘了隐含在其中的主体间性。并以美国对苏联和中国实施的地缘战略围堵为例,通过分析同一地缘战略所导致的截然不同结果,表明了地缘战略的构建、制定和实施都必须遵循主体间性。最后根据主体间性提出中国未来地缘战略抉择。     

THE PRESENT STATE AND TASKS OF COMPLEX MAPPING IN THE USSR

Recent developments in the Soviet Union's program of national thematic mapping and regional complex mapping are reviewed. A comprehensive mapping program along these lines, formulated in 1969 by GUGK, the government planning agency, has not been implemented. National thematic maps in the Soviet Union continue to be compiled by individual government agencies without coordination and without uniformity in legend and design, so that comparability is made difficult. The only thematic GUGK maps now being prepared are concerned with two long-term regional development programs in the Soviet Union–the rural development plan for the Nonchernozem zone of the European RSFSR and the construction of the Baykal-Amur Mainline (BAM) railroad in the Soviet Far East. The need for a comprehensive and coordinated program of national thematic maps and regional atlases or map series is once again stressed in connection with economic planning and environmental problems, and a program of continuously updated regional atlases, based on digital data banks, is proposed. Suggestions are also made for the coordination of thematic maps at the international level.     

AN APPRAISAL OF THE SOVIET CONCEPT OF THE TERRITORIAL PRODUCTION COMPLEX

The paper, contributing to one of the research goals of the Commission on Industrial Systems, International Geographical Union, provides an appraisal of the Soviet approach to spatial organization of the economy known as the territorial production complex. The authors review the genesis of the concept, definitional criteria, and its practical formation and operation, making occasional comparison with Western approaches to spatial economic organization. An unresolved problem for Soviet planners is the provision of a coordinating administrative authority for each territorial complex that would integrate the activities of individual industrial ministries involved in the creation of the complex; the current thinking of Soviet planners is illuminated by a recent statement appended to the paper. (For a previous Western view of Soviet regional development models, see G. A. Huzinec in Soviet Geography, October 1976.)     

INTERREGIONAL MIGRATION ANALYSIS

A formula for migration rate, proposed by Bogue, Shryock and Hoermann (1957), is modified to yield a simple coefficient of migration intensity for the analysis of the intensity of interregional streams of migration among the 72 oblasts, krays and autonomous republics of the RSFSR, the principal republic of the Soviet Union. The coefficient, which eliminates the impact of the populations of both region of origin and region of destination on the value of the coefficient, is obtained by dividing the shares of all regions of origin in the migration to each region of destination by the shares of the regions of destination in the total population of all regions. The 5112 coefficients of migration intensity are arrayed in a table and subjected to some preliminary analysis of migration patterns. The basic pattern is determined by 171 coefficients with values of 5 or higher, accounting for 3.4 percent of the total number of coefficients.     

THE WATER ASPECT OF THE GEOGRAPHY OF AGRICULTURE IN THE USSR

The long-term grain requirements of the growing Soviet population are calculated. On the basis of the relationship between water use and grain yields by natural soil zones of the USSR, the authors show that the amount of water needed per unit of output declines with a growth of productivity, especially in the non-chernozem zone of the Soviet Union. It is therefore concluded that greater water savings might be assured by expanding grain production in zones with an adequate supply of natural moisture rather than by the use of artificial irrigation of arid lands.     

THE SYSTEM OF PROTECTED NATURAL AREAS IN THE USSR AND PROSPECTS FOR ITS DEVELOPMENT

The International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources has developed a 10-category system for classifying the world's protected natural areas. The present article by two Soviet biogeographers, presented at Unesco's “Man and the Biosphere” conference in Minsk in 1983, analyzes the way in which the Soviet Union's protected areas fall into the classification system devised by the International Union. The article also discusses the types of protected areas found in the USSR, and the functions assigned to each. (The translation is by Philip R. Pryde, San Diego State University.)     

MAPPING OF THE POPULATION POTENTIAL

The development of the population potential model and its use both in the Soviet Union and abroad are reviewed. A formula proposed by O. D. Duncan, incorporating the so-called inner potential (equivalent to the actual population) in the formula for the population potential of a region or place is found to yield exaggerated high values for population centers. Interpolation of potentials on the basis of such peak values leads to considerable distortion of reality, as does the use of transport distance instead of straightline distance between interacting places. The author develops new formulas for the construction of population potential maps in an effort to refine the technique and extend its applicability to large-scale mapping.     

基于POI的城市影子教育机构空间格局及其影响因素——以兰州市主城区为例

影子教育作为普遍而又特殊的人文社会现象尚未引起空间科学的关注。本文基于POI数据,融合GIS空间分析及地理探测器等方法,探究了兰州市影子教育机构空间分布特征及影响因素。结果表明：①兰州市影子教育机构总体表现出“西疏东密”的河谷带状分布,并呈现“一主多次”的组团式空间结构;②内部差异较大且不同类型机构的分布特征不同,区位选择的尺度差异明显且集聚形态各异;③不同类型机构的专业化水平差异显著,形成了不同功能型的专业化空间单元;④城市居住小区、商服环境、主流教育机构及交通可达性是影响影子教育空间布局的重要因素,由此驱动形成了不同类型的空间布局模式。     

THE POPULATION DYNAMICS OF EAST SIBERIA AND PROBLEMS OF PREDICTION

A review of population trends in the USSR and in East Siberia suggests that net in-migration will become a negligible source of labor over the next 25 years until the year 2000 because past labor surpluses no longer exist in the western regions of the Soviet Union and because living conditions in the eastern regions are inferior to conditions in the west. East Siberia will therefore have to depend increasingly on the regional rate of natural increase. The region's population is expected to grow from 8 million in 1970 to 10–12 million by the year 2000. The slow predicted growth of population is not expected to become a constraint on the region's economic development because of rising labor productivity and a regional emphasis on energy-intensive and raw-material-oriented industries rather than labor-intensive activities.     

FROM GERMANY'S EAST PRUSSIA TO THE SOVIET UNION'S KALININGRAD OBLAST: A CASE OF SEQUENT OCCUPANCE

East Prussia, historically a German region, was divided between Poland and the Soviet Union at the end of World War II, with the northern, Soviet portion becoming Kaliningrad Oblast of the RSFSR. The author, who has long studied the transformation of the region as part of the Soviet Union, assesses the changes in administration, population and economy that have occurred.