Regional Planning Problems in the Soviet Far East

A variety of approaches are being recommended in regional plans for future settlements patterns in the Soviet Far East. In Magadan Oblast, the present scattered pattern of small populated places is to be superseded by greater concentration of urban population in a set of subregional service centers. In Khabarovsk Kray, different approaches are being recommended for the future development of the Khabarovsk and Komsomol'sk areas. Because limitation of the future growth of Khabarovsk is desirable, new industrial establishments are to be located in the future in nearby small towns and urban settlements of the Khabarovsk industrial district. In the Komsomol'sk area, satellite towns are to be significantly developed, giving rise to a grouped form of urban settlement, including the tin-mining center of Solnechnyy and the paper and chemical center of Amursk. In Amur Oblast, consideration is being given to the development of an iron and steel plant in the Svobodnyy area, giving rise to a city of up to 200,000 population.     

沙俄的远东移民政策

１８６０年《北京条约》签订后,沙俄政府一直鼓励、支持向所侵占的黑龙江以北、乌苏 里江以东地区移民。其颁布的一系列法令和采取的各项措施对加快移民的进程起到了重要作用。 在不同阶段,沙俄的远东移民政策具有不同的特点,但总体上都是出于政治需要,即缓解国内政治 危机,巩固自己新占领的远东地区,进而争霸远东。     

Developments in Russia's Far East and their implications for the Pacific Basin

The Soviet Union ceased to exist as a subject of international law and a geopolitical reality in December 1991 with the declaration of a new Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). For the present the territory formerly known as the Soviet Far East remains part of the Russian Republic controlled from Moscow, but its political and economic destiny remains uncertain. In 1986 Mikhail Gorbachev asserted that the USSR was an Asian-Pacific country and that the development of the Far East region was to be reinvigorated. This coincided with. and was closely related to, efforts designed to improve relations with several countries in the Pacific Basin, including Australia. This paper outlines some of the infrastructural, social and other obstacles to development that can only be overcome by financial and technological assistance from abroad. Lingering international tensions (such as the Kurile Islands dispute with Japan) and political, economic and administrative uncertainties within the Russian Republic and the CIS more generally have led private companies — including several in Australia — to defer their investment plans. It seems likely that it will be many years before the Russian Far East will have much impact on the economy of the Pacific Basin.     

俄罗斯远东的“犹太民族家园”

俄罗斯远东的“犹太民族家园”——犹太自治州诞生于苏联时代,迄今已有70余年的历史。作为世界上第一个犹太民族行政区,犹太自治州的创建与发展有着深刻的国际、国内背景,并日月显地带有象征意义,其中不仅反映出东亚局势的风云变幻、苏联远东移民与开发的时代特征,而且折射出苏联对待犹太人和犹太复国主义运动的态度。     

俄罗斯远东“中国移民问题”论析

在俄罗斯远东乃至全俄罗斯,“中国移民问题”是一个被有关势力上升到政治层面加以夸大、炒作的敏感问题。其主要肇因既有历史基因的复萌,也有现实利益的驱动。在其影响下,中俄两国开展劳务合作的潜力远未得到应有的发挥。近年来,俄虽有部分学者和政界人士能较为客观地分析中国移民问题,阐述利用中国劳务的必要性,且积极探讨利用中国劳务的有效途径,但俄罗斯社会对中国人持有的戒备和排斥心理仍相当浓厚。对此,我们应多从自身方面找原因,改进做法,积极应对,促使俄罗斯社会改变对中国人的偏见,从而将远东变成中俄合作真正的窗口和桥梁。     

Obsidian provenance for prehistoric complexes in the Amur River basin (Russian Far East)

The sources of high quality volcanic glass (obsidian) for archaeological complexes in the Amur River basin of the Russian Far East have been established, based on geochemical analyses by neutron activation and X-ray fluorescence of both ‘geological’ (primary sources) and ‘archaeological’ (artifacts from the Neolithic and Early Iron Age cultural complexes) specimens. A major obsidian source identified as the Obluchie Plateau, located in the middle course of the Amur River, was found to be responsible for supplying the entire middle and lower parts of the Amur River basin during prehistory. The source has been carefully studied and sampled for the first time. Minor use of three other sources was established for the lower part of the Amur River basin. Obsidian from the Basaltic Plateau source, located in the neighboring Primorye (Maritime) Province, was found at two sites of the Initial Neolithic (dated to ca. 11,000–12,500 BP). At two other sites from the same time period, obsidian from a still unknown source called “Samarga” was established. At the Suchu Island site of the Early Neolithic (dated to ca. 7200–8600 BP), obsidian from the ‘remote’ source of Shirataki (Shirataki-A sub-source) on Hokkaido Island (Japan) was identified. The range of obsidian transport in the Amur River basin was from 50 to 750 km within the basin, and from 550 to 850 km in relation to the ‘remote’ sources at the Basaltic Plateau and Shirataki-A located outside the Amur River valley. The long-distance transport/exchange of obsidian in the Amur River basin in prehistory has now been securely established.     

Modern Geography and its Tasks in Siberia and the Soviet Far East

The director of the Institute of Geography of Siberia and the Far East, founded in 1959 in Irkutsk, discusses his philosophy of modern geography, outlines the table of organization of his institute, and lists the principal research problems in the geography of Siberia and the Far East, with particular reference to the study of the tayga, or boreal forest.     

Warriors and blacksmiths: Mediating ethnicity in East African spears

Ethnoarchaeology offers some ability to transform contemporary forms of social constitution into a method for interpreting prehistoric social patterns and for understanding the coevolution of symbolic and utilitarian technologies. In north-central Kenya, one social caste of Lokop pastoralist actors (warriors) interacts with another (blacksmiths) to build a technology for socially constituting gender and social age. Three aspects of this process can help to direct analogous archaeological research in prehistoric contexts. First, this case reiterates that symbols for and symbolic acts of gender and social age continually help actors to constitute or negotiate their places within varied social fields. It is clear, however, that the connection between social prestige—essentially the goal of Lokop personal adornment—and real economic or political power is not necessarily direct. For Lokop herders, foreign traits of spear morphology are the stylistic raw material for constituting internally defined social fields. Ethmic distinctions are more pasively constituted, almost as an epiphenomenon. Second, the constituative significance of material symbols may be grasped without appealing to or understanding the cultural meaning of forms (in an emic sense) from only the archaeological evidence. In fact, prehistorians should not concern themselves with attempts to reconstruct the meaning of cultural phenomena. Rather, archaeological inquiry should attempt to infer the meaningfulness of formal traits within a specific social context, based on significant material patterns in the archaeological record. Third, the items of meaning themselves are constituted with their own material means of production, and these systems may be interpreted through economic models more familiar to archaeology. The Lokop case encompasses producers and users both as specialists. Blacksmiths rely on their marginal positions in herding society to make them the brokers of morphological traits. Warriors, also accustomed to marginal status, effectively collaborate with blacksmiths to set up their own future place as elders. For archaeological applications in prehistory, the exchange and processing of raw materials should reconstitute economic hierarchy in a very clear manner.     

Electoral Behavior in the Russian Far East, 1995-2000: Contextual and Compositional Effects

A group of political scientists specializing in Russia's post-Soviet electoral behavior explores the question of whether genuinely regional effects of voting behavior can be discerned (and at what scale) by controlling for variations in compositional characteristics measured by aggregate social and economic data. The paper seeks to identify situations in which contextual effects may be operating, using a scale of analysis that is intermediate between regional (oblast)-level case studies and nationwide surveys—that of the Russian Far East macroregion. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: H10, O50, Z10. 4 tables, 40 references, 1 appendix.     

A Feminist Literary Cartography of the Canadian North: Women,writing and place in Aritha van Herk's Places Far From Ellesmere

This article examines the idea of North in Aritha van Herk's (1990) Places Far From Ellesmere, a feminist rereading of Anna Karenin that is also an exploration of place—Ellesmere Island—and of gender, identity and belonging. I situate my reading of Ellesmere firstly within feminist literary theory, focusing on the concept of intertextuality and on the implications of the concept, from the perspective of feminist theorists, for the acts of writing and reading. I further contextualise van Herk's work by outlining the growing sensitivity to the complexities of writing Canadian space in Canadian literary criticism. The focus then shifts to Ellesmere, beginning with an investigation of van Herk's representational practices and philosophies, which are organised around a critique of the relationship between writing, gender and power. I argue that van Herk's insistence upon the power of feminist textual rereadings, an insistence that results from her aversion to authority, critically shapes her geographical imaginary, and her understanding of North. By extending the text and thereby the practice of reading to geography, van Herk makes possible a feminist representation or rereading of the North that simultaneously contests the conventions of literature, of place and of gender. Ultimately, I argue that it is van Herk's commitment to investigate the processes of representation in which she is engaged that makes her representation of the North such a valuable text for feminist and literary geographers.