Decolonising Russia

Seriously...

BBC

Society & Culture, Documentary

4.1 • 885 Ratings

🗓️ 12 March 2024

⏱️ 28 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

All along Russia’s border, in former Soviet republics, the Ukrainian war has prompted a new, more assertive sense of national identity. They’re asking whether – despite independence – they’ve really overcome the legacy of 'Russian colonialism.'

Meanwhile activists from the many ethnic minorities inside Russia are increasingly describing themselves as victims of colonialism too - and demanding self-determination. The debate about the 'imperial' nature of Russia has now also been taken up by strategists, politicians and scholars in the West. Many are questioning their own previous 'Russocentric' assumptions, and asking whether 'decolonising' Russia is the only way to stop the country threatening its neighbours - and world peace.

But some also wonder whether the term 'decolonisation' is really relevant to Russia – and what it means. Is it about challenging the '0imperial mindset' of its rulers – and perhaps of every ordinary Russian? Or perhaps it means dismembering the country itself? Or, as some claim, is the very idea of 'decolonising Russia' just part of an attempt by the West to extend its own neo-colonialist influence? Tim Whewell dissects a new and vital controversy with the help of historians, thinkers and activists from Russia and its neighbours, the West and the Global South.

Sound mixing by Hal Haines Production coordinators: Sabine Schereck, Maria Ogundele, Katie Morrison Editor: Richard Fenton Smith Extract from "Winnie-the-Pooh" by A A Milne, read by Alan Bennett

Transcript

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0:00.0	This was an impregnable fortress. The only way you get out was in a wooden box.
0:05.0	The controversial maximum security prison impossible to escape from.
0:09.0	And one of the duties of a political prisoner is the escape.
0:12.0	The IRA inmates who found a way. of a political prisoner is the escape.
0:12.5	The IRA inmates who found a way.
0:14.5	I'm Carlo Gableer and I'll be navigating a path
0:19.5	through the disturbing inside story of the biggest jailbreak in British and Irish history.
0:25.0	The narrative that they want is that this is a big achievement by them.
0:28.5	Escape from the Maze, listen first on BBC Sounds.
0:36.0	BBC Sounds, BBC Sounds, Music Radio Podcasts.
0:40.0	Welcome to Seriously from BBC Radio 4. I'm Vanessa Kasule. This podcast finds the world's best
0:47.0	audio documentaries and puts them all in one place.
0:52.0	My name is Sargulana Kondakova. I was born and raised in a small polar village near the Arctic Ocean.
0:59.0	In the Republic Sakyaquiuti, it's the largest region of the Russian Federation.
1:05.0	My ancestors, they were reindeer herders. I'm not ethnic Russian, but my mother told me that when
1:16.8	they were children, they were forbidden to speak their native language on their Russian.
1:22.0	It was written in the history books that our lands were
1:26.8	opened by the Russian explorers. How can you open the land if there are indigenous peoples living there for thousands of years?
1:38.1	But many people still have a colonial mindset. We believe that the Russian big brother is right in everything.
1:47.0	Russian colonialism. Suddenly, since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, it's a phrase you can hear more and more,
1:54.6	from some inside Russia and from many around its present borders.
1:59.5	My name is Batakoska-Sembeakawa.
	...

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