Migration and Restructuring in Post-Soviet Russia

W hen Russia became independent in 1992, it inherited from the Soviet Union a spatial distribution of its population that was incompatible with its emerging market economy. Internally the largest migration stream has been out of the overpopulated Russian north and Far East toward central Russia. At other geographic scales, as a result of decades of Soviet labor policy, there were numerous cities and towns in Russia that had many more workers than they would under market conditions. Simultaneously, the breakup of the Soviet Union caused the large-scale departure of Russians, Russian speakers, and others out of the nonRussian states of the former Soviet Union to Russia. The lifting of exit restrictions did not cause the mass exodus that many had predicted, but it did allow the emigration of many highly skilled persons who could have played a role in the country's transition. As a result of the deterioration of the economy and the opening of the economy to the outside world, there has been a rise in the trafficking of Russian women to the West. With the relaxation of border restrictions, there has been a large, undetermined increase in the amount of ¡Ilegal migration in Russia. These different migration streams are affected by, and are simultaneously affecting Russia's post-Soviet transition to a market economy and democratic society. In this article 1 examine the various migration streams that were set off by their breakup of the Soviet Union and the beginning of the transition period, with an emphasis upon the impact both nationally and locally.