Political causes and factors influencing protests of miners in Russia (1992-1999)

Abstract

The paper provides identification of political causes and factors of miner protest campaigns in the post-soviet Russia. The following research methods have been applied: contrastive-comparative analysis of literature on historic, sociological, political science, philosophic and economic issues; the method of statistical processing of the information; historical-typological analysis and generalization of documents in force and archival materials; the method of historical simulation. The authors gradually identified the most relevant political causes and factors affecting the development of miner protest campaigns in 1992–1999. Their interdependence on economic and socio-cultural aspects of phenomenon under consideration is also revealed. A comparative analysis with the “perestroika” period (1989–1991) was carried out. The authors made a conclusion that socio-political and socio-economic processes in coal mining regions were highly dependent on the policy of the federal center. The «experimental» nature of reforms in coal mining industry was not supported by additional political powers of leaders in coal mining territories, as the result, the policy was far behind economy and the social sphere of miners. Regional and local authorities were in the conditions of natural (market) selection; therefore, they spent most of their time keeping their political positions by any means, without any attempts to solve the problems in miner towns and settlements.