Moscow's Evolution as a Political Space

From Yuri Dolgorukiy to Sergei Sobyanin

verfasst von: Marina Glaser, Ivan Krivushin

Verlag: Springer International Publishing

Enthalten in: Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik" , Springer Professional "Wirtschaft"

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Über dieses Buch

The book aims to trace and explain the historical evolution of Moscow, the capital of the Tsardom of Russia, Soviet Union and Russian Federation, as a political entity and political community, and to understand what place Moscow occupied within the Russian political space and what role it played in Russian political life for centuries until 2018. The authors consistently examine the dramatic political history of the contemporary Russian capital in the Moscow (13th – 17th centuries) and St. Petersburg (18th – 19th centuries) epochs, in the Soviet period, in the post-Soviet era, and identify its key points and the most pivotal events.

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Frontmatter

Chapter 1. Introduction

Abstract

This chapter discusses the operational notions, terms, definitions which are used in the book—big cities, megapolis, capital. The chapter focuses principally on the methodological aspect of the book such as critical geography, specifications of connection between explanans and explanandum and the vital aspect of book’s theoretical framework—the phenomenon of the political. It examines some key characteristics of the political and presents some explanations for the selection of its criteria. A number of ways of strengthening these criteria are then discussed as well as the fact that the Moscow political—the space where political activity unfolds—has been shaped by the interplay between three types of political—antagonism, agonism and Platonism. It is argued that in Russian public space the city of Moscow has often been an arena of confrontation between the state power and city administration plans. One of the most important features characterizing contemporary Russia is the development of a vertical power and Moscow as a space of the political emphasis on the oppositions in Russia—capital (power) and regions.

Mara Morini

Chapter 2. Moscow as a Space of the Political in Russian History: The Moscow and Petersburg Epochs

Abstract

This chapter discusses the nature and evolution of the Moscow political from the period of Russian history, which was given the name of the Moscow epoch (thirteenth-very beginning seventeenth centuries) to end of the Petersburg epoch (very beginning seventeenth-beginning of twentieth centuries). It discusses several reasons for the upsurge of Moscow in pre-Mongolian times, causes and consequences of Moscow’s Rise in the thirteenth-fifteenth centuries. The chapter explores the dilemmas and tensions within the Moscow political under Ivan IV (the Terrible), the Time of Troubles and under the First Romanovs. It is argued that in the Moscow epoch Moscow acquired the specific essence that enabled it to assume the functions of the country’s political capital, became a city-state, a national spiritual center. The Moscow political acquired the form of a triad: antagonism—agonism—Platonism. In the Petersburg epoch, an opposition of the two capital cities arose, but Moscow did not alter the formula of its political legitimacy. The Moscow elites considered the situation of “the two capitals” a politically temporary one. The Moscow political remained Platonic till one of the key events within the Petersburg epoch, the Revolutionary Period (1905–1917), caused triumph of antagonism.

Marina Glaser, Ivan Krivushin

Chapter 3. Moscow as a Space of the Political in the Soviet Era

Abstract

This chapter illustrates how Moscow as a space of the political changed in the Soviet Era. It analyzes the various challenges that new era posed for Soviet capital, describes how the Moscow innovations set the tone and rules of life in the country as well as the brief history of Moscow mayors. The chapter discusses terror and war, antagonism and the revolutionary aesthetic (1920s–1940s); explains why in 1930s Moscow lost its multinational, multicultural diversity, which had grown the city in the 1920s and why the October Revolution became a symbol of the revived great power, focusing on Moscow. This chapter explores the Moscow political in the 1950s–1960s: from the agonism of the “Khrushchev Thaw” to the antagonism of re-Stalinization; the Moscow political in the 1970s—first half of the 1980s: Platonism of “wise leaders” and mass depoliticization; Moscow in the last years of the communist regime: turning the capital into a citadel of liberal opposition. The chapter also identifies key reasons for the success of democratic forces in Moscow in the early years of the post-Soviet era.

Marina Glaser, Ivan Krivushin

Chapter 4. Luzhkov’s Moscow: Antagonism—Agonism—Platonism

Abstract

This chapter considers Moscow's political evolution under Mayor Yury Luzhkov (1992–2010). It shows how the capital’s political turned into a business project and how Moscow evolved from a pro-Kremlin liberal bastion to the citadel of centrism opposed to the Kremlin in 1992–1999 and, then, in 2000–2010, from an anti-Kremlin centrist zone to the segment of political space loyal to the Putin regime. The chapter also reveals the most important factors in this evolution, first of all, the changing political preferences of the urban population’s wealthy and highly educated groups, and the main reasons and causes behind the resignation of Yuri Luzhkov in the fall of 2010. And, finally, it considers the hierarchy of Muscovites’ identities and basic features of their attitudes toward provincial Russia and Russians.

Marina Glaser, Ivan Krivushin

Chapter 5. Sobyanin’s Moscow in 2011–2018: Antagonism—Platonism—Agonism

Abstract

This chapter discusses Moscow’s political evolution from 2010 to 2018 under Mayor Sergei Sobyanin. It demonstrates why the Moscow political turned into the aesthetic, visually marking the qualitative differences between the Luzhkov and Sobyanin epochs, and how the capital evolved from the center of anti-Kremlin activities to a pro-Kremlin zone. The chapter reveals the most important moments and factors in this evolution, including the role of the “Crimean success” and the trend toward personifying Russian politics. It also tries to explain the causes of the protest wave of 2011–2013 and the rise of Alexei Navalny as the main leader of the opposition movement in Russia. And, finally, the chapter considers the influence and impact that the “physical” expansion of Moscow in 2012 by including a part of the rural periphery around it had on the political situation in the capital city. The authors conclude that, by the end of the 2010s, Moscow remained one of the most unreliable and dangerous bricks in the political building constructed by Vladimir Putin.

Marina Glaser, Ivan Krivushin

Chapter 6. Conclusion: The Nature of the Moscow Political

Abstract

This chapter summarizes key ideas and results and outlines future research of the topic. The chapter outlines the way that political Moscow has long been represented by the triad of “antagonism – agonism – Platonism.” This has become the expression of one of the main challenges to the state throughout its history—the deadlock of paternalism. The chapter concludes by arguing that Russia is in a trap of a super centralization process throughout its history, it was being built within a centrally peripheral logic. During the Russian Federation, Moscow in the 1990s favored Federalism’s growth, but in the early 2000s, the tendency to make universal decisions based on the Center’s interests began to accelerate. The Moscow agglomeration was growing in size territorially, demographically, and financially. This chapter argues that in Moscow’s political history from the late 1980s to 2018, three completed political cycles are identified. The new political cycle that began at the end of 2018 and has not come to an end yet. The chapter concludes that the liberalism and oppositionism of the federal government represented Moscow’s characteristics as a political community that contrasted it with the rest of Russia. Moscow remained one of the most vulnerable links in Vladimir Putin’s political configuration.

Marina Glaser, Ivan Krivushin

Backmatter

Titel: Moscow's Evolution as a Political Space
verfasst von: Marina Glaser
Ivan Krivushin
Verlag: Springer International Publishing
Electronic ISBN: 978-3-030-68673-4
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-68672-7
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-68673-4