Political autonomy and ethnic mobilization: Russian-speaking minorities in Ukraine's Crimea and Donbas, and Kazakhstan's Qaraghandy

The collapse of the Soviet Union provides several situations where the presence of Russian-speaking minorities produces a potential challenge to the consolidation of former Soviet Republics as independent democracies. My dissertation examines ethnic relations in two former Soviet Republics: Ukraine and Kazakhstan. The goal of this dissertation is to answer the question of how different degrees of institutionalization of ethnically defined territorial minorities---i.e. when provided with institutions of political and cultural autonomy---create stimulus for elites to engage in ethno-political mobilization. My research question is the following: What explains variation in the degree of ethno-political mobilization by Russian-speaking minorities, in newly emerged states that were once former Soviet republics, especially Ukraine and Kazakhstan? My dependent variable, consequently, is a qualitatively evaluated degree of ethnopolitical mobilization by Russian minorities. I hypothesize that if an ethnic minority is a regional majority in an ethno-federal or autonomous territorial unit, the institutional and ethno-demographic structure of this situation will create a stimulus for elites and political entrepreneurs (regional government officials, labor unions leaders, etc.) to present ethno-political claims---as opposed to non-ethnic, civic, socio-economic appeals for support---that are both electoral and non-electoral. This hypothesis is narrowed to the conditions of the nationalizing newly emerged states, and the following case studies are proposed to be tested in the dissertation: the Crimea and the Donbas region in Ukraine (two similar regions where different levels of ethnic mobilization of Russian-speakers took place during the early 1990s), and the Qaraghandy in Northern Kazakhstan, the region where Russian-speakers were successfully integrated into the dominant Kazakh nation. The dissertation, after examining these three mentioned case studies, will test a hypothesis that the institutionalization of ethnically defined territorial structures and the provision of minorities with autonomous institutions may intensify ethnic mobilization under certain conditions and produce conditions leading to ethnic mobilization. This hypothesis is consistent with already existing institutionalist theories, arguing that demographic factors determine the ability to use institutions of autonomy as mobilizing tools. Consequently, ethno-demographic differences between Russian-speakers in the three cases within two different former Soviet Republics are defined by their institutions' different types and arrangements. This theoretical argument, if proved, will also have a practical meaning: once the conditions under which autonomy produces ethnic mobilization are identified, it will be suggested not to implement autonomy in such cases where the potential for ethnic mobilization exists.