THE IMPACT OF RUSSIAN CULTURE ON THE POLITICAL ORIENTATIONOF WESTERN EXPATRIATES IN RUSSIA

Abstract

This paper strives to show the importance of links between culture and politics, which some analysts say has been sadly neglected in contemporary political science. The theoretical base for this research includes reference to the ‘degree of acceptance’ of a call to securitise an issue or event. Such a ‘degree of acceptance’ of a securitisation issue or event, it is argued, may vary because of differing cultural norms in different countries. Transculturism, which advocates, in broad terms, seeing the ‘we’ in the ‘other,’ is also discussed in terms of identifying a theory which reifies culture as being of fundamental importance to global security. The measurement of alterations in the political views, over time, of western expatriates working and living in Russia is used as a case study. The tense East-West political environment at the time of writing this paper provides a sufficiently contrasting political climate within which any alterations of political orientation of western expatriates who took part in the research could be observed. Research showed that the political orientation of expatriates did not change in a ‘black and white’ way, however expatriates seem to develop and assimilate a second political identity, which gives them a meaningful (for them) alternative point of view on Russia and global security in general.