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Russian Academic Diaspora: Its Scale, Dynamics, Structural Characteristics, and Ties to the RF

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Book cover Migration from the Newly Independent States

Part of the book series: Societies and Political Orders in Transition ((SOCPOT))

Abstract

Russia’s worsening relations with the West and the proliferation of negative trends in the country’s development are raising serious questions related to scale, dynamics, territorial patterns, and structural characteristics of the Russian intellectual migration flow. Equally important are the degree of the Russian intellectual diaspora’s heterogeneity, the character and intensity of its attitudes toward the RF, and the major forms of its activities. Previous Russian policies toward its elite diaspora were both inconsistent and ineffective. In particular, policy goals should aim neither at limiting the intellectual migration flow nor at seeking the elite migrants’ massive repatriation to Russia. Rather, they should be limited in scale and aimed at an effective inclusion of Russian science into the international academic networks as well as the formation of Russian elite diasporas abroad.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Understood as “the growth of networks of worldwide interdependence” (Nye 2002: xiii).

  2. 2.

    Among the leaders in terms of the number of emigrating innovators, India ranks first; China, second; and Russia, seventh. At the same time, India, Russia, and Brazil still show a nearly zero inflow of innovators (WIPO 2014; Russia Direct 2014: 5, 7; Khadria 2010: 178).

  3. 3.

    For further details, see Mikhail Denisenko’s and Mark Tolts’ chapters.

  4. 4.

    Using Kathleen Newland’s and Sonia Plaza’s definition, “Diasporas encompass emigrants and their descendants who maintain connection to their countries of origin or ancestry” (Newland and Plaza 2013: 10). Newland also emphasizes diasporas’ “central role in the global discussion of the links between migration and development. Diasporas are assumed to be ‘resource multipliers’ for their countries of origin, but all too often, only the short-term gains from remittances and investments are considered. This is unfortunate, as the longer-term benefits of diaspora engagement—such as the greater integration of the country of origin into the global economy and newfound access to concentrations of talent that the home market cannot sustain—may be even more important to development” (Newland 2010: 2).

  5. 5.

    On average, the relatively poor countries invest up to $50,000 in the training of a university graduate and consequently, have to absorb financial losses in the case of his or her emigration (NBER 2008).

  6. 6.

    The real numbers of those traveling abroad were much larger as most of those traveling were not officially reporting their trips. Still, these data offer an important overview of the Brain Drain structure.

  7. 7.

    The group of countries with extra-large diasporas (more than 1,000,000) includes India, 2,080,000; China, 1,655,000; the Philippines; the UK; and Germany (OECD 2011; World Bank 2018; Dezhina et al. 2015: 18).

  8. 8.

    In March 2015, for instance, the RAS President Vladimir Fortov claimed that visible was a significant Brain Drain intensification (Tarakanova 2015). In his turn, Nikolay Dolgushkin, the RAS Chief Academic Secretary, recognized in 2018 that the number of researchers in Russia has declined 2.7 times since 1990, while the share of those in the retirement age in the ranks of academic personnel has reached 1/3. Dolgushkin also claimed that 44 thousand highly qualified migrants left the RF in 2016 alone (“RAN…” 2018).

  9. 9.

    The surveys, conducted with the author’s participation, were organized by the Eurasian Network for Political Research (Merkushev 2009) and the Russian International Affairs Council and a consortium of other organizations (Russian Council 2015).

  10. 10.

    The subsequent surveys have confirmed this characteristic, simultaneously indicating a quickly increasing share of those with a Western terminal degree among the intellectual migrants from Russia—a trend showing that the initial study in a Western university/graduate school is becoming the major Brain Drain route from the RF regardless of one’s field of specialization. Among the 2009 survey participants, for example, 49.2% had a Western Doctoral or Master’s degree; 6.6%, a Russian Doctor of Science degree; and 26.6%, a Candidate of Science degree.

  11. 11.

    In 2017, for instance, the post-Soviet states accounted for 13.4% of the Russian exports and 10.7%, of its imports (in 2000, the respective shares were 13.4% and 34.3%) (Rosstat 2018).

  12. 12.

    Many 2009 survey respondents, especially from the ranks of the returnees, indicated more than one country they used to live and work in.

  13. 13.

    Created by the Presidential Decree on June 21, 2007, but nevertheless defined officially as an NGO, the Foundation lists among its major goals:

    • “…- cooperation with the Russian, foreign, and international state, public, academic, commercial, non-commercial, and charity organizations; institutions in the fields of education and culture; other institutions, organizations, and unions; individuals in the area of Russian language and culture popularization;

    • support for the activities of the Russian diasporas abroad in terms of protecting their cultural identity and of the Russian language as a means of international communication; support for the establishment of the climate of international respect and peace;

    • support for the exports of the Russian educational services;

    • assistance to the expert, academic, and educational exchanges corresponding to the Foundation’s goals…” (https://russkiymir.ru).

  14. 14.

    The agency, formed by President Vladimir Putin’s decree No. 1315 in September 2008, currently has 98 offices in 81 countries, including 74 Russian Science and Culture Centers in 62 countries (http://rs.gov.ru/ru/about).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Middle Tennessee State University, Murfreesboro, TN, USA

    Andrei V. Korobkov

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  1. Andrei V. Korobkov
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Correspondence to Andrei V. Korobkov .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. National Research University Higher School of Economics, Moscow, Russia

    Mikhail Denisenko

  2. Department of Political Sciences, University of Naples Federico II, Naples, Italy

    Salvatore Strozza

  3. Centre for Criminology, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada

    Matthew Light

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Korobkov, A.V. (2020). Russian Academic Diaspora: Its Scale, Dynamics, Structural Characteristics, and Ties to the RF. In: Denisenko, M., Strozza, S., Light, M. (eds) Migration from the Newly Independent States. Societies and Political Orders in Transition. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-36075-7_14

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