Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-2pzkn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-05-17T08:23:34.670Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Market meets nationalism: making entrepreneurial state subjects in post-Soviet Russia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 November 2018

Martin Müller
Martin Müller*
Affiliation:
Universität St. Gallen, St. Gallen, Switzerland
*
*Email: martin@martin-muller.net. website: www.martin-muller.net
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This paper argues that nationalism and neoliberalism should not be considered as conflicting ideologies, but can enter into a productive association. This association creates an entrepreneurial nationalism that people can actively embrace as self-governing subjects in pursuit of a good life and successful career, rather than as subjects governed through state-mandated projects from above. The paper illustrates this argument with material from nine months of fieldwork at a Russian elite university. While students at that university strive to develop their potential and increase their market value to be successful in the competition for the best jobs, they also emphasize that developing themselves is not antithetical to serving Russia and being true to one's country. On the contrary, advancing Russia and advancing one's own career are articulated as two sides of the same coin. At the same time, the Russian nationalist project is reframed in entrepreneurial terms: making the Russian nation strong is about developing its potential and raising its competitiveness in the global marketplace.

Keywords

nationalismpatriotismeducationneoliberalismsubjectivationRussia
Type
Articles
Information
Nationalities Papers , Volume 39 , Issue 3 , May 2011 , pp. 393 - 408
Copyright
Copyright © 2011 Association for the Study of Nationalities 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Allensworth, Wayne. “Dugin and the Eurasian Controversy: Is Eurasianism ‘Patriotic'?” Russian Nationalism and the National Reassertion of Russia. Ed. Lamelle, Marlène. London: Routledge, 2009. 104–22. Print.Google Scholar
Audureau, Jean-Pierre. “Assujettissement et Subjectivation: Réflexions sur L'usage de Foucault en Éducation.” Revue Française de Pédagogie 143 (2003): 17–29. Print.Google Scholar
Beichelt, Timm. “Two Variants of the Russian Radical Right: Imperial and Social Nationalism.” Communist and Post-Communist Studies 42 (2009): 505–26. Print.Google Scholar
Billig, Michael. Banal Nationalism. London: Sage, 1995. Print.Google Scholar
Breuilly, John. Nationalism and the State. Manchester: Manchester UP, 1993. Print.Google Scholar
Brudny, Yitzhak M. Reinventing Russia: Russian Nationalism and the Soviet State, 1953-1991. Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP, 2000. Print.Google Scholar
Burchell, Graham. “Liberal Government and Techniques of the Self.” Economy and Society 22 (1993): 267–82. Print.Google Scholar
Caldwell, Melissa. “The Taste of Nationalism: Food Politics in Postsocialist Moscow.” Ethnos 67 (2002): 295–319. Print.Google Scholar
Cook, Ian, and Crang, Michael. Doing Ethnographies. Norwich: Environmental Publications. 1995. Print.Google Scholar
Eurasia Press 2007. “TNK-BP, MGIMO and MIEP Sign an Agreement.” 19 Oct. 2007 Web. 13 Feb. 2011 <http://www.oilandgaseurasia.com/news/p/0/news/1227>>Google Scholar
Ferguson, James. “Stillborn Chrysalis: Reflections on the Fate of National Culture in Neoliberal Zambia.” Global Networks 3 (2003): 271–97. Print.Google Scholar
Foucault, Michel. Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison. New York: Vintage, 1979. Print.Google Scholar
Foucault, Michel. Dits et Écrits IV. Paris: Gallimard. 1994. Print.Google Scholar
Foucault, Michel. “Governmentality.” The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality. Eds. Gordon, Colin, Burchell, Graham and Miller, Peter. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991. 87–104. Print.Google Scholar
Foucault, Michel. “J.K. Simon: A Conversation with Michel Foucault.” Partisan Review 38 (1971): 192–201. Print.Google Scholar
Fox, Jon E. “Consuming the Nation: Holidays, Sports, and the Production of Collective Belonging.” Ethnic and Racial Studies 29 (2006): 217–36. Print.Google Scholar
Fox, Jon E., and Miller-Idriss, Cynthia. “Everyday Nationhood.” Ethnicities 8 (2008): 536–76. Print.Google Scholar
of Russia, Government. Gosudarstvennaya Programma ‘Patrioticheskoe Vospitanie Grazhdan Rossiiskoi Federatsii na 2006-2010 Gody’ [State Program ‘Patriotic Education of Citizens of the Russian Federation for 2006-2010']. Moscow. 2005. Print.Google Scholar
Gowan, Peter. “Neo-Liberal Theory and Practice for Eastern Europe.” New Left Review 213 (1995): 3–60. Print.Google Scholar
Hamann, Trent H. “Neoliberalism, Governmentality, and Ethics.” Foucault Studies 6 (2009): 37–59. Print.Google Scholar
Hannerz, Ulf. Transnational Connections: Culture, People, Places. London: Routledge, 1996. Print.Google Scholar
Hanson Thiem, Claudia. “Thinking through Education: The Geographies of Contemporary Educational Restructuring.” Progress in Human Geography 33 (2009): 154–73. Print.Google Scholar
Harvey, David. A Brief History of Neoliberalism. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2005. Print.Google Scholar
Helleiner, Eric. “Economic Nationalism as a Challenge to Economic Liberalism? Lessons from the 19th Century.” International Studies Quarterly 46 (2002): 307–29. Print.Google Scholar
Hobsbawm, Eric. Nations and Nationalism since 1780: Programme, Myth, Reality. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1991. Print.Google Scholar
Ivanova-Galitsina, Anna. “A Training Ground for Tomorrow's Elite: MGIMO.” Financial Times 10 May 2000: 8. Print.Google Scholar
Jackson, Patrick Thaddeus. “Can Ethnographic Techniques Tell Us Distinctive Things About World Politics?” International Political Sociology 2 (2008): 91–93. Print.Google Scholar
Job, Sebastian. “Globalising Russia? The Neoliberal/Nationalist Two-Step and the Russification of the West.” Third World Quarterly 22 (2001): 931–49. Print.Google Scholar
Kaldor, Mary. “Nationalism and Globalisation.” Nations and Nationalism 10 (2004): 161–77. Print.Google Scholar
Khachaturian, Rafael. “The Specter of Russian Nationalism.” Dissent 56 (2009): 19–24. Print.Google Scholar
Laruelle, Marlène. In the Name of the Nation: Nationalism and Politics in Contemporary Russia. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009. Print.Google Scholar
Laruelle, Marlène. “Introduction.” Russian Nationalism and the National Reassertion of Russia. Ed. Lamelle, Marlène. London: Routledge, 2009. 1–10. Print.Google Scholar
Laruelle, Marlène. “Rethinking Russian Nationalism: Historical Continuity, Political Diversity, and Doctrinal Fragmentation.” Russian Nationalism and the National Reassertion of Russia. Ed. Lamelle, Marlène. London: Routledge, 2009. 13–48. Print.Google Scholar
Laruelle, Marlène. Russian Nationalism and the National Reassertion of Russia. London: Routledge, 2009. Print.Google Scholar
Lemke, Thomas. “'The Birth of Bio-Politics': Michel Foucault's Lecture at the Collège de France on Neo-Liberal Governmentality.” Economy and Society 30 (2001): 190–207. Print.Google Scholar
Lo, Bobo. Russian Foreign Policy in the Post-Soviet Era. Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2002. Print.Google Scholar
Majordom. “Dvoinoi Diplom - Trebovanie Vremeni [The Double Degree Is a Requirement of Our Times].” Majordom 1 (2006): 74–76. Print.Google Scholar
Majordom. “Ministr Nashikh Del [Minister of Our Affairs].” Majordom 3 (2005): 60–65. Print.Google Scholar
Majordom. “Torgovlya Omzhiem - Delo dlya Professionalov [The Arms Trade Is a Business for Professionals].” Majordom 3 (2005): 72–75. Print.Google Scholar
Majordom. “Uspeshnaja Bol'shakova [Successful Bol'shakova].” Majordom 2 (2005): 54–55. Print.Google Scholar
Mendelson, Sarah E., and Gerber, Theodore P. “Us and Them: Anti-American Views of the Putin Generation.” The Washington Quarterly 31 (2008): 131–150. Print.Google Scholar
MGIMO 2010. “Management in the Area of Defense-Technological Cooperation and High-Tech.” Web. 11 Feb. 2011. <http://www.mgimo.ru/master/menvts/index.phtml>>Google Scholar
Mitchell, Katharyne. “Educating the National Citizen in Neoliberal Times: From the Multicultural Self to the Strategic Cosmopolitan.” Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers 28 (2003): 387–403. Print.Google Scholar
Müller, Martin. Making Great Power Identities in Russia: An Ethnographic Discourse Analysis of Education at a Russian Elite University. Zürich: LIT. 2009. Print.Google Scholar
O'Toole, Gavin. “A New Nationalism for a New Era: The Political Ideology of Mexican Neoliberalism.” Bulletin of Latin American Research 22 (2003): 269–90. Print.Google Scholar
Oushakine, Serguei Alex. The Patriotism of Despair: Nation, War, and Loss in Russia. Ithaca: Cornell UP, 2009. Print.Google Scholar
Pickel, Andreas. “Explaining, and Explaining with, Economic Nationalism.” Nations and Nationalism 9 (2003): 105–27. Print.Google Scholar
Mendelson, Sarah E., and Gerber, Theodore P. “False Oppositions: Reconceptualizing Economic Nationalism in a Globalizing World.” Economic Nationalism in a Globalizing World. Eds. Helleiner, Eric and Pickel, Andreas. Ithaca: Cornell UP, 2005. 1–20. Print.Google Scholar
Rose, Nikolas. Inventing Our Selves. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1996. Print.Google Scholar
Rose, Nikolas. Powers of Freedom: Reframing Political Thought. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1999. Print.Google Scholar
Saul, John Ralston. “The collapse of globalism and the rebirth of nationalism.” Harper's March (2004): 33–43. Print.Google Scholar
Shevchenko, Olga. “'Between the Holes': Emerging Identities and Hybrid Patterns of Consumption in Post-Socialist Russia.” Europe-Asia Studies 54 (2002): 841–66. Print.Google Scholar
Simonsen, Sven Gunnar. “Nationalism and the Russian Political Spectrum: Locating and Evaluating the Extremes.” Journal of Political Ideologies 6 (2001): 263–88. Print.Google Scholar
Smith, Adrian. “Culture/Economy and Spaces of Economic Practice: Positioning Households in Post-Communism.” Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers 27 (2002): 232–50. Print.Google Scholar
Smith, Adrian. “Imagining Geographies of the ‘New Europe': Geo-Economic Power and the New European Architecture of Integration.” Political Geography 21 (2002): 647–70. Print.Google Scholar
Smith, Anthony D. “The Limits of Everyday Nationhood.” Ethnicities 8 (2008): 563–73. Print.Google Scholar
Smith, Anthony D. Nationalism: Theory, Ideology, History. Cambridge: Polity, 2001. Print.Google Scholar
Sperling, Valerie. “The Last Refuge of a Scoundrel: Patriotism, Militarism and the Russian National Idea.” Nations and Nationalism 9 (2003): 235–53. Print.Google Scholar
Sperling, Valerie. “Making the Public Patriotic: Militarism and Anti-Militarism in Russia.” Russian Nationalism and the National Reassertion of Russia. Ed. Laruelle, Marlène. London: Routledge, 2009. 218–71. Print.Google Scholar
Swain, Adam. “Soft Capitalism and a Hard Industry: Virtualism, the ‘Transition Industry’ and the Restructuring of the Ukrainian Coal Industry.” Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers 31 (2006): 208–23. Print.Google Scholar
Temnitskii, Aleksandr L. “Sociologicheskii Monitoring Protsessa Polucheniya Elitnogo Obrazovaniya (na Primere Studentov MGIMO) [Sociological Monitoring of the Process of Elite Education (the Case of Students at MGIMO)].” Elitnoe Obrazovanie: Mirovoi Opyt i Model’ MGIMO [Elite Education: Global Experience and the Model of MGIMO]. Eds. Ashin, Gennadij K. and Kravchenko, Sergei A. Moscow: MGIMO, 2002. 189–223. Print.Google Scholar
Tilly, Charles. “States and Nationalism in Europe, 1492-1992.” Perspectives on Nationalism and War. Eds. Comaroff, John L. and Stern, Paul C. Amsterdam: Gordon and Breach, 2000. 187–204. Print.Google Scholar
Torkunov, Anton V. MGIMO-Universitet: Traditsii i Sovremennost': 1944-2004. (MGIMO-University: Traditions and Present: 1944-2004). Moscow: Moskovskie Uchebniki i Kartolitografiya. 2004. Print.Google Scholar
Tuminez, Astrid S. Russian Nationalism since 1856: Ideology and the Making of Foreign Policy. New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2000. Print.Google Scholar
Umland, Andreas. “Russian Ultranationalist Party Politics And ‘Uncivil Society'.” Magisterium 31 (2008): 30–39. Print.Google Scholar
Vann, Elizabeth F. “Domesticating Consumer Goods in the Global Economy: Examples from Vietnam and Russia.” Ethnos 70 (2005): 465–88. Print.Google Scholar
Vrasti, Wanda. “The Strange Case of Ethnography and International Relations.” Millennium: Journal of International Studies 37 (2008): 279–301. Print.Google Scholar
Worth, Owen. “The Janus-Like Character of Counter-Hegemony: Progressive and Nationalist Responses to Neoliberalism.” Global Society 16 (2002): 297–315. Print.Google Scholar
Yurchak, Alexei. Everything Was Forever, until It Was No More. Princeton: Princeton UP. 2006. Print.Google Scholar
Yurchak, Alexei. “Russian Neoliberal: The Entrepreneurial Ethic and the Spirit Of “True Careerism”.” Russian Review 62 (2003): 72–90. Print.Google Scholar