Identity of Kaliningraders: Influence of Social Beliefs on the Choice of Self-Identification

Abstract

Research into the identity of residents of Kaliningrad Oblast is characterized by a combination of close attention to the ideologically significant factors of its formation and its deficit in personal belief and mindset issues. At best, researchers talk about stereotypes of public opinion and enduring mythologems. The authors seek to fill this gap by offering a look at identity as a reflective project supported by narratives and controlled by social practice. The purpose of the article is to show shifts in the understanding of the surrounding reality that took place in Kaliningrad society at the beginning of the 21st century and to the nature of their influence on the self-identification of Kaliningrad residents. The authors relied on a series of interviews conducted in the summer of 2020. The results of content analysis of text materials were compared with findings by other researchers and sociological survey data. The analysis showed that Kaliningrad society is characterized by opposing cultural phenomena: "Delays," i.e., comprehension of ongoing changes in categories relevant to the previous era, and "getting ahead," the use of narratives and practices characteristic of postmodernity. The authors suggest that the level of pluralism achieved by Kaliningrad society, based on a combination of modern and traditional values, provides the identity of the oblast's residents with the necessary stability. However, the contradiction between identity retention policy within traditional statist ideas and the reflexivity of modern society, in which an individual is not bound by traditions and ascriptive relations, can upset the existing equilibrium.

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ISSN 2079-9705, Regional Research of Russia, 2021, Vol. 11, No. 4, pp. 533–542. © The Author(s), 2021. This article is an open access publication.
Russian Text © The Author(s), 2021, published in Izvestiya Rossiiskoi Akademii Nauk, Seriya Geograficheskaya, 2021, No. 4, pp. 565–578.
Identity of Kaliningraders: Influence of Social Beliefs
on the Choice of Self-Identification
O. I. Vendinaa, *, A. A. Gritsenkoa, **, M. V. Zotovaa, ***, and A. S. Zinovyevb, ****
a Institute of Geography, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, 119017 Russia
b St. Petersburg State University, St. Petersburg, 199034 Russia
*e-mail: vendina@igras.ru
**e-mail: antgritsenko@igras.ru
***e-mail: zotova@igras.ru
****e-mail: a.zinovyev@spbu.ru
Received May 22, 2021; revised May 22, 2021; accepted July 16, 2021
Abstract—Research into the identity of residents of Kaliningrad Oblast is characterized by a combination of
close attention to the ideologically significant factors of its formation and its deficit in personal belief and
mindset issues. At best, researchers talk about stereotypes of public opinion and enduring mythologems. The
authors seek to fill this gap by offering a look at identity as a reflective project supported by narratives and
controlled by social practice. The purpose of the article is to show shifts in the understanding of the surround-
ing reality that took place in Kaliningrad society at the beginning of the 21st century and to the nature of their
influence on the self-identification of Kaliningrad residents. The authors relied on a series of interviews con-
ducted in the summer of 2020. The results of content analysis of text materials were compared with findings
by other researchers and sociological survey data. The analysis showed that Kaliningrad society is character-
ized by opposing cultural phenomena: “Delays,” i.e., comprehension of ongoing changes in categories rele-
vant to the previous era, and “getting ahead,” the use of narratives and practices characteristic of postmoder-
nity. The authors suggest that the level of pluralism achieved by Kaliningrad society, based on a combination
of modern and traditional values, provides the identity of the oblast’s residents with the necessary stability.
However, the contradiction between identity retention policy within traditional statist ideas and the reflexiv-
ity of modern society, in which an individual is not bound by traditions and ascriptive relations, can upset the
existing equilibrium.
Keywords: Kaliningrad Oblast, identity, reflexivity, narratives, values, sociocultural context
DOI: 10.1134/S2079970521040195
INTRODUCTION
Interest in studying the identity of the inhabitants
of Kaliningrad Oblast began almost immediately after
the collapse of the USSR and has not weakened since.
The reasons for this are the peculiarities of the geopo-
litical position of the region and concern about the
state loyalty of Kaliningraders due to close contacts
with neighboring European countries. The events in
Ukraine and Crimea’s change of jurisdiction have
shown that such anxiety is not baseless. In conditions
of acute internal political crises, the population’s non-
recognition of their state as truly “their own” may act
as a decisive factor in realizing a self-determination
scenario. However, the situation in Kaliningrad Oblast
only vaguely resembles that in Crimea. There have
never been any problems of linguistic competition or
interethnic rivalry for the right to consider oneself
“primordial masters of the land.” The last German
population left the region in the early 1950s, and nos-
talgic tourists who come to see their ancestral home-
land can hardly be suspected of intending to reclaim it.
And the locals treat them with sympathy rather than
prejudice. Nobody expects mass repatriation or resti-
tution. Nevertheless, the lingering perception of the
region as a “trophy of war” and the unfavorable com-
parison with its European neighbors create a sense of
ideological competition for cultural dominance. In the
last decade, these emotions have provoked an infor-
mation campaign against Germanization of the region
in the context of national security threats.1 Its support-
ers and protagonists proceed from the notions of clas-
sical geopolitics about the revanchism of states that,
for one reason or another, have lost part of their terri-
tories. According to this logic, the territorialization of
the imaginary Prussian–Germanic identity and con-
cern for restoration of historical heritage are signs of
cultural expansion and the basis for legitimizing a
hypothetically possible change in regional jurisdic-
tion. Although the policy of strengthening national-
SOCIAL GEOGRAPHY

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REGIONAL RESEARCH OF RUSSIA Vol. 11 No. 4 2021
VENDINA et al.
state identity through discursive suppression of threats
to sovereignty appears instrumentally justified one, it
has serious side effects: an increase in mutual suspi-
cion, erosion of trust, and social disunity. The matter
lies not only in the expression and demonstration of
patriotic feelings. Many, if not all, actions, deeds and
habits of a person are manifestations of his identity.
Calls to patriotism and prohibitions on the demon-
stration of other forms of cultural loyalty remain a pro
forma and trigger rejection if they do not rely on prag-
matic and completely mundane practices. The exag-
geration of the role of ideology and underestimation of
quotidian factors are the reason for the failure of many
projects for forming the “necessary” identity. If we
consider the situation in Kaliningrad Oblast from
these positions, it becomes noticeable how politicized
the issues of Kaliningrad’s identity are. Close atten-
tion to its ideologically significant components is
combined with a lack of attention to worldview issues
and discursive context. Little is known about the
social convictions of Kaliningraders—the ideas and
views they share that help people explain what is hap-
pening—and even less about the inconstancy of men-
tal schemes that can change a person’s view of
him/herself and others, interpretation of past and
present events. This article attempts to partially fill this
gap. Based on a comparison of interview materials
conducted in August 2020 and conclusions of sociolo-
gists obtained in earlier studies, the paper aims to show
shifts in the understanding of the surrounding reality
that took place in Kaliningrad society at the beginning
of the 21st century, and to identify the nature of their
influence on the self-identification of Kaliningraders.
MATERIALS AND METHODS
Identity is a conceptually important, widely used,
and, at the same time, vague concepts, overloaded
with meanings. The first studies of the identity of
Kaliningraders interpreted it as the result of a synthesis
of a person’s value and emotional ideas about his/her
belonging to various communities, distinguished
1Here are some random examples: Deutschland was here. As in
Kaliningrad, businessmen are fighting the prosecutor’s off ice
for the German language. Independent information portal
“Kholod,” November 11, 2020. https://holod.media/
2020/11/06/hier-war-deutschland/?utm_source=lch&utm_-
medium=vk&utm_campaign=lnt. Accessed November 13,
2020; Revanchist myths about Kaliningrad seem ridiculous, but
they are taking shape. NewsBalt, September 12, 2019.
https://newsbalt.ru/news/2019/12/09/revanshistskie-mify-o-
kaliningrade/. Accessed November 13, 2020; Germanization in
Kaliningrad. After Empire, January 1, 2019. https://afterem-
pire.info/2019/01/31/germanizaciya/ (accessed November 13,
2020); “German order” in Kaliningrad Oblast has come: tomor-
row the occupation? IA REGNUM, 15.12.2016. https://reg-
num.ru/news/polit/2218090.html. Accessed November 13,
2020; “Licking German:” how the Kaliningrad media fought
against “Germanization.” New Kaliningrad, 12.10.2017.
https://www.newkaliningrad.ru/news/community/15280621-
oblizyvanie-nemetskogo-kak-kaliningradskie-smi-borolis-s-
germanizatsiey.html. Accessed November 13, 2020.
according to the principle of cohabitation in a specific
territory. The presence of such “imaginary communi-
ties” (Anderson, 2016) was concretized via the specif-
ics of the region’s geopolitical position, which affects
the behavioral practices and lifestyle of people. This
approach corresponds to the concept of identity pro-
posed by (Erikson, 1956), according to which a per-
son’s self-identification is based on his awareness of
the integrity of his personality, which is formed in cer-
tain social and cultural circumstances and is based on
an understanding of acquired experience. The variety
of problems and social environments that a person
encounters predetermines the multiplicity and vari-
ability of his/her identity, and cultural certainty deter-
mines its stability (Erickson, 1996). The analytical
advantage of Erickson’s concept is the ability to recog-
nize individual components of human self-determina-
tion, e.g., Russian, European or local identity, rank
them according to social significance, observe the
dynamics of changes, and assess the role in the forma-
tion of ideas shared in a particular society.
All these advantages have been fully exploited in
the ongoing research. Regular polls have shown the
stability of the structure of Kaliningraders’ identity:
predominance of regional self-identification and
gradual growth of its Russian component. The option
“Russians, citizens of Russia” in 2001 was chosen by
25% of surveyed residents of Kaliningrad Oblast; in
2015–2016, according to some data, 41%;2 according
to other data, 60% (Klemeshev et al., 2017; Lyovkina
and Alimpieva, 2015; Martynova and Grigorieva,
2018a; Rossiyskiy …, 2017). Among the explanatory
factors mention was made of the region’s relative iso-
lation, the difficulty of contacts with the main territory
of the country compared to the frequency and ease of
travel to neighboring Poland and Lithuania, and shifts
in the composition of the region’s population as a
result of migration. Recent migrants from other
regions of the Russian Federation and CIS countries
more often called themselves Russians than native res-
idents of Kaliningrad.3
Despite the clarity and consistency of this explana-
tion, it left a feeling of dissatisfaction. An objection
was raised, first, by the excessive objectification of
groups, distinguished according to the principle of
shared identity. They emphasized the multiplicity,
instability, and fundamental incompleteness of human
2Sociologist Efim Fidrya: “A separate Kaliningrad identity is a
myth.” New Kaliningrad, December 2, 2016. https://www.
newkaliningrad.ru/news/community/11797648-sotsiolog-efim-
fidrya-otdelnaya-kaliningradskaya-identichnost-eto-mif.html
(accessed November 13, 2020); Less than half of the residents of
Kaliningrad Oblast perceive themselves to be residents of Rus-
sia. IA “The Russian West–Kaliningrad.” 02.10.2015.
https://ruwest.ru/news/48353/. Accessed November 13, 2020.
3Survey of residents of city of Kaliningrad, October 2018. KMG
Research Company. http://kmgroup.ru/2018/11/16/opros-
zhitelej-goroda-kaliningrada-oktyabr-2018/. Accessed Novem-
ber 13, 2020.

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IDENTITY OF KALININGRADERS: INFLUENCE OF SOCIAL BELIEFS ON THE CHOICE 535
identity and the conditionality and permeability of
intergroup boundaries. In discussions about the
Kaliningrad’s identity, the term “identification” is
increasingly used (Brubaker and Cooper, 2000),
implying the flexibility and situational nature of peo-
ple’s perceptions (Berendeev, 2007; Drobizheva, 2017;
Kuznetsov, 2017; Lyovkina and Alimpieva, 2015).
Second, according to the results of longitudinal
research of the Institute of Sociology of the Russian
Academy of Sciences, Russian identity is one of the
most widespread collective identities in the country,
but it is far from always a priority and, moreover, is
reflected (Drobizheva, 2017). According to Samuel
Huntington, the “natural” hierarchy of self-identifi-
cation, reflecting the closeness of a person’s connec-
tion with various territorial communities, is built in
accordance with the priority of local, regional, and
only then national-civil (country) identity. Local soli-
darity is always more important than national solidar-
ity, except in cases of the population’s mobilization
against various external threats (Huntington, 2004).
Therefore, concern about the weakness of Russian
identity may be far-fetched, and it makes sense to ana-
lyze not so much the nominative relationship (Kalin-
ingrad or Russian), as the content-richness of identi-
ties and the strength of the associative ties that arise.
Third, in the conducted studies, subjective factors
have been very poorly taken into account. Thus, the
relatively low adherence to Russian identity in the first
post-Soviet decade could have been explained not
only by the crisis situation in the region and the nov-
elty of its geopolitical position, but also by the poor
understanding of the term “Russians,” which is still
ambiguously perceived today. Not to mention that the
limitedness of a person’s worldview owing to the nar-
row framework in which her/his lives is a typical fea-
ture of a provincial society. Similarly, the increase in
the number of residents in Kaliningrad Oblast who
share a Russian identity can be explained not only by
the strengthening of civic consciousness and migra-
tion inflow from other Russian regions, but also by the
atmosphere of political distrust and fear created by the
campaign to combat “Germanization.”
Attention to the sociocultural context of identity
formation highlights the importance of its cognitive
(knowledge, information) and reflexive (self-direct-
edness) aspects. In the world of information richness
and changing discursive practices, multiple interpreta-
tions of the same events and facts are becoming the
norm. The belief in the presence of unshakable princi-
ples, cultural codes, and traditional values that had
previously determined the integrity of the individual
and stability of society is progressively weakening. The
diversity of viewpoints, none of which can be com-
pletely trusted, even if it is backed up by scientific
knowledge and undeniable authorities, makes a per-
son doubt everything, including him/herself. The
answer to the questions who I am and how do I want
others to perceive me is never final and depends on
newly received information and sociocultural context.
This idea, as applied to Kaliningrad Oblast, was intui-
tively expressed by Mikhail Berendeev (2007, p. 129):
“A person who considers him/herself a Kaliningrader,
in two minutes, in a different situation, with no less
conviction, can characterize him/herself as a Euro-
pean, and on the morning of the next day, as a Rus-
sian.” In other words, identity appears not as a mirror-
ing of multiple personality traits and not as a result of
identifying oneself with a certain group or social role,
but as derived from practice, past experience, and a
plurality of choices—as a reflexive project, supported
by narratives and controlled by social orders and hab-
its. The more modern the society is, the more an indi-
vidual is absorbed in him/herself, and the less role tra-
ditions and social prescriptions play in the regulation
of social relations (Alexander, 1996; Archer, 2007;
Beck et al., 1994; Chaffee, 2019; Craib, 1998; Gid-
dens, 1991; Gurevich, 2010).
The concept of “reflexive identity” (Beck et al.,
199 4; Giddens, 1991) corresponds most to the intent
of this article, since it allows us to explain the mecha-
nisms of the inf luence of shifts in social perceptions of
Kaliningraders on their self-identification. When
planning the study, we wanted to immerse ourselves in
the discursive reality, having compared people’s views
and assessments with demographic, socioeconomic,
and sociological facts.
The main method of study was a content analysis of
interviews conducted in August 2020 with representa-
tives of the expert community of Kaliningrad Oblast.
Our partners in this dialog included journalists,
sociologists, historians, civic activists, entrepreneurs,
museum workers, and employees of regional and
municipal administrations, i.e., people who form the
information agenda and influence the interpretation
of events.
An interview guide was developed, which included
the following blocks of questions:
—the main problems of the region and city and
strategies for their solution adopted at the level of
administrations and practiced by local residents;
—determination of the “particularity” of Kalinin-
grad Oblast compared to Russia and neighboring
European countries;
—description of the distinctive features of the local
society, relationships between people, habits, and life-
styles;
—social activity and passivity, people’s involve-
ment in public initiatives and/or elimination from
public activities;
—peculiarities and geography of contacts, mobility
and life experience;
—attitude towards cultural heritage and imple-
mented projects for its preservation and maintenance.

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VENDINA et al.
The thematic structure of the interview was strictly
adhered to, although the questions were adjusted
depending on the field of activity and competence of
our respondents. We also asked them to explain such
contradictions of Kaliningrad society as: “They live in
Russia, but are more often in neighboring countries,”
“they live relatively well, but they feel bad,” “they
share anti-Western sentiments, but are friends with
their western neighbors,” “they value German cultural
heritage, but they don’t cherish the Soviet one and
don’t treat it as heritage,” etc. In total, 30 interviews
were conducted with a single guide. Expert opinions
were compared with interpretations of the results of
surveys conducted in different years. We look at differ-
ences in assessments as at symptoms of shifts in public
consciousness. We were aware of the problematic
nature of broad generalizations based on a single field
study, so we considered it as a pilot project to develop
a program for further research.
RESETTLEMENT REGION
Discussions about Kaliningrad Oblast as a resettle-
ment region precede almost every study devoted to its
socioeconomic, demographic, cultural, and political
problems. The migrant narrative has become so deeply
imbued in the public consciousness that the formula
“everybody here are newcomers” began to be per-
ceived as an immutable truth and a ready-made expla-
nation for all occasions. This argument is also given
when it comes to disunity and lack of initiative in
Kaliningraders (If you are newcomers and can leave
tomorrow, you may not be sitting on your suitcases, but
you will definitely not be building something major.
Why?! (m., journalist)), and when, in a more positive
way, there is a low level of antimigrant sentiments (You
are trying to transfer your Moscow views to our region,
but we do not have any fear of migrants, because here all
newcomers and every family has migration experience
(f., professional sociologist)).
However, historical facts, census data, and opinion
polls paint a different picture. Actually “resettle-
ment”—the replacement of the German population by
Soviet, mainly Russian—took place in the first post-
war years (Kostyashov, 1996; Kretinin, 2015; Marty-
nova, 2014a). It was a stressful migration, the bulk of
migrants were disadvantaged and war-weary
(Kostyashov, 2009). The living conditions in the new
place were hardly “sweet” (Vostochnaya …, 2018),
although today the former problems have been erased
from memory, and stories about the high prewar stan-
dard of living in the region, which caused mixed feel-
ings of admiration and frustration among the first set-
tlers, are quite common.
In the next 40 years, the situation stabilized. The
main factor that determined the demographic dynam-
ics was not migration, but natural population growth.
Over the years, a new generation of Kaliningraders was
born, grew up, and had their own children.
The second wave of mass migrations was associated
with the collapse of the USSR, at first it took the form
of an “exodus” of the Russian and Russian-speaking
population from Kazakhstan, the neighboring Baltic
states, the countries of the Caucasus and Central Asia.
Later they were replaced by labor migrants and immi-
grants from other Russian regions, who viewed Kalin-
ingrad Oblast as a place to live, a springboard for busi-
ness, career growth and, possibly, further migration
“to the West.” At the same time, the region began to
lose population in the migration exchange with Mos-
cow, Moscow Oblast, St. Petersburg, and its neigh-
bors—Lithuania and Poland.
Since the mid-2000s, there has been a new migra-
tion wave, which has compensated for population out-
flow. People were already talking about the benefits of
migration, not the stress. A category of “new”
migrants appeared—former compatriots who received
state and regional support upon changing citizenship
and moving to the Russian Federation. The share of
pensioners who move here after completing their labor
activity “in the north” or in other resource regions of
the country has noticeably increased.4 The impor-
tance of seasonal migrations associated with the pur-
chase of housing in a resort area for their own resi-
dence in summer or to receive rental income from
tourism has risen. Be that as it may, and no matter how
great the role of migration, the share of local natives
among the inhabitants of the region grew throughout
the entire postwar period.
According to the 1989 census, the share of local
natives among the inhabitants was 40%; in 2002, 48%;
in 2010, it exceeded half the population; and by 2015,
it reached 60% (Abylkalikov and Sazin, 2019). Among
the younger generations, the indicators were even
higher: 82% for those born in 1980–1984, and already
91% in the 1990s (Abylkalikov and Sazin, 2019, p. 41).
Sociological polls5 also give close values. Moreover, all
researchers emphasize: Kaliningraders are incompa-
rably more likely to associate the region with “their
land” and “native land” than with an “island” or
“enclave.”
It would seem that there is every reason to talk
about the rootedness of the inhabitants of Kaliningrad
4“People who are not poor are coming to us”: Acting Head of
Kaliningrad Oblast Anton Alikhanov told Ekaterina Danilova
about the reasons for the region’s attractiveness to pensioners.
Ogonyok. No. 15. 17-Apr-17. https://www.kommersant.ru/
doc/3267573. Accessed November 13, 2020.
5The “Kaliningrad problem” in the mirror of public opinion.
Analytical review. Moscow: ZIRCON, KSC, 2002. http://www.
zircon.ru/upload/iblock/f7d/Kaliningradskaja_problema_v_
zerkale_obshhestvennogo_mnenija.pdf. Accessed Decem-
ber 11, 2020; The Russian frontier: civic identity at the forefront
of the country. 2017. Moscow: ZIRCON. http://www.zir-
con.ru/upload/iblock/76c/Rossijskij_frontir_Analiticheski-
j_otchet.pdf. Accessed February 11, 2020; The drift of public
opinion or Kaliningraders 16 years later. 2019. KMG Research
Company. http://kmgroup.ru/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/
Forgo_doc.pdf. Accessed November 09, 2020.

REGIONAL RESEARCH OF RUSSIA Vol. 11 No. 4 2021
IDENTITY OF KALININGRADERS: INFLUENCE OF SOCIAL BELIEFS ON THE CHOICE 537
Oblast, investing in this concept a sociological (dura-
tion of residence, presence of intergenerational ties,
common experience, memory, local and regional
identity), and not ethnographic (indigenous peoples,
aborigines, autochthonous population) meaning. The
difference between these approaches is fundamental,
although both of them associate the idea of people’s
interest in local and regional development, trust, and
solidarity with a sense of rootedness.
Let us consider an example to show the effect of the
mix of concepts. In a study by reputable Kaliningrad
researchers, we read: “The resettlement character of
the population, both in the past and, to a large extent,
the present, in addition to the well-known “garrison”
quality of the region, does not contribute to the forma-
tion of the autochthonous regional population”
(Andreychuk and Gavrilina, 2011, p. 73). However,
the autochthonous population of modern Kaliningrad
Oblast was exterminated or assimilated during the first
crusades, and today there are hardly any forces capa-
ble of reviving it. Neither were the prewar inhabitants
of the region autochthonous, although they were old-
timers with a long history of generational change. The
uprootedness felt by today’s Kaliningraders is created
not only by migrations and the aforementioned garri-
son quality, but also by the dominant narrative “here
everyone is a newcomer.” In fact, the Kaliningrad
identity of the regional inhabitants is being questioned
by the constantly reproduced discourse of immigrants
who are not entirely sure of their rights or their future.
The fact is poorly reflected that Kaliningrad Oblast,
being a resettlement region, has long ceased to be a
region of newcomers. The familiarity of the dominant
mental scheme distorts the perception of modern real-
ities.
This thesis is well illustrated by newspaper articles
that study the demographic dynamics of the region’s
population. They present as a problem even growth in
the population of local natives—a positive fact from
the viewpoint of overcoming uprootedness.6 It is
assumed that the need for contacts with relatives living
in other Russian regions is weakening among second-
and third-generation Kaliningraders, which may
entail an increase in the risks of isolationism, separat-
ism, etc. Although such inferences result from analyt-
ical one-sidedness, when they pass through media fil-
ters, they appear as threats and actualize the discourse
of security. A situation of a “kingdom of crooked mir-
rors” arises, which, as in the famous book, drives real
6Kaliningrad is moving away. How demographic trends are
increasing the isolation of the Excalav. iQ.HSU.RU. September
16, 2 019. ht tps://iq.hs e.r u/news/306915233.html . Accessed
November 13, 2020; HSE demographers: Kaliningrad identity
can “withdraw into oneself,” the feeling of isolation from Russia
will increase. KGD.RU, September 17, 2019. https://kgd.ru
/news/society/item/84725-demografy-vshje-kaliningradskaya-
identichnost-mozhet-zamknutsya-v-sebe-usilitsya-chuvstvo-
otorvannosti-ot-rossii. Accessed November 13, 2020.
problems inside and forces people to avoid discussing
them, destroying the positive basis of identity.
“OTHER” RUSSIANS
Already the first studies of the identity of Kalinin-
graders showed the prevalent view of themselves and
regional society as “special Russians” (Kalashnikov
and Budilov, 2019; Kaliningradskaya …, 2002; Kleme-
shev and Fedorov, 2004; Martynova, 2014b; Zadorin,
2018). The circumstances of place and time played a
role in this self-determination, which, from the view-
point of local residents, allowed them to adopt the
European lifestyle and become more “civilized”
(Alimpieva, 2003, 2009). Among the main reasons for
this transformation are the accessibility and frequency
of travel abroad, the massive possession of interna-
tional passports, the adhering to the consumption and
fashion offered in neighboring Poland. Statements
such as our Ikea in Gdansk (f., administration
employee); for us, of course, Europe was and remains a
huge trade center (m., journalist); Kaliningrad airport
in Gdansk, get a ticket for 10 euros and fly (f., editor)
were interpreted as signs of belonging to the European
cultural core. Together with the region’s German past
and predominant regional self-identification among
residents, such a view of things gave grounds for rea-
soning about the unique “Kaliningrad ethnocultural
phenomenon” (Andreychuk and Gavrilina 2011;
Shakhov, 2002, 2017). Without dwelling on the scien-
tific consistency of this approach,7 we note that the
terminology developed within its framework has
gained popularity. The terms “Russian Europeans,”
“European Russians,” “Kaliningrad ethnos,” and
“Rusobalts” began to be widely used in other research
and media, influencing public opinion.
However, referring to a “special” Kaliningrad soci-
ety and Kaliningraders as “other” Russians would
have looked like a repetition of the well-known sce-
nario, if a different trend had not emerged against this
background. Judging by publications, since the mid-
2010s, the influence of a diametrically opposing nar-
rative began to grow—Kaliningraders are no different
from other Russians. The same polls in which the
main focus was drawn to self-determination of Kalin-
ingraders as “Europeans” showed that they belonged
to Russian cultural continuum.8 Among the main fea-
tures that Kaliningraders attributed to themselves are
the same characteristics as “Russian man,” which are
consistently reproduced in any research on this topic:
from “simple,” “kind,” “cultural,” and “responsive”
7A brilliant analysis of the practice of artificial construction of
ethnicity is given in a study by K.A. Gavrilova (2018) on the
example of an “autonomous ethnic community” the Pinega
Chud.
8Survey of residents of the city of Kaliningrad, October 2018.
KMG Research Company. http://kmgroup.ru/2018/11/16/
opros-zhitelej-goroda-kaliningrada-oktyabr-2018/. Accessed
October 11, 2020.

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VENDINA et al.
before “lazy,” “drinkers,” and “lack of initiative.”9
The set of Kaliningraders’ values also contains no sur-
prises: as in other regions of the country, they value
material well-being and a sense of stability over inter-
esting work, new impressions, freedom, and opportu-
nities for self-realization (Kuznetsov, 2016, 2017; Ven-
dina, 2016). Structural differences in the value system
are explained by generational rather than geographical
factors; the main shifts are characteristic of young ages
(Kuznetsov, 2017; Martynova and Grigorieva, 2018b).
Therefore, it is not surprising that the “discovery” of
significant similarities between residents of Kalinin-
grad Oblast and other Russian regions was made by
people whose were in the years of undivided domi-
nance of the discourse of regional features. We can say
that the pendulum of Kaliningrad identity has swung
in the opposite direction:
—Every year I have to organize several events, and,
to be honest, I do not see any difference at all between us
and the residents of, say, Kurgan oblast. In general, there
are none (m., researcher);
—We are more oriented towards the West than to the
East… I did not travel much in Russia. … My first big trip
was to Vladivostok, three years ago. We f lew for a day.
We went by taxi to the city, and the taxi driver began the
local spiel for visitors. And after about 15 minutes I real-
ized I had deja vu, that he was singing the same song I do
when I greet guests. That the Russian history here is not
rich, not long, that once upon a time there were some
wonderful Jurchen people who performed craniotomy in
the 13th century. … We have Prussians. The following is
a story about a Moscow “bloodsucker,” and that we have
all the resources to live happily ever after. … All three
weeks that we were in Vladivostok, I found some paral-
lels. I saw these houses and did not understand why they
were so similar. Then, in the course of conversations, it
turns out that they were built by Germans. And I gradu-
ally realize that we are very different and very close. For
me it was a discovery, a shock that at different ends of this
huge country, which I, to be honest, did not perceive all
this “there” as my homeland. Here, yes; there, no. And
suddenly, all these three weeks I felt “at home.” I was
imbued with the fact that I am a Russian person, and it
became interesting to me, based on what I saw there, not
here. (m., entrepreneur).
The above excerpts from the interview (and the
limited volume of the article does not allow us to cite
other examples) illustrate well the thesis about the
reflexive nature of identity and the significance of the
discursive context as a condition for its formation and
maintenance.
9Russian character. WCIOM Analytical review. August 24, 2020.
Wciom.ru. https://wciom.ru/analytical-reviews/analiticheskii-
obzor/russkij-kharakter. Accessed November 13, 2020.
ALIEN CULTURE AND SOVIET BARBARISM
The legacy that Kaliningrad Oblast inherited from
various historical eras is rich and varied; among other
things, this baggage includes dissident sentiments.
They were widespread in the Brezhnev era, but, as a
rule, they did not go beyond friendly circles and
kitchen conversations. In the post-Soviet era, the
accumulated discontent spilled out, acquiring the
meaning of the truth gained through suffering. Priori-
tization of a per son’s private life has come to be seen as
just as fundamental a political principle as the dogma
of public interests that prevailed quite recently. In this
logic, the actions of the Soviet government were inter-
preted as erroneous and inhuman. Everything that was
Soviet became “barbarism,” and everything that was
pre- and non-Soviet was viewed as “culture.” And in a
free society a public discussion began, of the remnants of
foreign culture, miraculously preserved during the period
of Soviet barbarism (m., researcher). This viewpoint
captured the space of social imagination, it was repeat-
edly broadcast to us in numerous stories about the
destruction of the drainage system of the polder lands
of the region, the removal of cathedral bricks for the
construction of pigsties and sheds, the demolition of
the ruins of the royal castle in the center of Kalinin-
grad, the felling of old trees, etc. In this paradigm,
everything Soviet was categorically deprived of the
features of culture.
—I cannot imagine any specific Kaliningrad, not
Königsberg, but Kaliningrad architecture. It doesn’t
exist. There is no Kaliningrad architecture! (m., journal-
ist).
Perhaps the only topic not subjected to revision
from dissident positions was World War II. It has
remained an untouched part of the Soviet past, in
which an “alien culture” nurtured Nazism, and the
Soviet one made it possible to crush the “fascist bar-
barians in their lair.” However, this discourse in the
post-Soviet years was undermined by the “tale of two
totalitarianisms” actively promoted by Poland and the
Baltic countries. Equalization of the Soviet and fascist
barbarians met with quite understandable resistance
from Kaliningraders: the shadow of the “execution-
ers” in this legend fell not only on the prewar, but also
on the current residents of the region, their parents
and grandparents. Despite all the criticism of the
Soviet regime and rejection of Stalinism, they did not
at all consider it to be equivalent to Nazism.
—I don’t even want to get into this question, but I
would not compare Hitler with Stalin. This is my view-
point. Hitler for me is a terrible figure; Stalin, I wouldn’t
say that he was perfect either. I have a grandfather: in
1942 in Arkhangelsk Oblast, well, he was convicted of
libel and repressed. I only recently found where he died
(f., library worker).
The situation is not much better with the assess-
ment of the present. Germany in the postwar years has

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IDENTITY OF KALININGRADERS: INFLUENCE OF SOCIAL BELIEFS ON THE CHOICE 539
turned from a cursed country into an example of a
prosperous and justly organized society.
—Germanization is not when you sigh, looking at the
ruins, digging some shards in the ground. Germanization
is when… here’s a friend of mine who works in Germany
at a BMW plant. He lives 120 km from the factory, gets
up at half past five in the morning… he drives ver y fast on
the autobahn, which is very well built. In his expensive
car. High-ranking specialist. At seven in the morning he
starts working. He does not drink coffee at seven in the
morning, does not sit with his colleagues, he starts work-
ing at seven in the morning. And he works until six in the
evening. This is Germanization (m., entrepreneur).
This vision was relayed to the past of the region.
Agrarian East Prussia, which retains many features of
feudalism, was portrayed by our respondents almost as
the most developed part of prewar Germany. The fur-
ther people pushed back their imagination into his-
tory, the more romantic it seemed. The past was
inhabited by knights, princesses, and well-dressed
masters. To see and admire it, it was enough to buy
prewar postcards and photo albums. This aberration of
vision stems largely from the fact that the postwar gen-
erations of Kaliningraders have ceased to treat the sur-
rounding cultural landscape as alien. Buildings, mon-
uments, city ruins, and even hundred-year-old trees—
witnesses of history—have become benchmarks for
Russian self-identification. Their preservation was
perceived in the context of maintaining the integrity of
one’s own personality, not the desire to discover a
Prussian in oneself, to protect the Prussian spirit and
alien values. Although an increase in the intensity of a
person’s feelings about the place of his/her own life
was typical for all corners of the country, only in
Kaliningrad Oblast did it give rise to the central prob-
lem of identity. Not so much the resettlement charac-
ter of the region as the overloading of interpretations of
local history with anti-Nazi and anti-Soviet meanings
deprived the Kaliningrad identity of its support in the
past, giving rise to ambiguity and nihilism.
Overcoming the crisis of the disappearance of his-
torical continuity, which devalued the life of previous
generations, was made possible by a gradual departure
from the idea of opposing culture and barbarism. In
the last decade, the narrative of the region as a cultural
crossroads, traversed by many peoples who left their
mark, began to gain more and more influence. It
allowed avoiding extreme assessments and embedding
individual episodes of history simultaneously in the
Russian and European context.
—In general, I try not to talk about this topic, good or
bad, because these are stages of history. Good or bad that
Germany fell in the war, that Königsberg was destroyed.
This is a historical truth triggered by a chain of events. It
tu rned out that way. Is i t good or bad that Königsberg cas -
tle was destroyed? Well, from the cultural viewpoint, of
course; a catastrophe, of course, is bad. But from the
viewpoint of the chain of events, this is all natural. It hap-
pened because it was launched this way, it happened thus.
The same House of Soviets… we have a whole layer of
people who say that this is the ugliness of the city, I don’t
think so. … By the way, I cannot say that the castle was
an architectural masterpiece. … It contained a certain
symbolism. In was one kind of symbol of one, and the
House of Soviets, another, and how can I say—is this
good or bad? (m., architect).
This reasoning is dominated by the idea of time,
involving everyone and everything in its vortex, which
is opposed to the paradigm of place as cultural soil that
makes Russians forever strangers and newcomers in
Kaliningrad Oblast. The logic of the chain of events
turns randomness into regularity and reduces the
intensity of political passions, but the presented argu-
ments run the risk of being suspended in a void with-
out the support of local specifics. Such support was
found in the private life of a person and accompanying
routine of quotidian concerns. The discourse of the
priority of human interests, which at the beginning of
the post-Soviet era served primarily to denounce the
Soviet regime, aroused genuine interest in the every-
day trifles, feelings, and thoughts of people.
A vivid example is the publication history of the
seminal work East Prussia through the Eyes of Soviet
Re-Settlers. The book on the scientific method and
information presented was revolutionary for Soviet
historiography and was in the mainstream of an
understanding sociology, placing at the forefront the
issues of people’s self-awareness. Its publication, ini-
tially supported by the regional administration, was
halted due to the inconsistency of facts of the oral his-
tory with the officially approved views on events.10
Nevertheless, an abridged version of the book was
published in small runs, f irst in Germany in 1998, then
in Poland, St. Petersburg, and in 2002 by the publish-
ing house of Kaliningrad University. Only 20 years
later was a complete folio containing a large number of
photographs published by the regional printing house
(Vostochnaya …, 2018).
The history of the ordeal of the “history of re-set-
tlers” fully reflects the transformation of the world-
view shared by Kaliningraders: it has become import-
ant not to forget the past, but to remember everything
that happened. The refrain of public presentations of
the book sounded arguments about the invaluableness
of eyewitness testimonies and proposals to collect the
memories of friends and relatives not only about the
war and postwar period, but also about the “thaw” and
“stagnation” eras. It was immediately discovered that
modern schoolchildren and young people do not know
how to talk with their parents, they don’t know either the
10“There was a feeling of a temporary stay, and it was especially
felt that we are strangers here.” A new edition of the legendary
book East Prussia through the Eyes of Soviet Re-Settlers is being
published in Kaliningrad. Information portal Klops.
https://special.klops.ru/pereselenie. Accessed November 13,
2020.

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VENDINA et al.
history of the country, or the history of their families (f.,
sociologist). Training seminars were held, and as a
result, about 200 h of interviews with stories about
everyday life during the Soviet era were collected. The
depoliticization of the regional historical narrative
contributed to the fact that family legends entered the
public space, populated it, and “domesticated” the
media of cities and towns in the region: this process
turned out to be no less painful than the dissident truth
about the Soviet regime.
The rethinking of local history through the events
of private life first affected the German specifics of the
region. Still, in the opinion of Kaliningraders, it was
culture. The most striking example is the opening in
2014 of the AltesHaus apartment museum, which tells
about the way of life of townspeople in prewar Königs-
berg. Then the trend of humanizing local history
began to spread to the Soviet past. The founders of the
museum of everyday German life also intended to
show the complexity of the structure of Soviet society
and the variety of styles and lifestyles of Kaliningrad-
ers. This concept went far beyond the clichéd notions
of Soviet people as an indistinguishable gray mass. The
new exhibit, accompanied by recordings of oral sto-
ries, should give an idea of life in a Kaliningrad “com-
munalka,” where different generations and holders of
different beliefs collided in the cramped space of a
three-room apartment: the family of a sailor-whaler
and his wife, student daughter and teenage son, and a
representative of the local underground, who listened
to “enemy” voices, watched Polish television, and is
engaged in illegal traffics. Although these are small
projects compared to the information campaign
against Germanization, their impact on Kaliningrad’s
identity is great, first of all, because they allow people
to perceive and feel this land as their own, not alien.
DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS
In beginning the research, we set ourselves the goal
of showing the peculiarities and changeability of the
context of formation of the Kaliningrad identity and
highlighting the role of nonideological factors, such as
lifestyle, everyday narratives, and personal experience,
in rethinking a person’s ideas about him/herself,
“his/her” society, etc. A content analysis of interviews
with specialists who shape the regional information
agenda led us to the following conclusions.
First, Kaliningrad society is characterized by sig-
nificant complexity and internal heterogeneity: along
with massively shared ideas, a number of alternative
social beliefs have formed here, allowing people to
comprehend and rethink social and political realities
in their own way. The active cross-border contacts of
the most mobile part of the region’s inhabitants con-
tribute to the introduction of new views on familiar
things, and their diffusion and the filling of Kalinin-
grad identity with new meanings are facilitated by the
compactness of the territory and close intraregional
ties. The dynamism and weak controllability of ongo-
ing changes raises the concern of the ruling elites and
actualizes the problems of maintaining the usual social
order. The main focus is on securitization policy. As a
result, many nonpolitical issues important for the
local society, including those related to issues of cul-
tural heritage and historical memory, are politicized,
turned into security threats, and removed from public
discourse.
Second, the success of the policy of containing
changes in the Kaliningrad identity with the aid of dis-
course tools is largely determined by the inertia and
prevalence of the phenomenon of cultural lag. A quar-
ter of a century later, Soviet and anti-Soviet views are
still in demand, retaining their influence on the inter-
pretation of the facts of modern life. This conclusion
is also confirmed by the results of a study conducted in
Kaliningrad Oblast in 2016 using the methodology of
the World Values Survey project (Inglehart and Wel-
zel, 2011). The region, like Russia as a whole, occupies
an intermediate position on the scale of values
between the poles of traditionalism and modernity
(Kuznetsov, 2017). The legacy of the Soviet system is
still strong here, which presupposed the unity of man
and state, prevented changes in identity and punished
violations. The fight against “Germanization”
observed today in the region fits the same logic of
imposition, prohibitions, and subordination (Alimp-
ieva, 2014). Although society’s conservatism provides
a certain margin of social strength, the chosen ideo-
logical course carries the risk of dogmatism, and
therefore symbolic devastation of politics, preserving
the appearance of consent in the absence of convic-
tions.
Third, the content analysis of the interviews
showed the emergence and strengthening of new nar-
ratives that accentuate fundamentally different views
on life. Provided they are massively distributed, they
can lead to significant social shifts, since they take the
choice of self-identification out of the plane of politi-
cized “truths,” without conflicting with them. Thus, a
keen sense of the specialness of Kaliningrad society
finds a balance in a sense of similarity with other Rus-
sians and the discovery of Russian cultural unity, a
denial of Soviet values in interest in family history, a
wary attitude towards German heritage in conversa-
tion about it as an environment for one’s own life, etc.
Being a derivative of everyday practice, and not of state
ideology, reflexivity adheres a mosaic of opposing
views, working as a mechanism for reconciling incom-
patible and maintaining discursive balance. However,
risks of a different kind arise.
Self-focus and its “I” entails a weakening of ideas
about social obligations and civic consciousness. This
trend is clearly seen in Russian society. According to
Valery Fedorov, head of Russian Public Opinion
Research Center (WCIOM), “Russian people, in con-
trast to Soviet people, are not interested in world

REGIONAL RESEARCH OF RUSSIA Vol. 11 No. 4 2021
IDENTITY OF KALININGRADERS: INFLUENCE OF SOCIAL BELIEFS ON THE CHOICE 541
events, but in themselves, their families, and at most in
the city where they live. Everything else exists for them
on TV, in the news….” (2008, p. 61). Anthony Giddens
(1991) also writes about the phenomenon of “detach-
ment from society,” pointing out that in the modern
world, individuals make excessive requests of others
while evading the demands on themselves. Finding
freedom from social obligations and concern for the
common good, they become prisoners of their desires
and hostages of the search for pleasure.
One might think that such reasoning has little to do
with Kaliningrad Oblast, but many of our interlocu-
tors called a distinctive feature of Kaliningraders a
kind of hedonism. In their opinion, this feature was
expressed not only in the love of comfort, but also in
the tendency to associate ideas of “normal life” with
the practice of traveling to neighboring European
countries, perceived as a huge supermarket and enter-
tainment fair. Another thing is also important: this
hedonism reveals the social and ideological stratifica-
tion of Kaliningrad society. According to surveys, two-
thirds of the region’s residents have rarely been abroad
and have a very average financial situation,11 so that
their hedonism is most likely limited to the usual plea-
sures of life. This suggests that there are profound dif-
ferences in thought and outlook on life between those
who live in a world of traditional beliefs, authority, and
loyalties, and those who share the values of individu-
alism. Our experts undoubtedly belonged to the more
modern part of Kaliningrad society. It is in this envi-
ronment that the transformations described in the
article took place, and precisely this environment pro-
duces shifts in the discursive context of the formation
of the Kaliningrad identity. However, recording the
changes, we can say nothing about the influence of the
new worldview and degree of its penetration into pub-
lic consciousness. A cautious assumption can be
made: the level of pluralism of opinions achieved by
Kaliningrad society does not allow us to speak about
the identity of Kaliningraders in terms of social con-
sensus, but it provides it with the necessary degree of
flexibility and stability due to the balance of differing
ideas and partial overcoming of post-Soviet nihilism.
It is difficult to say how strong such a balance is, since
it can always be disturbed by the struggle between
efforts to maintain identity within the framework of
traditional statist notions and the reflexive practice of
modern society, in which an individual does not com-
mit him/herself to obligatorily follow precepts and
ascriptive social relations.
11The drift of public opinion or Kaliningraders 16 years later.
2019. KMG Research Company. http://kmgroup.ru/wp-con-
tent/uploads/2019/09/Forgo_doc.pdf. Accessed November 13,
2020.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The team of authors is grateful to all the experts who
showed interest in the study and agreed to participate,
answering numerous questions.
FUNDING
The study was supported by the Russian Foundation for
Basic Research (project no. 20-05-00697 “Kaliningrad
Identity in Cross-Border and Cross-Cultural Contexts;”
field research), as well as within the state-ordered research
theme of the Institute of Geography of the Russian Acad-
emy of Sciences (no. 0148-2019-0008 (AAAA-A19-
119022190170-14) “Problems and Prospects for Ru ssia’s
Territorial Development under Conditions of its Uneven-
ness and Global Instability;” analytics.
CONFLICT OF INTEREST
The authors declare no conflict of interest.
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