Regional Features of Shaping the Ethnic Structure in the Russian Population

Abstract

The interest taken by Russian researchers in studying the ethnic structure of the Russian population is due to a number of factors. First, Russia is a multiethnic country, with both vast areas sparsely inhabited by the small peoples of the North and the Far East, and areas with various ethnic groups concentrated together - the South of Siberia, the Volga region, the North Caucasus. Second, the contemporary migration processes change the ethnic structure of the population in the Russian regions, whereas the distribution of certain peoples comes along with the change in the geography [6]. Third, it has been shown that a high rate of transformation in the ethnic structure can lead to an increase in inter-ethnic tensions in certain regions. All these factors above, revealing the comprehensive nature of the current ethnic processes, account for the respective scientific interest.