Will and fate: Siberian frontier as a search for paradise

Siberia occupies about two-thirds of the territory of the Russian Federation. In the present article the authors consider the moral and political bases of the Siberian frontier as a phenomenon of development of this vast territory that is unique in its scale and speed. There are stereotypes of the Western society, and sometimes of the Russians themselves, about the "dark Siberia": emptiness, cold, night, bears, hard labor, when the Siberian world just shrinks to the abbreviation GULAG. No doubt, the extreme climatic conditions of the region as well as the horrors of Siberian camps should not be ignored. At the same time, it should be recalled that, paradoxically, this land, in particular because of its vastness and remoteness from Moscow and Saint-Petersburg, has been considered for centuries as a place of refuge and asylum, as the promised land, where new social practices can take place, as a land of freedom in isolation from an authoritarian and predatory "center". The authors consider the dichotomic concepts 'will' and 'fate' as mental background of massive waves of migration to Siberia - Cossack and peasant ones respectively. Human diversity has created a kind of a "spiritual reservoir" for a potential transformation in Siberia today, as before, for the missionaries of various denominations as a result of a variety of religious interactions and ideas. Finally, through history this region can be considered as a kind of Eden where different and even opposing styles and models of life coexist - the traditional economy of the Siberian peoples and the oil and gas industry. Protective space for somebody, territory of utopias implementation for others, Siberia has also been and continues to be a place of economic migration. For the Russian internal space as well as for the external one, natural resources of Siberia make a real Eldorado of it. In the process of development the content of the myths about Siberia has been changing: from the image of a great desert out of the Urals to the images of terrestrial paradise or hell. It is not always that this image corresponds to reality, but if we use the concept 'Homeland', it is Siberia that as a result of voluntary and forced selection has created a special type of Russians. The very perception of Siberia as 'paradise' or 'hell' is a value basis for the ongoing discussion about the importance of this land for Russia.

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