Ethnicity drift in the oil and gas development and urbanization of the Khanty-Mansi Okrug (1960s-1980s)

The article attempts a historical-dynamic analysis of ethnicity in the period of oil and gas development and urbanization of the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug (KHMAO) in the 1960s-1980s. The work is written on the basis of quantitative and statistical methods of the study of the materials of 1959, 1970, 1979 and 1989 censuses found in the State Archive of Tyumen Oblast and published in collections of the Statistics Department of Tyumen Oblast. The main stages of the formation of the ethnic structure of the population of KHMAO are identified. The main trend in the dynamics of the national structure of the urban population of KHMAO was the strengthening of multi-ethnicity through the fall in the share of the Russians and the increase of the share of other peoples, especially the Ukrainians, the Tatars, the Bashkirs, the Belarusians, the Chuvash, the Azerbaijani and the Moldovans. But in absolute terms, in 1959-1989, almost all the ethnic groups showed population growth, except the indigenous peoples of the area - the Khanty and the Mansi. The characteristics of the ethnic dynamics in the context of the basic and youngest cities in the region are identified. From 1959 to 1970 the largest share of the population in the cities of the district after the Russians belonged to the Tatars. Then came the Ukrainians. In 1979-1989, the place of the Tatars was taken by the Ukrainians. The Tatars became the third largest population group. The interconnection of ethnicity with production identification in oil and construction industries in the region is shown. At the initial stages, the interconnection was caused by the migration of ethnic groups living in the oil-producing areas of the country: the Tatars, the Bashkirs, the Azerbaijanis and other ethnic groups originally from oil-producing regions (the Volga region, Chechnya-Ingushetia, Azerbaijan). In the early 1980s, the increasing multi-ethnicity of the population in KHMAO was the result of a change in the strategy of oil and gas development in the region, whereas the construction industry was announced to be the industrial support of the West Siberian oil and gas complex, and organizations and enterprises of the republics of the Soviet Union and the largest cities and regions of the RSFSR were additionally involved in the development of the construction industry. Thus, builders came to play a crucial role in the formation of the polyethnic composition of the population of KHMAO. Urbanization of the region led to the gradual weakening of ethnic identification in the Soviet period. This is indirectly indicated by the reduced number of people speaking their native language among the Ukrainians, the Bashkirs, the Tatars, the Chuvash, the Germans, and the increased number of these peoples' representatives speaking the Russian language. The author comes to a conclusion that oil and gas development was carried out through the migration of ethnic Russians, Ukrainians, Tatars, Belarusians, Bashkirs, which led to the formation of a multiethnic society in KHMAO. The main trend was to reduce the specific share of the Russian population and to increase the proportion of other ethnic groups. However, in absolute numbers most nationalities increased their population in the region, except for the indigenous peoples of the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug. The ethnic palette in the region was a reflection of production identification of migrants working in the oil industry and in the construction industry.

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