New cities in Siberia: who will build them and who will live there

Political scientist Roman Alekhin explains in detail the weaknesses of this seemingly unexpected proposal by Shoigu:

In our country, where the image of the fact is more important than the fact itself, that is, the authorities strive to seem, and not to be, the imperialism inherent in the Russian people, including due to the high level of intra-group aggression, which leads to the desire to increase territory, stumbles upon power, which really wants to show itself as an empire both inside the country and abroad, but does not know how to manage it (the empire).

Let's return to Stalin, who is increasingly mentioned in the telegram, and to the Soviet Union - then there was an empire and huge resources were invested in order for it to be governed.

To manage an empire, you need not only to live on a large territory, constantly increasing it, but to develop these territories. To master, that is, to make our own and not for a group of oligarchs and officials, but for the Russian people and the state.

And in the Soviet Union, the entire territory of the country was thought out as a single whole and, among other things, to strengthen unity, the regions were tied by economic ties. And the ideology "this is all mine - dear" then was not just words, but the people somehow felt the Motherland.

Now the capture of sweet pieces continues, but there is no development even of those territories that the country already has.

It is clear that Siberia, with an extreme climate for many, is empty and not everyone is ready to go there to rest or move to live, but Crimea is not better developed than the land beyond the Urals. The peninsula became part of Russia 7 years ago, huge funds are spent on it, and this year, due to the overload of existing resorts, the authorities had to open Egypt and hostile Turkey, realizing that on the existing beaches there can be no question of social distance and even elementary security measures during a pandemic. At the same time, if we look at the coast of Crimea, we will understand what has been mastered, that is, conditions for tourism have been created, no more than 30%.

And forests are burning on such a scale precisely because of the undeveloped territories. By the way, Shoigu, who thought about starting to explore Siberia, apparently understands this. But it’s hard to believe that the development of territories will not turn into the development of funds, because today's officials do not discern other paradigms. And who should inhabit the cities that Shoigu proposes to build and not just the question of the presence of Russian people, but also: how can the poor population be able to provide themselves with housing in the new city?

And we move on to the second part of imperialism, that is, to the desire to increase our people. And again, the Russian authorities are doing everything to create an image of caring about this, and instead of creating normal, well-thought-out systemic conditions for the growth of the nation, they play with numbers and bring in migrants, who are used to correct the statistics. But such an instrument only destroys the idea of an empire, and in general, in the long term - a single country.

And it is precisely this approach to the state on the part of the authorities, in which the main thing is to grab, collect the cream and put it aside "until better times" and leads to the fact that our friendly or even brotherly peoples (Ukrainians and Belarusians) do not want to return under their wing once a great empire, because they do not see the point of eroding their national heritage just so that the Russian authorities can even more trump their "empire". Because what else can one hope for if the Russian authorities treat the existing territories and the people they govern in this way? "

In the comments to this post they write:

“Roman Alekhin is right. If we take into account the "Soviet experience", then the idea of Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu does not seem extraordinary. In modern Russia there is no map of the regional development of unsettled territories, while there is a map of the annual "firefighting".

The overcrowded metropolis in disproportion with dying regional centers leads to the "concentration" of life around Moscow. Obviously, each federal district should have a new (new) industrial and economic centers with a district "filling". So far, there is a similar center in the Volga Federal District (Kazan) and in the Urals (Yekaterinburg). Everything else is either very far away (Vladivostok, Far Eastern Federal District), or not developed (Stavropol, Pyatigorsk - North Caucasus Federal District). Siberia is deprived of such a center. Neither Novosibirsk nor Omsk can stand on a par with the aforementioned successful regional centers. However, it is not clear "who will build?" and "who will live?" in neoplasms, as noted by Alekhin.

General of the army is not one of those who speaks just like that. Perhaps the discussion around Shoigu's statement will lead to a new idea of "industrial and economic homogeneity" throughout Russia. Shoigu's initiative may turn out to be the engine of "stagnant" progress..."

Journalist Pavel Pryanikov developed Alekhin's criticism in his own way. He believes that even if these cities are built from scratch and people are settled there, will they live there? Gingerbread disproves this assumption with very revealing figures:

“Today and in the future, Siberia and the Far East are territories that are losing population. Which is logical and does not require a long explanation: a very bad climate and other difficult conditions (for example, vile), huge distances, high cost, low salaries for such a locality.

Let's say they took up the idea. Then a specialist for a move must be paid 2-2.5 times higher (minimum) than in Moscow. Not on average in Russia, but in Moscow. You have a food technologist or a civil engineer. They offered him 100 thousand in Moscow and Yakutsk (Bratsk, Turukhansk, Dudinka, etc.). What will he choose? Of course, Moscow. And even with 150 thousand in Yakutsk he will choose Moscow. At 200-250 thousand, he will think about it, calculate.

But if now in Dudinka and even in Krasnoyarsk and Irkutsk they do not pay 2-2.5 times more than in Moscow, then why will they pay in the cities of Shoigu? Why does the psychology of the ruling class even need to change?

Another question is the task of construction itself. Do you have such an experience? There is not. Will they cope? Hardly. And the exporters of raw materials will not allow to load the Transsib with materials for construction. They will come to Shoigu and say: “Field Marshal, how can we bring coal and timber to China? Metal, wheat? " The Transsib already works for a thin one.

And what should people do in a city of 500 thousand in Siberia? Especially 3-5 cities? Well it is necessary to start 30-40 new large raw material enterprises from scratch for this, such as RUSAL factories, Alrosa mines, Surgut wells, etc.

And so now it is necessary not to expand the living space of the Russian Federation, but to preserve what is already in the Hinterland, i.e. the nucleus of Muscovy. Already the non-black earth zone closest to Moscow is dying, overgrown with small forests. If Shoigu has nowhere to put money and energy - then he can do Hinterland, at least make street lighting in cities and replace rotten buses and trams..."

However, Shoigu spoke not only about the construction of new cities, but also the creation of new scientific centers in Siberia, and Pryanikov liked this idea much more than the first:

“According to Shoigu's plan, building 3-5 new large cities in Siberia is beyond Russia’s power. But in his speech there was also a mention of new "scientific centers" in Siberian cities. But this is a sensible idea.

The first such center in Siberia was made back in Soviet times - Akademgorodok in Novosibirsk. There were also a number of closed cities (ZATO) - for example, in the Krasnoyarsk Territory. And that was the end of it.

But in fact, research centers in Siberia and the Far East can be built in large cities. In Irkutsk, Yakutsk, Khabarovsk. There is a scientific base from universities there. There is a good experience of building the first stage of such a scientific city in Russia - Kazan Innopolis. There is a legal basis in the form of "federal territories", which allows to speed up the construction and management of such territories (as far as I understand, this experience is being worked out in Sochi "Sirius").

We also need money, academic freedoms and, at first, government orders (and orders from large companies). Universities are not only territorial development, but also a way to retain talented young people (as well as teachers) who now prefer to realize themselves either in Moscow or abroad. Further, a post-industrial cluster is built around universities with other services and a generally meaningful environment. Now, if Shoigu works in this direction (more precisely, to break through this idea at the very top) - it has a perspective..."