2.7.1. Ethnic Nationalism Discourse

In case of Russian nationalists, the perception about Chinese immigration is being constructed through one of the key documents, which continues to have the strongest influence on this group, when it talks about “Chinese problem”. It is an anonymous pamphlet called “China or us”, which was published in 1904 in the Russian city of Kursk. The document states that there “will be war with the yellow race” that can result in a “second Mongolian slavery” or “complete dissolution of Russians in Chinese masses” if Russia turns out to be the losing side (Ohranka; 2013).

The war itself, according to the pamphlet, will happende towards Chinese may resulrding to the pamphlet when 0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 by “peaceful conquest as Chinese will settle in Russia and work as a cheap labor force”; the argument goes on by saying that “cheap laborers will cause poverty and misery among Russians, while China will become stronger through individual contributions of millions of workers of Chinese origin”, llions of workers and will lay its tenacious hands on Russia in the future0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 what may potentially lead to “rich and strong China will easily taking Russia into its tenacious hands, bringing doom to the white race!” (Ohranka; 2013).

As can be seen from above, the pamphlet constructs a rather dark perception of the reality where there is virtually no choice for Russia but to fight China: interestingly, author uses the phrase “second Mongolian slavery” which refers to earlier stages of the Russian history, namely, to that of Mongolian domination when Russia experienced an indirect Mongolian rule and Russian feudal lords were forced to pay tributes to the Golden Horde. Obviously, pamphlet’s main goal is, through historic association, to construct negative views of Chinese as being “occupants” rather than “laborers”.

Taking into account the historical context, 1904 was a time when Sino-Russian relations heavily deteriorated due to Russian involvement in the suppression of the Boxer Rebellion; therefore, this context led to an emergence of Russian anxiety about China for the first time, due to its vast numerical advantage in terms of population. Considering the fact that China today is an economic powerhouse, fears about Chinese might, which are explicitly stated in the pamphlet, became true, what eventually serves as an additional reason for Russian nationalists to base their logic on this document as well as use political language that was created by it. Modern Russian nationalist, however, not only argue along the lines of the pamphlet but also use anti-government rhetoric what is going to be demonstrated on the example of a prominent right-wing activist Alexander Belov.

Alexander Belov is a member of one of the most well-known Russian nationalist organization “Movement Against Illegal Immigration” (or DPNI in Russian): he assumed important positions in this organization throughout its history and took over the leadership during 2008-2010. He is currently a vice-president of another right-wing group which calls itself “Russians”. Belov occasionally appears on non-governmental media channels and has been gaining recognition by using Internet; all in all, he is one of the most well-recognized and well-known nationalists in Russia today.

In an interview, which he gave to a local newspaper “The New Region”, Belov was asked about nationalists’ involvement in the Russian politics as well as about political stance of DPNI. The following fragment of the interview is Belov’s answer to the question “Who DPNI sees as its biggest enemy today?”

His answer was: “I must say that illegal immigrants are not the main enemy, the real threat is the corrupt officials as well as those who have pro-immigration attitudes. They do not realize that today we are talking about biological survival of the Russian people. Anyone who thinks like that does not understand the fact that there are no “peaceful” and law-abiding immigrants. As soon as they have grown-up children, riots and violence immediately occur on the streets of European cities – just look at ethnic riots inu we do not want to admit lly experienced peacefulris. stance of DPNI. 000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 Paris, for example. Migrants of Moscow also have children and we can only guess what awaits us.

You asked me about the anti-Semitism before. This theme is present, but it is not that crucial. From the fact that there are people like Abramovich, Russians will not die. But if 10 million Chinese will come and start to breed here, this will end the Russian biological species. That's what we do not want to allow” (New Region, 2005).

From the above mentioned interview, one can see striking similarities with the pamphlet as such terms as “biological survival of Russian people” or “end of the biological species” are constantly brought and emphasized several times – the pamphlet argues along the same lines, referring to the threat of “white race being doomed”; in addition to that, both of these opinions refer to the fact that there is a threat of massive Chinese influx as millions and millions of Chinese immigrants will move in and breed, what threatens Russian “survival”. Thereby, Belov’s stance serves to be a good example of political language being a defining factor in construction of perceptions – more than 100 years divide Belov and anonymous author, however, the core argument is virtually the same.

However, Belov brings in additional argument which was not present in the pamphlet as he defines “corrupt officials” and “holders of pro-immigration views” as the main threat. If one brings the historical context once again, it turns out that 1904 Russia was dominated by ethnic nationalism, therefore, author of the pamphlet and the czarist government practically shared the same views and were “allies” to some extent; in modern Russia, however, this is not the case, since civic nationalism has replaced its ethnic counterpart and does not allow the latter to affect the decision makingnationalism from the poweration policies at all.re ignored in the decision making ethnic counterpart and, due to authorita. Therefore, Belov addresses this issue to be the main problem, since nationalists can not shape migration policies at all.