Russia Tries to Address Future of Monocities

Summary

This article discusses a situation that is troubling the monocity Baranchinsky, as well as many other monocities throughout the country. A monocity is one city that is dependent on just one energy source, and one industrial factory supports about 90 percent of the cities people in some way. Baranchinsky is coming close to nonexistence as most of the workers at its only factory have received their tiny pay only once in the last 16 months. The businesses don't want to spend the money, the workers don't want to relocate and the government doesn't want to deal with the instability that comes with unemployment. These monocities, described by citizens as "dying settlements" have had trouble since the fall of Communism. The people don't have the money to leave or the skills to work in a bigger city, leaving them almost trapped in these monocities, waiting for life to improve.

Correlation

Russia has overal experienced a boom in economy since the fall of the Soviet Union. True, there were some downfalls as the country switched from a centrally operated economy to a market economy, but in general the growth of the economy, nationally, has been great. Regionally, however, the effects have not been as good. This is one of the problems that came along with Russia's relatively recent democratization. Twelve percent of russia's population currently lives in these monocities, whose function is to fit the demands of a more socialist, centrally oriented economy. Their function is now becoming obsolete and they are more of a burden to the government as they must now try to find an effective way to address the problem, while they try to deal with multiple global issues at the same time. Bad transportation and lack of proper training to find new jobs have left the people in a sort of quarantine. With the globalization of the larger cities, the economies of these monocities have been hit hard. This relates to what we've learned so far in comparative government because it focuses on the burdens experienced by the people of a recently democratized country, and also problems that can arise from having a large income gap throughout a country.

Photo Credit: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/05/world/europe/05russia.html