Autumn anti-migrant escalation

Following the "Local" movement, the "Young Guard of United Russia" has joined the anti-migrant campaign currently unfolding in Russia. The unfolding of the campaign looks especially alarming against the background of preparations for the celebration of November 4, when, even without additional factors, there is an aggravation of nationalist sentiments.

On October 31, 2008, the announcement of the action "Our money - our people!!!" was published on the website of the organization. "We demand to expel labor migrants from Russia and close the border for them for the next year, give all jobs to Russians, and adopt relevant legislative acts," the announcement of the action says.

is also expected According to Kommersant, in addition to the officially scheduled pickets in Moscow, St. Petersburg, Nizhny Novgorod, Chelyabinsk, Novosibirsk and Khabarovsk, "patrolling the streets in search of guest workers" .

Despite the fact that ethnic terms are not used in the slogans of the MGER, it is quite obvious that the organization considers "migrants" precisely as an ethnic, and not as a social category, since the statement does not explicitly imply that a "migrant worker" can be a Russian citizen.

It is easy to see that the demands and intentions of the MGER repeat the rhetoric and intentions (including illegal ones - patrols and document checks) of the DPNI and the "Locals". The fundamental difference between the statements of the "Young Guard" and their predecessors is that their demands no longer use demagogic statements about "illegal immigrants" - the MGER demand applies to everyone without exception and without regard to the status of labor migrants.

Formally, the demands are justified by purely economic interests caused by the crisis.

The Molodogvardeytsev have already been supported by deputies of the State Duma from United Russia. So, on October 19, Andrei Isaev made a statement, the meaning of which boiled down to the following: "When inviting labor migrants, we must be prepared for the fact that when they are thrown into the street, either we ourselves or our relatives will receive a brick on the head." Supported MGER and the head of the executive committee of United Russia, State Duma deputy Andrey Vorobyov.

The campaign was also supported by Moskovsky Komsomolets, which immediately responded to the initiative of MGER with a message that "according to the metropolitan police, visitors from Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and other countries of Central Asia are guilty of seventy percent of cases of street crime" (We are not aware of cases when the police department Moscow has ever made such statements - ed. ).

The MGER initiative was also unconditionally enthusiastic among DPNI. The organization perceived the actions of the pro-Kremlin movement, which was extremely dependent in its activity, as an unequivocal change in state policy, a vector close to the populist actions of the fall of 2006 : “This means that we will soon achieve our goal. It is unlikely that these young people would have made such a decision without a decree from the Kremlin Everyone understands that in connection with the crisis, an uprising of migrant workers is likely ," DPNI leader A. Belov commented on these actions to MGER

Against the backdrop of the clearly unfolding anti-migrant campaign, it looks like some curiosity that almost simultaneously the Russian government increased the quota for labor migrants from 1.8 to 3.4 million people. (The corresponding order of the Ministry of Health and Social Development of October 16 was published in Rossiyskaya Gazeta on October 31). This, of course, is a coincidence, and, as far as we know, the order of the ministry is of a technical nature, aimed at correcting miscalculations in the documentation discovered at the beginning of the year.

But the launch of an anti-migrant campaign by a de facto state youth organization, with simultaneous government actions to increase quotas for labor migrants, looks like a clear gap between the state's attempts to combine economically necessary actions with political anti-migrant populism.

**In the center of events // TVC. 2008. October 19.

Savina Ekaterina. Impatience and work: // "Young Guard" declared an anti-crisis war on legal migration**

Sources

• "Our money - to our people!": "Young Guard" demands to close the borders of Russia from labor migrants // Official website of MGER. 2008. October 31.
• Smolyakova Tatiana. Additional call: Regions have increased quotas for attracting foreigners // Russian newspaper. 2008. October 31.
• Kindling of national friendship // Moscow's comsomolets. 2008. October 31.