Institute of Private Land in Cross-Border Zones of Southern Russia: Ethnic Aspect

The paper presents intermediate results of a comparative analysis of land reforms conducted on the cusps of XIX– XX and XX–XXI centuries. It focuses on their medium- and long-term impact on the native territories of Russia’s southern frontier. The article describes the correlation of state and ethnic interests in land management and formation of the private land institute. The research owes its relevance to the problems of the system of regional ethnological monitoring, as well as that of the effect of the national and agricultural state policy on the scientific forecasting of the changes in the ethno-social situation. The corruption-based principle of social stratification was initially incorporated in the mechanism of land market formation proposed by the state. In ethnic regions, the reorganization of land ownership triggered a secondary process of ethnic stratification. As a result, allocated shares concentrated in the hands of ethnic nobility families, thus shaping a social stratum during the Soviet period. The research was a pilot study of the natural resource management systems used by ethnic and migrant communities in the southern frontier and social policy of the late XIX – early XXI centuries. The author concludes that the Russian government retained levers of direct influence on the processes of: a) administrative and territorial structure; b) settlement system and population structure, including ethnic; c) social strata of land owners; d) traditional land use systems and subsistence of rural enclave transformation. This trend made it possible to consider the history of Russian state land policy in the context of the general course of national policy, which is part of interdisciplinary research that unites history, ethnology, politics, sociology, and economics.