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Humanitarian sciences in Siberia

2016 year, number

RUSSIA IN THE ARCTIC: PROBLEMS OF STUDYING THE HISTORICAL EXPERIENCE OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE REGION

A.I. Timoshenko, A.Kh. Elert
Institute of History SB RAS, 8, Nikolaeva Str., Novosibirsk, 630090, Russia
Keywords: Arctic, Northern Sea Route, historical experience, state strategy, mobilization methods, special-geographic factors, mineral resources

Abstract

The purpose of the article is to identify major problems connected with studying the historical experience of development of the Russian Arctic and Northern Sea Route. According to the authors, the research objectives should be set taking into account the primary goal of showing within a wide chronological framework the processes associated with the Russian state’s presence in the Arctic territories and water areas. For this purpose it is necessary to determine to what extent the Russian state policy in the Arctic along with the practice of development of Northern territories were affected by the objective and subjective factors, natural constants, changing social and political, technical and economic opportunities. Studying the continuity of the Russian state policy in the Arctic as a territory of major importance for the efficient national development can be viewed as one of the major aspects of research. The authors suggest that the study should focus on the events of the Soviet period when the Arctic strategy was provided with clear prospects for significant capital investments necessary for modernization of the socioeconomic and socio-cultural spheres of the Russian North. In the opinion of the authors, for the benefit of the Russian Arctic Zone the studies should be carried out with interdisciplinary methods and approaches aiming at fundamental analysis of problems connected with historical substantiation of the Russian state’s presence in the Arctic region from ancient times up to the present. The key challenge is to prove the fact that for centuries the Arctic region has been viewed in the Russian state policy as a strategically important territory with great resource and economic potential, while the history of development of the high latitude regions of Russia has been an integral part of tremendous process of Russian advance into Eurasia, formation of the largest state in the world.