Between the “Global North” and the “Global South”: What Could Suburbanization Look Like in Eastern Russia?

Abstract

This article analyzes suburban growth in Eastern Russia, using Irkutsk as a case study, and continues the discussion on Russian suburbanization. It demonstrates, through an analysis of migration flows within the suburban area, that processes contributing to suburban growth coexist not only within a single region but also within individual suburban settlements. These include centripetal urbanization migration, classical suburbanization, urban sprawl, and the transformation of dachas as a development of Soviet suburban growth. The combination of such diverse processes in terms of social content forms an eclectic landscape in the suburbs, where very different forms of social organization coexist. Such eclecticism, characteristic of transitional states, has become a key feature of the Russian suburbs. This allows for the adoption of Tuvikin’s model of the “post-Soviet” as a de-territorialized concept. This model implies a non-contradictory combination of continuity in development set by the socialist past and capitalist innovations in the socio-spatial development of the city as a basic characteristic of such urban and suburban development. Additionally, understanding the connotations of “post-Soviet” enables a broader perspective to define suburban development in Eastern Russia as a model of the “Global East” in the interpretation of Müller.