Impact of the Ussr State Policy on the Vepsians’ Assimilation in the 20th Century

Abstract

The article describes the impact of the USSR state policy on the socio-cultural development of the Vepsian ethnic group in the 1920-80s. The Vepsians are considered as one of the Finno-Ugric nations affected by different aspects of the USSR national policy (from the national localization in the 1930s to the struggle against the so-called "bourgeois nationalism" and mass political repressions after 1938). The authors of the work pay special attention to the reasons of the Vepsians’ migration, considerable reduction of the traditional inhabitance areas and, finally, their assimilation. The aim of the article is to classify these factors and to establish the correlation between their negative impact and the dramatic decrease of the Vepsian population from 32800 in 1926 to 12500 in 1989 (according to the census reports).

DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2015.v6n3p677