The Demographic Echo of War and Social Mobility in Russia

press release: 

Speaker: Gordey Yastrebov, PhD researcher, European University Institute 

When: Thursday, April 13th, 4pm (Refreshments starting at 3:45)

Where: Room 206, Ingraham Hall, 1155 Observatory Drive

Sponsored by CREECA and UW-Madison Sociology Department

About the talk: The Second World War has left a traceable scar in Russia’s population age structure by causing a sizeable discontinuity in the sizes of generations, which were born during the war and immediately after it. The initial momentum of this discontinuity was so strong (and the processes that could potentially counter it so weak) that the ripples it sent through the population age structure continue to be visible even today. Russian demographers metaphorically term this phenomenon the ‘demographic echo of war’, and it is known to be a strong factor affecting Russia’s economy. However, much less is known about the implications of this factor for social mobility of Russians, i.e. how individuals born to cohorts of particular size fared in their life course. Moreover, existing research, which explored the relationship between demographic cycles and personal welfare, is heavily biased towards Western countries (mainly the US) that represent a different demographic and institutional context. In my talk I will present the results of my current dissertation research, in which I attempt to shed light on this issue in Russia by exploring educational and occupational careers of different generations of Russians using data from Max Planck Education & Employment Survey and Russian Longitudinal Monitoring Survey.

About the Speaker: Gordey Yastrebov is a 3rd year PhD researcher at the European University Institute (Florence, Italy), currently on a short-term exchange visit to UW-Madison. He received his BA in Economics and MA in Economic Sociology at the National Research University Higher School of Economics (Moscow, Russia), and a Candidate degree in Sociology awarded by the Institute of Sociology of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Apart from exploring the link between demography and the structure of social inequality in Russia, he is more broadly interested in other micro- and macro-level explanations of social stratification in modern societies. His most recently published work includes the co-authored chapters on social inequalities in Russia’s educational system in Models of Secondary Education and Social Inequality (Ed. by Blossfeld et. al, Edward Elgar Publishing 2016) and Childcare, Early Education and Social Inequality (Ed. by Blossfeld et. al, Edward Elgar Publishing 2017). He is also a co-editor of the journal Mir Rossii (Russian sociological quarterly).