Racial and ethnic composition of the population. Racial, ethnic and national composition

Racial composition of Russia. Human races (H.R.) are collections of populations, that is, territorial communities of people, within which marriages take place over many generations much more often than with persons of other communities. Ch.r. are in a state of dynamic equilibrium, change in space and time and at the same time have a certain genetically determined stability. In all basic morphological, physiological and psychological characteristics, there is similarity between all Ch. is large, and the existing differences do not relate to the biologically most important features of the structure and functions of the human body and are manifested in a relatively small number of characteristics. Fully viable and fertile offspring are born from marriages between representatives of any race. The complete biological and socio-cultural usefulness of mixed groups has been proven, which serves as proof of the anti-scientific essence of various racist theories.

There is a widespread idea that modern humanity is divided into three races: “black”, “white” and “yellow”. However, skin color is not the only, and in some cases not the main feature for distinguishing races. Scientists use a set of characteristics to make this distinction.

Currently, some scientists deny the existence of races. However, they leave aside the characterization of morphological racial differences and do not fully illuminate those problems that in the past became the basis for racist perversions of science. On the scale of the genus, the racial differences known to us are striking at the first acquaintance with the diversity of modern humanity.

Among the races modern people, belonging to the island. that subspecies Homo sapiens sapiens, first of all, the largest divisions are distinguished, usually called large races. These are Caucasoid, Mongoloid, Negroid and Australoid. The population of Russia is represented by the first two large races. In the contact zone of large races there are a number of mixed racial types.

Caucasians in general have wavy or straight soft hair different shades, light or dark skin, a wide variety of iris colors (from brown to light gray and blue), strong development of tertiary hair, weak or medium protrusion of the cheekbones, slight protrusion of the jaws, a narrow protruding nose with a high bridge, thin or medium thickness lips. Caucasians are divided into three main groups or branches: southern - with dark skin, predominantly dark eyes and hair; northern - with fair skin, a significant proportion of gray and blue eyes, light brown and blond hair; intermediate, which is characterized by medium-intensive pigmentation. According to the color of the skin, hair and eyes, according to the structure of the facial skeleton and soft parts of the face, according to the proportions of the cerebral part of the skull, often expressed by the cephalic index, and according to some other characteristics, various races of the second order are distinguished among Caucasians.

To the east Within the boundaries of their range, Caucasians have been mixing with Mongoloids since ancient times. As a result of their early mixing, which probably began in the Mesolithic era (10-7 thousand years ago), the Ural race was formed in the north-west of Siberia and in the extreme east of Europe, which is characterized by a combination of intermediate Mongoloid-Caucasian features with some specific features. The laponoid race is close to the Ural race in many ways. Some anthropologists combine these races into one - the Ural-Laponoid races, the features of which are also expressed in a less dramatic form among some Volga peoples.

Ethnic and National composition population of the Russian Federation

* For the category “Avars” the figure is given without taking into account the number of Ando-Tsez groups and Archins, and for the category “Dargins” - without taking into account the Kaitags and Kubachi people.** In 1989, the Ando-Tses and Archins were included in the Avars; The Dargins include the Kaitag and Kubachi people.

There was a decrease in Russians by 3%, and the share of the country's population decreased by 2%. The main reason for the decline is the low birth rate and high death rate. A secondary factor in the reduction is migration outflow. In general, migration plays a positive role, compensating for the decline in the Russian population. An additional source of demographic replenishment is assimilation in favor of the Russian language and ethnic identity among other groups. In general, we can talk about the numerical stagnation of Russians with a tendency to decline due to demographic aging.

The census results once again confirmed that Russia is one of the most multinational states in the world.

National affiliation during the population survey was indicated in accordance with the Constitution Russian Federation by the respondents themselves on the basis of self-determination and was recorded by census workers strictly from the words of the respondents. The census received more than 800 various options population's answers to questions about nationality, the spellings of which often differ from each other only due to the language dialect and the accepted local self-names of ethnic groups. When processing census materials, the population's answers about nationality were systematized into approximately 160 nationalities.

In 2002, there were 23 of the most numerous nationalities, the population of which exceeded 400 thousand people; in 1989, there were 17 such nationalities. Due to population growth, this group included Azerbaijanis, Kabardians, Dargins, Kumyks, Ingush, Lezgins and Yakuts, Jews dropped out due to population decline. As in 1989, the number of seven nations exceeds 1 million people, however, changes have occurred in the composition of this group: during the intercensal period, Chechens and Armenians entered the group, Belarusians and Mordovians left.

So, according to Goskomstat data:

The Russian population is still the largest(about 116 million people) and accounts for almost 80% of the total population. Compared to 1989, its share in the entire population of the country decreased by 1.7 percentage points. This happened mainly due to natural loss, amounting to almost 8 million people, which could not be compensated by the slightly more than three million migration increase of Russians.

Second largest population in the country, as with the previous census, occupied by Tatars, whose number is 5.56 million people (almost 4% of the country's population).

Due to emigration and natural decline, it decreased during the intercensal period number of Jews(from 0.54 million people to 0.23 million people) and Germans(from 0.84 million people to 0.60 million people).

Mainly due to migration growth, the number of Armenians(from 0.53 million people to 1.13 million people), Azerbaijanis(from 0.34 million people to 0.62 million people), Tajiks(from 0.04 million people to 0.12 million people), Chinese(from 5 thousand people to 35 thousand people).

First after the 1926 population census, the number of people who classified themselves as Kryashens(about 25 thousand people). Also, for the first time since the 1897 census, the number of persons who called themselves Cossacks(about 140 thousand people), and a number small peoples Dagestan.

From approximately 1.5 million people, which not filled in answer to the question on the census form about nationality, almost two thirds are living in Moscow, St. Petersburg and the Moscow region.

RACIAL AND ETHNIC COMPOSITION OF THE POPULATION

Human race- a historically established group of people who have similar external (physical) characteristics that are inherited.

Composition and structure human races, (%).

Ethnic groups (peoples)- an established stable community of people united by language, territory, economy, culture, national identity and opposing itself to all other similar groups.

In total, there are 3-4 thousand peoples, or ethnic groups, in the world, some of which have formed into nations, while others are nationalities and tribes. Naturally, with such a number of peoples, their classification is necessary. For population geography highest value have classifications of peoples, firstly, by number and, secondly, by language.

The classification of peoples by numbers indicates, first of all, the extremely large differences between them: from the Chinese, of whom there are already more than 1.3 billion, to the Vedda tribe in Sri Lanka or the Botokuds in Brazil, which number less than 1 thousand people. The bulk of the Earth's population consists of large and especially most big nations, while many hundreds of small nations account for only a few percent of the world's population. But its contribution to world culture Both large and small nations have contributed and continue to contribute.

The classification of peoples by language is based on the principle of their kinship.

All languages ​​are united in language families, which are divided into language groups. The most common of them is the Indo-European family.

The languages ​​of this family are spoken by 150 peoples with a total population of more than 2.5 billion people, belonging to 11 language groups and living in all parts of the world. IN overseas Europe and America, the languages ​​of this family are spoken by 95% of the total population.

More than 1 billion people speak languages ​​of the Sino-Tibetan family, mainly Chinese, more than 250 million speak languages ​​of the Afroasiatic family, mainly Arabic. The number of most other families is much smaller.

In cases where national (ethnic) boundaries coincide with political ones, mononational states; most of them are in Europe, in Latin America, in Australia and Oceania, in the Middle East. There are also binational states- Belgium, Canada. Along with these, there are many countries that represent multinational states; Some of them are home to dozens and even hundreds of peoples. In many cases they have a federal or confederal administrative-territorial structure.

Problems and tests on the topic "Racial and ethnic composition of the population"

• Population size and composition - Population of the Earth 7th grade

  Lessons: 3 Assignments: 8 Tests: 1

• Population and countries of North America - North America 7th grade
• Population and countries of South America - South America 7th grade

  Lessons: 4 Assignments: 10 Tests: 1

• Brazil - South America 7th grade

  Lessons: 4 Assignments: 9 Tests: 1

• Population distribution - Population of the Earth 7th grade

  Lessons: 3 Assignments: 9 Tests: 1

Leading ideas: Population is the basis material life society, an active element of our planet. People of all races, nations and nationalities are equally capable of participating in material production and in spiritual life.

Basic concepts: demography, growth rates and population growth rates, population reproduction, fertility (birth rate), mortality (mortality rate), natural increase (natural increase rate), traditional, transitional, modern type reproduction, population explosion, demographic crisis, demographic policy, migration (emigration, immigration), demographic situation, age and sex structure of the population, age and sex pyramid, EAN, labor resources, employment structure; resettlement and placement of the population; urbanization, agglomeration, megalopolis, race, ethnicity, discrimination, apartheid, world and national religions.

Skills and abilities: be able to calculate and apply indicators of reproduction, security labor resources(EAN), urbanization, etc. for individual countries and groups of countries, as well as analyze and draw conclusions (compare, generalize, determine trends and consequences of these trends), read, compare and analyze age-sex pyramids of various countries and groups of countries; Using atlas maps and other sources, characterize changes in basic indicators across the world, characterize the population of the country (region) according to the plan using atlas maps.

Ethnic composition of the population

Studying any country in geography is impossible without knowledge of the peoples who live in it. Here it is important to know what language this people speaks, and what features of the spiritual and material culture distinguish it from other nations, what is the peculiarity of its demographic behavior. Many sciences study the past and present of peoples: archeology, geography, philosophy and other sciences. But there is also a special science - ethnography (ethnology), which studies the origin of peoples, their main characteristics and properties, and the relationships between them.

The main concept in ethnography is the concept of ethnicity.

Ethnos– (from the Greek éthnos - society, group, tribe, people) a historically established stable community of people, possessing a set of characteristics: common territory and language, relatively stable features of material and spiritual culture and psyche, as well as awareness of its unity and difference from others of the same kind formations, i.e. self-awareness and self-name (according to Yu.V. Bromley

Of the listed characteristics of an ethnic group, not one is absolutely necessary to classify a group of people as a specific nation. Thus, one and the same people can speak two languages ​​(for example, Belarusians speak both Russian and Belarusian languages). And on English language spoken by the British, Australians, New Zealanders, US Americans, Irish and other peoples. As for the commonality of territory, this attribute is not always an obligatory attribute of an ethnic group. For example, those emigrants who moved to permanent place residence in Canada, USA, Brazil. Very difficult inside large group people to find absolute similarity in clothing, food, social behavior. People are always different. And maybe a metropolitan resident of Moscow will be closer in terms of material and spiritual culture to a Parisian or Londoner than to a similar Russian, but living in a village beyond the Urals. Rather, the commonality of territory is a necessary condition for its emergence and existence.

Therefore, the most important element of ethnic identification of any group of people is ethnic identity.

Under ethnic identity It is customary to understand a person’s awareness of his belonging to a certain people (ethnic group), and by self-designation designate this ethnic group with a word.

Sometimes ethnic self-awareness takes on hypertrophied forms, i.e. representatives certain people consider themselves more “significant” in comparison with other peoples living nearby, while achieving the privileges of one people over another in many spheres of life (in the sphere of power, economic structures, symbols, etc.) Such ethnic identity is called nationalism. An extremely aggressive form of nationalism is chauvinism, in which representatives of a certain ethnic group apply ethnic discrimination or forced assimilation to other peoples. Moreover, if these measures reach the extermination of people of another nationality, then such a phenomenon as genocide.

Famous Russian scientist L.N. Gumilyov believes that the ethnic group is in the process of constant development and transformation, has a stage of origin, development, aging and disappearance (now such peoples as the Byzantines, Hellenes, Romans, Huns, Babylonians have already been forgotten, but once these were great peoples who left us traces of our great culture). From the moment of origin to the moment of extinction, about 1200-1550 years pass, and the current “backward peoples”, for example, the peoples of Africa or Oceania, are just ethnic groups at their stage of youth or, on the contrary, old age, and civilized Europeans are arrogant because they can use the accumulated culture of previous centuries of its development.

In our ethnography it is customary to distinguish three stages formation of an ethnos (the so-called staged or temporary types).

The earliest and simplest stage of development of an ethnos is considered clan and tribe. clan and tribe has following signs: specific territory; general signs economic activity; tribal power. Ethnic identity among tribe members is reflected in the idea of ​​a common ancestor. This category is historical and classic example Evenks and Nenets served ( northern peoples, living in the European north of our country) in the recent pre-revolutionary past. Examples modern period some surviving tribes can serve in inaccessible isolated places among the Indians South America, aborigines of Australia, peoples of equatorial Africa.

With growth social division labor, with the advent of class society and the formation of states began to take shape nationalities– the second stage of development of the ethnos. Nationality can be perceived in two senses:

1. Stage of development of an ethnos, occupying an intermediate position between a tribe and a nation. In this case, this group of people has the following characteristics: a single territory, culture, the beginnings of a community economic life and statehood; ethnic self-awareness is already expressed in the awareness of common origin from a particular tribe.

2. Modern ethnic groups that have lost the characteristics of a tribe and have not become nations.

The highest stage of development of an ethnic group is the nation.

Nation can also have two meanings:

§ The highest stage of development of an ethnic group, characterized by the presence of statehood, community ethnic territory, economic life, emergence and spread literary language, recognized as state, by the presence of ethnic identity;

§ The totality of citizens of one state.

Ethnic communities are in constant motion: their numbers change, their gender and age composition changes, some communities disappear, others emerge. All those processes that lead to changes either in some individual elements or in the ethnic group as a whole are called ethnic processes. They are ethnically unifying or ethnically dividing.

At the stage of the emergence and formation of states, ethno-unification processes were most common. Experts mainly distinguish two such processes: consolidation and assimilation. Consolidation is the merging of groups that are close in language and culture into a larger ethnic community or the inclusion of a group close to it into an ethnic community. Thus, from the related tribes of the Krivichi, Radimichi and Dregovichi, such a people as the Belarusians were subsequently formed. Ethnic assimilation- this is the process of “dissolution” of a previously independent ethnic group or some part of it in the environment of another, usually more large ethnic group. It can be natural and violent. With natural assimilation, due to long residence in a foreign country, immigrants acquire the language, culture, and stereotypes of behavior of people in the country of residence. The main way in this case is interethnic marriages. An example of forced assimilation could be the Polishization of Belarusians during the annexation of Belarusian lands to the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, when the Polish language, the Catholic faith, and Polish schools were implanted in our population.

Not today precise definition the number of peoples, but the most common value for the number of peoples is 2000 – 2500, which are at various stages of development. The most widespread among geographers are classification of peoples by number and language.

By population the grouping of peoples was proposed by S.I. Brook. The largest nations, whose number exceeds 100 million people. are: Chinese, Hindustani, US Americans, Bengalis, Russians, Brazilians, Japanese, Punjabis. These 8 nations account for about 41% of the total world population. Nations with a population of 50 to 100 million make up about another 17% of the population. Today there are 12 such peoples. But most of all (more than 180) peoples have a population of 1 to 5 million people. Although together they account for only 8% of the world's population.

The most common is linguistic classification of peoples world (based on the relationship of languages). The taxonomic ranks of the peoples of the world adopted in the linguistic classification of peoples are as follows:

§ Subgroup

§ Division

In the linguistic classification of the peoples of the world, it is customary to distinguish the following families: Indo-European, Sino-Tibetan, Niger-Congo family, Semitic, Berber, Cushitic, Chadian, Austronesian, Dravidian, Altai, Ural-Yukaghir, Austroasiatic, Paratai, Nilo-Saharan, North Caucasian, Kartvelian, Miao-Yao family, Australian, Eskimo- Aleutian, Chukchi-Kamchatka, Papuan families, families of Indian peoples, Andaman.

Some peoples occupy an isolated position, i.e. do not belong to any named family (Ainu, Basque, Nivkh, Burishi, Hoti, Kusunda).

Racial and ethnic (national) composition of the population

In resolving issues related to the justification of the location of productive forces, great importance has the study of the racial and ethnic (national) composition of the population, i.e. the ratio of representatives of individual races and peoples, their distribution, legal status, labor skills, etc.

All of humanity characteristic features The external appearance of people is usually divided into three big races: Caucasoid, Mongoloid and equatorial.

Representatives of the Caucasian race, constituting 47% of the total number of inhabitants of the Earth, lived in Europe, North Africa, the Near and Middle East and India before the great geographical discoveries, and later settled throughout the world. People of the Mongoloid race, constituting 37% of the world's population, live mainly in the Eastern and South-East Asia. The indigenous population of America, the Indians, also belong to the Mongoloid race. Representatives of the equatorial, or Negro-Australoid, race (about 5% of the Earth's population) live mainly in Africa.

The rest of the planet's inhabitants (about 11-12%) belong to mixed and transitional racial groups, formed as a result of migrations and mixing of racial types.

Large races, in turn, are divided into so-called small races. For example, the Caucasian race is divided into northern, Baltic, Alpine and a number of other small races.

Human races-- a group of people connected by a common origin and external physical signs(skin color, hair type, facial features, etc.), formed in the distant past under the influence of the natural environment. These traits are mainly of an adaptive nature, acquired by humans as a result of adaptation to the conditions of the natural environment.

Nations(peoples, ethnic groups) were formed as society developed, usually from representatives of several small or large races.

The characteristic features of an established nation are: common territory, language, economic life, national culture, a sense of patriotism.

Thus, peoples (ethnic groups) are groups of people united by the historically established unity of language, territory, economic life and culture, and national identity. There are about 4 thousand peoples in the world, which can be classified according to various criteria, including size and language.

The numerous peoples (from 100 million or more people) include: Chinese - Han (representatives of the Han ethnic group live mainly in China and make up more than 95% of the population of this country), Hindustani (residents of India, make up about a quarter of the population of this country), Americans (USA), Bengalis (the main population of Bangladesh and the Indian state of West Bengal), Punjabis (mainly residents of Pakistan and the Indian state of Punjab), Biharis (residents of the Indian state of Bihar, Bangladesh, Nepal), Russians, Brazilians, Japanese, Mexicans, Javanese.

The number of most peoples is small - less than 1 million people.

The classification of peoples by language is based on the principle of their kinship, i.e., taking into account the relatedness of the origin of the language. On this basis, all peoples are united into linguistic families. There are about 20 such families in total. The most common of them is the Indo-European family, its languages ​​are spoken by almost half of all humanity. Included Indo-European family Slavic, Romance, Germanic, Celtic, Baltic and other language groups are distinguished. Sino-Tibetan, Altai, Uralic, Caucasian, Niger-Kordofanian, Semitic-Hamitic families of languages ​​are also widely spoken.

In accordance with the national composition of the population, all countries of the world are divided into single-national and multinational. In general, the world is dominated by multinational states, some of which are home to dozens and even hundreds of peoples. Representatives of such states can be India, China, Indonesia, Pakistan, Iran, Russia, the USA, and most African countries. Examples of single-national states are Poland, Hungary, Germany (in Europe), Chile (in Latin America), Japan, Korea, Bangladesh (in Asia), Australia.

49. Ethnic (national) composition of the world population

The study of the ethnic (national) composition of the population is a science called ethnology(from Greek ethnos - tribe, people), or ethnography. Formed as an independent branch of science in the second half of the 19th century, ethnology still maintains a close connection with geography, history, sociology, anthropology and other sciences.

The basic concept of ethnology is the concept of ethnicity. Ethnicity is a stable community of people that has developed in a certain territory and, as a rule, has common language, some common features culture and psyche, as well as general self-awareness, i.e., awareness of its unity, in contrast to other similar ethnic formations. Some scientists believe that none of the listed characteristics of an ethnic group is decisive: in some cases main role territory plays, in others - language, in others - cultural features, etc. (In fact, for example, the Germans and Austrians, the British and Australians, the Portuguese and Brazilians speak the same language, but belong to different ethnic groups, and the Swiss, on the contrary, they speak four languages ​​and form one ethnic group.) Others believe that the defining feature should still be considered ethnic identity, which is also usually fixed in a certain self-designation(ethnonym), for example, “Russians”, “Germans”, “Chinese”, etc.

The theory of the emergence and development of ethnic groups is called theories of ethnogenesis. Until recently, Russian science was dominated by the division of peoples (ethnic groups) into three stage types: tribe, nationality and nation. At the same time, they proceeded from the fact that tribes and tribal unions - as communities of people - historically corresponded to the primitive communal system. Nationalities were usually associated with the slave-owning and feudal system, and nations as higher form ethnic community- with the development of capitalist and then socialist relations (hence the division of nations into bourgeois and socialist). IN Lately due to the revaluation of the previous formational approach, which was based on the doctrine of historical continuity of socio-economic formations, and with an increasing focus on modern civilizational approach, many previous provisions of the theory of ethnogenesis began to be revised, and in scientific terminology – as a generalizing one – the concept of “ethnos” began to be used more and more widely.

In connection with the theory of ethnogenesis, it is impossible not to mention one fundamental dispute that has long been waged by domestic scientists. Most of them adhere to the view of ethnicity as historical-social, historical-economic phenomenon. Others proceed from the fact that ethnicity should be considered a kind of bio-geo-historical phenomenon.

This point of view was defended by geographer, historian and ethnographer L. N. Gumilev in the book “Ethnogenesis and Biosphere of the Earth” and his other works. He considered ethnogenesis to be a primarily biological, biospheric process associated with passionarity a person, that is, with his ability to supercharge his forces to achieve a great goal. In this case, the condition for the emergence of passionary impulses that influence the formation and development of an ethnic group is not solar activity, but a special state of the Universe, from which ethnic groups receive energy impulses. According to Gumilyov, the process of existence of an ethnos - from its origin to its collapse - lasts 1200–1500 years. During this time, it goes through phases of rise, then breakdown, obscuration (from the Latin obscurous - darkened, in the sense of reactionary) and, finally, relict. When the highest phase is reached, the largest ethnic formations—superethnoses—emerge. L.N. Gumilyov believed that Russia entered a phase of recovery in the 13th century, and in the 19th century. moved into a phase of breakdown, which in the 20th century. was in its final stage.

After becoming familiar with the concept of ethnicity, you can move on to considering the ethnic composition (structure) of the world's population, that is, its distribution according to the principle of ethnicity (nationality).

First of all, naturally, the question arises about the total number of ethnic groups (peoples) inhabiting the Earth. It is usually believed that there are from 4 thousand to 5.5 thousand. More exact figure It is difficult to name, since many of them have not yet been sufficiently studied, and this does not allow us to distinguish, say, a language from its dialects. In terms of numbers, all nations are distributed extremely disproportionately (Table 56).

Table 56

GROUPING OF PEOPLES ACCORDING TO THEIR NUMBER (1992)

Analysis of table 56 shows that in the early 1990s. 321 nations, numbering more than 1 million people each, accounted for 96.2% of the total population of the globe. Including 79 nations with a population of more than 10 million people accounted for almost 80% of the population, 36 nations with a population of more than 25 million people accounted for about 65%, and 19 nations with a population of more than 50 million people each accounted for 54% of the population. By the end of the 1990s. number of most large nations increased to 21, and their share in the world population approached 60% (Table 57).

It is not difficult to calculate that the total number of 11 nations, each of which numbers more than 100 million people, is about half of humanity. And at the other pole there are hundreds of small ethnic groups living mainly in tropical forests and in the regions of the North. Many of them number less than 1,000 people, such as the Andamanese in India, the Toala in Indonesia, the Alakaluf in Argentina and Chile, and the Yukaghir in Russia.

Table 57

NUMBER OF THE LARGEST NATIONS OF THE WORLD AT THE BEGINNING OF THE XXI CENTURY.

No less interesting and important is the question of the national composition of the population of individual countries of the world. In accordance with its characteristics, five types of states can be distinguished: 1) single-national; 2) with a sharp predominance of one nation, but with the presence of more or less significant national minorities; 3) binational; 4) with a more complex national composition, but relatively homogeneous ethnically; 5) multinational, with a complex and ethnically diverse composition.

First type states are quite widely represented in the world. For example, in foreign Europe, about half of all countries are practically single-national. These are Iceland, Ireland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Germany, Poland, Austria, Czech Republic, Slovenia, Italy, Portugal. In foreign Asia there are much fewer such countries: Japan, Bangladesh, Saudi Arabia, and some small countries. There are even fewer of them in Africa (Egypt, Libya, Somalia, Madagascar). And in Latin America, almost all states are single-national, since Indians, mulattoes, and mestizos are considered parts of single nations.

Countries second type are also quite common. In foreign Europe these are Great Britain, France, Spain, Romania, and the Baltic countries. In foreign Asia - China, Mongolia, Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Iraq, Syria, Turkey. In Africa - Algeria, Morocco, Mauritania, Zimbabwe, Botswana. IN North America– USA, in Oceania – Australia and New Zealand.

Third type countries is much less common. Examples include Belgium and Canada.

Countries fourth type with a rather complex, although ethnically homogeneous composition, are most often found in Asia, Central, Eastern and South Africa. They also exist in Latin America.

Most characteristic countries fifth type– India and Russia. This type also includes Indonesia, the Philippines, and many countries in Western and Southern Africa.

It is known that recently, in countries with a more complex national composition, interethnic contradictions have noticeably worsened.

They have different historical roots. Thus, in countries that emerged as a result of European colonization, oppression of the indigenous population (Indians, Eskimos, Australian aborigines, Maoris) continues. Another source of controversy is the underestimation of the linguistic and cultural identity of national minorities (Scots and Welsh in Great Britain, Basques in Spain, Corsicans in France, French Canadians in Canada). Another reason for the intensification of such contradictions was the influx of tens and hundreds of thousands of foreign workers into many countries. IN developing countries interethnic contradictions are associated primarily with the consequences of the colonial era, when the boundaries of possessions were drawn for the most part without taking into account ethnic boundaries, as a result of which a kind of “ethnic mosaic” arose. Constant contradictions on national grounds, reaching the point of militant separatism, are especially characteristic of India, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Ethiopia, Nigeria, DR Congo, Sudan, Somalia, and many other countries.

The ethnic composition of the population of individual countries does not remain unchanged. Over time, it gradually changes, primarily under the influence ethnic processes, which are divided into processes of ethnic division and ethnic unification. Separation processes include those processes in which a previously unified ethnic group either ceases to exist or is divided into parts. Unification processes, on the contrary, lead to the merging of groups of people of different ethnic background and the formation of larger ethnic communities. This occurs as a result of interethnic consolidation, assimilation and integration.

Process consolidation manifests itself in the merging of ethnic groups (or parts thereof) that are close in language and culture, which as a result turn into a larger ethnic community. This process is typical, for example, of Tropical Africa; it also happened in former USSR. Essence assimilation lies in the fact that individual parts of an ethnic group or even an entire people, living among another people, as a result of long-term communication, assimilate its culture, perceive its language and cease to consider itself belonging to the previous ethnic community. One of important factors such assimilation is served by mixed nationally marriages. Assimilation is more typical for economically developed countries with long-established nations, where these nations assimilate less developed ones national groups of people. And under interethnic integration understand the convergence of different ethnic groups without merging them into a single whole. It occurs in both developed and developing countries. It can be added that consolidation leads to the consolidation of ethnic groups, and assimilation leads to a reduction in national minorities.

Russia is one of the most multinational states in the world. It is inhabited by more than 190 peoples and nationalities. According to the 2002 census, Russians make up more than 80% of the total population. In second place in terms of numbers are the Tatars (more than 5 million people), the third are the Ukrainians (over 4 million), and the fourth are the Chuvash. The share of each of the other nations in the country's population did not exceed 1%.