Class rivalry in ethno-national migration: Soviet intelligentsia vs. the Russian middle class in Israel

Abstract

While most research on stigmatization in migration deals with the prejudice of locals toward immigrants, this article analyzes the symbolic rivalry and contest vividly present in the intra-group Russian-language immigrant discourse in Israel. Drawing on our recent digital ethnography, we focus on the heated discussion between the two social class-based groups – the Soviet-Jewish ‘Intelligentsia’, oldcomers from the Soviet Union to Israel, and the recent migration from Putin’s Russia. If the first is a remnant of the Soviet social structure, the latter is the symbolic successor of the former and is part of the post-Soviet transition. In our interpretation of the harsh digital exchange, we build on the conceptualization of educated middle-class migration and then employ the theoretical lenses of scapegoating and Orientalization – mechanisms of inter-group stigmatization that are both universal and driven by particular scripts of social relations. Our analysis contributes to understanding the broader context of contemporary migration by demonstrating the role played by significant social categories borrowed from home in post-migration processes and group relations. In addition, the article offers a pioneering sociological portrait of the new post-Soviet immigrant group leaving Russia under Putin’s regime.

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