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Revision as of 20:44, 13 March 2016 editMy very best wishes (talk \| contribs)Extended confirmed users56,580 edits →Suggest removal: this is not about Soviet Union← Previous edit		Revision as of 20:59, 13 March 2016 edit undoGuccisamsclub (talk \| contribs)Extended confirmed users3,333 edits →Suggest removal Next edit →
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	::::: I agree. FWIW, the phrasing here could be improved: "''According to British medical researchers, the economic shocks associated with wholesale ] was associated with a sharp increase in the death rate''". This is A) awkward B) needlessly attributed. The fact that the death rate skyrocketed in the early 90-s is uncontroversial (we have hard numbers on this - not "estimates"). Neither is the "association"/"correlation" between economic collapse and death rates. It is only statements about ''causation'' that would be potentially controversial. I say change it to: ''The economic shocks associated with wholesale privatization were accompanied by sharp increases in mortality.'' ] (]) 19:55, 13 March 2016 (UTC)		::::: I agree. FWIW, the phrasing here could be improved: "''According to British medical researchers, the economic shocks associated with wholesale ] was associated with a sharp increase in the death rate''". This is A) awkward B) needlessly attributed. The fact that the death rate skyrocketed in the early 90-s is uncontroversial (we have hard numbers on this - not "estimates"). Neither is the "association"/"correlation" between economic collapse and death rates. It is only statements about ''causation'' that would be potentially controversial. I say change it to: ''The economic shocks associated with wholesale privatization were accompanied by sharp increases in mortality.'' ] (]) 19:55, 13 March 2016 (UTC)
	::::::No, this is NOT about "the final decades of the Soviet Union". , and it tells about "post-communist countries". ] (]) 20:44, 13 March 2016 (UTC)		::::::No, this is NOT about "the final decades of the Soviet Union". , and it tells about "post-communist countries". ] (]) 20:44, 13 March 2016 (UTC)
			:::::::As I've already pointed out, your "irrelevance" argument would be more persuasive if: a) you deleted the whole section; b) you did not start off with an entirely different argument about the study being "highly questionable" and a straight-up strawman about "correlation not implying causation". ] (]) 20:59, 13 March 2016 (UTC)

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August 2, 2005	Peer review	Reviewed
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Holodomor

Sub article on holodomor? 8 million genocide man made famine created by USSR — Preceding unsigned comment added by Xelophate (talk • contribs) 00:14, 30 May 2015 (UTC)

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The first archive is a dead link, so I removed it from the article. Other two are OK. Vanjagenije (talk) 21:11, 20 September 2015 (UTC)

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Tatarstan and Chechnya (Ichkeria)

Tatar Autonomous Republic and Chechen-Ingush Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic of the RSFSR made changes to their constitutions just prior to dissolution of the Soviet Union stating that their respective constitutions has precedence over both constitution of the Soviet Union and the Constitution of RSFSR. That might be interpreted as getting independence. Nobody took that seriously at the time. Certainly nobody recognized the sovereignty of those republics, it was the time of strange laws then a district of Moscow city made a similar change in their local laws. For Tatarstan the story remained as a judicial curiosity, for Chechnya/Ichkeria in a couple of years time, it became a claim to legality of separation during the First Chechen War.

The story desreves to be included as a section, but putting Ichkeria and Tatarstan to the infobox without providing any references as direct descendants of the Soviet Union is highly misleading. Alex Bakharev (talk)

Agreed. XavierGreen had attempted this edit originally and reverted himself, but only because the infobox syntax had defeated him. I re-introduced and fixed his edit in a purely gnomish way so that it could be considered. His original comment in the edit summary was: "Tartarstan and Ichkeria also separated from Russia, and left the soviet union prior to its dissolution, they were both later reintegrated into Russia". As you say, it is probably overstating the case. The Chechen-Ingush story made the Western news at the time, but was overtaken by events to become little more than a footnote in history. It would still be nice if we could include the information somewhere in the article. Polly Tunnel (talk) 12:29, 3 March 2016 (UTC)

I think the information should be included in the article, and in the "decendent" countries portion of the infobox. In regards to Tartarstan, it was more than a judicial curiosity, the government in the early 1990's there attempted to assert there sovereignty, issued there own currency, ect, however given that none of the surrounding republics attempted to secede and that Tartarstan was completely surrounded by Russia, the Tartarstan government gradually ceded back there self proclaimed sovereignty to Russia.XavierGreen (talk) 14:06, 3 March 2016 (UTC)

Suggest removal

This edit. Yes, it is sourced, but I see two problems with this. First, this is not about Soviet Union (subject of this page). Second, the study is ridiculous. Yes, there were increased death rate, increased disease, increased unemployment, increased prices, increased murders, increased suicides, etc. during this time. Was it all caused by privatization, economic hardship, crime or something else? The study does not show what was the cause, it only show correlations. My very best wishes (talk) 04:19, 13 March 2016 (UTC)

The correct response is to expand upon the edit - not to remove it. There is no question that the collapse of the USSR and the two subsequent economic shocks (initial privatization and the 1998 crisis) were closely correlated with increased mortality. But as in all cases of mass death, the causes were more complex than "failed economic policy". The collapse of the USSR was followed by impoverishment, stress, collapse of services, increased alcohol abuse, lag-effects of earlier alcohol abuse, crime, as well as ethnic conflicts spearheaded by by the successor states (Russia's total war in Chechnya being the most prominent example). The very same report from Lancet goes into all this complexity at great length, giving particular attention to alcoholism. I also suspect that the 1 million figure is an understatement. maybe it only pertains to the first few years, in order to zero in on the effects of initial collapse. I remember seeing crude excess-death figures that were much higher that this figure - not surprising, since life expectancy plummeted and stayed depressed for two decades. The correct response is to flesh out these issues, not to sweep them under the rug. Using the same callous approach one could deny outright the role of the Soviet regime in the famine of the 1930's, citing peasant sabotage (i.e. blaming the victim), crop blight etc. In the social sciences, there is always a great deal of ambiguity and debate about cause and effect, especially when major social changes are being discussed. You can never pin the single "cause" down precisely, like you can in the hard sciences. The description of the Lancet study as "ridiculous" is completely uncalled for. It's not "ridculous" to examine the mortality spike in the Post-Soviet space - which is a serious problem for anyone who cares about what life was was like after the collapse of the USSR. Guccisamsclub (talk) 15:56, 13 March 2016 (UTC)

Anything about mortality rates in the SU in 1930 does belong to this page, because it was in the Soviet Union. However, anything that had happened after dissolution of the Soviet Union belongs to page Post-Soviet states. You are very welcome to place this info in Post-Soviet states. Then the only remaining issue will be reliability of this study. There is nothing "ideological" about it. My very best wishes (talk) 18:01, 13 March 2016 (UTC)

That's an argument for removing the whole section, not just the passage. As for "reliability", was this your objection: " Was it all caused by privatization, economic hardship, crime or something else? The study does not show what was the cause, it only show correlations." Yet the very edit you removed and the Lancet study do not assert that "privatization was the cause". The headline was that the collapse was "associated" with the mortality crisis - precisely the "correlation" you talk about, not a blanket assertion of causation. I think, with due respect, that you are wrong here. I think that the consensus is to keep the passage you removed.Guccisamsclub (talk) 18:42, 13 March 2016 (UTC)

the study is ridiculous--goodness we have editors arguing demography with the leading medical journal in Britain???? The impact of the collapse of the final decades of the Soviet Union on its people is a very important topic. Rjensen (talk) 19:01, 13 March 2016 (UTC)

I agree. FWIW, the phrasing here could be improved: "According to British medical researchers, the economic shocks associated with wholesale privatization was associated with a sharp increase in the death rate". This is A) awkward B) needlessly attributed. The fact that the death rate skyrocketed in the early 90-s is uncontroversial (we have hard numbers on this - not "estimates"). Neither is the "association"/"correlation" between economic collapse and death rates. It is only statements about causation that would be potentially controversial. I say change it to: The economic shocks associated with wholesale privatization were accompanied by sharp increases in mortality. Guccisamsclub (talk) 19:55, 13 March 2016 (UTC)

No, this is NOT about "the final decades of the Soviet Union". Here is latest source, and it tells about "post-communist countries". My very best wishes (talk) 20:44, 13 March 2016 (UTC)

As I've already pointed out, your "irrelevance" argument would be more persuasive if: a) you deleted the whole section; b) you did not start off with an entirely different argument about the study being "highly questionable" and a straight-up strawman about "correlation not implying causation". Guccisamsclub (talk) 20:59, 13 March 2016 (UTC)

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