TRANSFORMATION OF POLITICAL ELITES OF THE CRIMEAN PENINSULA IN THE CONTEXT OF REUNIFICATION WITH THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION

Abstract

The article is devoted to the study of the Crimean political elite in the context of the entry of the Republic of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol as a subject of the Russian Federation. I considered the main elite groups operating on the Peninsula since the 1990s of the 20th century, their relationship with the Ukrainian authorities, as well as the transformation and renewal of the ruling groups in connection with the reintegration of the Republic of Crimea. It is noted that there is no obvious split among the ruling elite on the Peninsula, no groups are created according to political views. However, there is a marked difference in the origin of the members of the regional elite. The author comes to the conclusion that there is a complex of objective and subjective difficulties of staff transformation of the Crimean elites. In particular, I considered the problem of relations between the Crimean political elite and the Federal government and the struggle for key positions in the region. The main conflict of interaction is the weak orientation of the new elite in the specifics of the Peninsula’s life, the mentality of the inhabitants and its history. At the same time, there is an acute shortage of highly qualified personnel. As a result, the Peninsula is experiencing, to some extent, a shortage of personnel what provokes the federal authorities to attract managers from the mainland.