Contribution short abstract:

In this paper, I show how migration and diasporic life involve negotiating and moving between complicities. Drawing from research on the experiences of Russian war emigrants in Central Asia, I argue to challenge the assumption of an overly stable link between complicity and cynicism.

Contribution long abstract:

My research in Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, two former Soviet republics in Central Asia, focuses on the experiences of Russians who left their country after the full-scale invasion of Ukraine. They left Russia either to avoid being drafted into the army, to escape political persecution, or to keep their jobs with foreign companies affected by international sanctions. While these people seek to avoid complicity with the Putin regime in Russia, life in Central Asia quickly confronts them with another kind of complicity. As relatively affluent and well-educated Russian emigrants, they partly reproduce the history of colonial power asymmetries in the region. Negotiating complicity thus becomes an inherent feature of everyday life in the diaspora. The emigrants struggle to position themselves in relation to their host society as well as Russia, while attempting to create meaningful communities and organise everyday life abroad. This gives rise to complex and sometimes contradictory affective dynamics, including cynicism and resignation as well as empathy and compassion, even hope. Assuming an overly stable link between complicity and cynicism may not be helpful in understanding how people negotiate complicity in diasporic life. I argue that a perspective on how multiple complicities affect people differently contributes to pluralising our understanding of living with complicity.