Among Differences: Local Ethnic Heterogeneity and Trust in People of Other Nationalities in Russia

Among Differences:
Local Ethnic Heterogeneity and Trust in People of Other Nationalities in Russia


Kazun A.P.

Cand. Sci. (Sociol.), Assoc. Prof. at the Department of Applied Economics, Director, Institute for Industrial and Market Studies, HSE University, Moscow, Russia akazun@hse.ru

ID of the Article:


The study was carried out within the Basic Research Program of the HSE University № HSE-BR‑2025-033.

Rubric: Ethnosociology

For citation:

Kazun A.P. Among Differences: Local Ethnic Heterogeneity and Trust in People of Other Nationalities in Russia. Sotsiologicheskie issledovaniya [Sociological Studies]. 2026. No 8. P. 116-128



Abstract

In both the international and Russian literature, it remains disputed whether ethnic diversity undermines social cohesion or, on the contrary, creates conditions for intergroup trust. This article examines the statistical association between the ethnic structure of a locality and its residents’ trust in people of another nationality. The empirical basis is a large-scale online survey of Russian adults conducted in 2024, supplemented with settlement-level indicators of ethnic composition. For each locality, the share of residents reporting a non-Russian nationality, the fractionalization index, a polarization index, and entropy are calculated. Regression models with regional fixed effects and an extended set of individual-level controls show that the share of non-Russian residents is unrelated to trust, whereas indices capturing the multiplicity and balance of ethnic groups (fractionalization, polarization, entropy) show a robust positive association with trust in people of another nationality. At the same time, local diversity is unrelated to generalized trust. This result is consistent with the logic of Allport’s contact theory and does not support Putnam’s “hunkering down” hypothesis. Although the analysis does not allow us to speak about the direction of the causal relationship, the results show that higher local ethnic heterogeneity in Russia is not associated with lower trust in people of another nationality.


Keywords
ethnic diversity; outgroup trust; social capital; interethnic contact; ethnic fractionalization; entropy; Russia

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Content No 8, 2026