City Research Online

Abstract

How do minorities come to be seen as security threats? This paper examines the case of the large Russian-speaking minority in Estonia and Latvia in the context of neighbouring conflict activities driven by the minority’s alleged kinstate. The paper focuses on the trend of securitization experienced by the minority within the area of public life participation. This dynamic takes place through domestic laws linked to the decision-making sphere and self-governance opportunities. How this occurs is researched through primary fieldwork data from semi-structured interviews with Russian-speaking minority elites, whose perspectives are often overlooked in research addressing the particularities of the region. The fieldwork data complements the legal analysis and finds effects of securitization on public participation of minorities, regardless of whether they were successful in entering into governing coalitions or remained in the opposition within the State legislature. While some of those inefficiencies are caused by governing coalition agreements, other obstacles are created by divisions within the minority. Furthermore, the minority group experienced negative effects on their public participation opportunities through limited prospects facilitated by consultative bodies and self-governance arrangements. Finally, the perceived association with the alleged kinstate shapes the minority to the extent of essentially securitizing them.

Publication Type:	Article
Additional Information:	© The Author(s) 2026. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) which permits any use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access page (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage).
Publisher Keywords:	public participation, securitization, minorities, law, Russian-speakers, Estonia, Latvia
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HT Communities. Classes. Races K Law > K Law (General)
Departments:	The City Law School The City Law School > Academic Programmes
SWORD Depositor:	Symplectic Administrator

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