Suchergebnisse

Most Russian cities are currently facing major transformation processes in the public transport supply. Commercial paratransit services, known as marshrutkas, have been criticised heavily for unsafe and uncomfortable facilities as well as for anti-social business behaviour, prone to tax evasion and daily penny wars on the street. Consequently, many municipalities have enforced various strategies to restrict informal marshrutka services. This article compares the distinct policy strategies of two municipalities, Rostov on Don and Volgograd, and discusses the different outcomes. When analysing the case studies, two prevailing discourses seem to have informed the locally applied transport policies: a neoliberal, free market approach that perceives the loosely regulated commercial transport operations superior to state-led services and a rather neo-modernist perception of informal transport operation, calling for a rigorous push back of marshrutka mobility. Prominent in both policy discourses is the notion of informality as an instrument to govern the transport setting. Reviewing the developing field of informal transport studies, the article argues that the governments of the respective cities have employed (simplified) notions of informality as a legitimisation argument to take action. A closer perspective on the daily operations, however, unveils a socially institutionalised transport service full of complex operation practices beyond policy-strategic divides between the formal and informal. The contribution utilises the formal/informal nexus successfully developed in urban studies and applies it to international transport studies. Thus it enables the unveiling of insufficiencies in urban transport provision without falling in the trap of superficial modernisation narratives.

It is well known that labor migrants from different countries all over the Eurasian Union are the backbone of crucial economy sectors in the Russian Federation as, inter alia, construction, agriculture or trade. This article deals with another less mentioned but similarly significant labor market, which substantially changed its assemblage during the last couple of years, namely commercial urban transport services. In the last two decades, the marshrutka sector underwent major reforms and formalization processes that, on the one hand, brought operators back into the tax net and ensured a certain extension of control to the local transportation departments but, on the other hand, worsened the labor conditions of the transportation workers. Drawing from the empirical evidence of my fieldwork in southern Russia, I describe currently problematized mobility assemblages and embed the actor's articulations in broader conflicts within the marshrutka business and transportation regulation policy. I further analyze how labor migrants have been forced to accept unfavorable working conditions in the enterprises as a direct result of politically triggered reforms in the marshrutka business. The paper provides insights into the social arena of the marshrutka, which serves as a societal encounter of urban conflicts and transformation mirroring (un-)intended effects of the local transportation reformation attempts.

One of the key research questions of this study is to explain how commercial marshrutka transport services persist in both my case studies - Volgograd and Rostov on Don, although they are challenged, questioned and attacked from most parts of the society including local and federal politicians, competing transport enterprises and workers as well as citizen initiatives and the majority of opinion-forming media. To answer this question, the thesis brings in empirical material and describes in detail the recent developments, current design and ongoing conflicts and problems related to marshrutka mobility in both cities. The focus of the research lays in a first part on the variable outlook and design of marshrutka enterprises. This seems promising as marshrutka practices are mostly perceived, discussed and criticized as a surprisingly non-structured, sometimes even anarchical action program of individuals, concealing the ordering institutions behind as a black box. Therefore, the analysis pays special attention to the practices and structures of marshrutka drivers' working environments. This is done through an investigation of marshrutka enterprises from a sociological perspective on institutional frames and sociotechnical stabilisation attempts without losing the focus on the actors' everyday practices. Thus, following socially mediated regulatory frameworks as well as implemented law texts, the aim is to describe the established control institutions, work plans and tax regulations around the transport service and ask for the flexibility and adaption of marshrutka modes to change. The study will show that entrepreneurial actions look very different from varying angles and build, in sum, a trajectory of marshrutka representations. In this sense, I apply a broad definition of marshrutka enterprises serving simultaneously as a detailed introduction into the everyday marshrutka practices of the actors involved and as an analysis of the organisation structure of everyday marshrutka work. Inevitably, the analysis unveils a number of structural deficits and contradictions, which lead to the second part of the analysis. In this section, the major objective is to enroll observed constellations of conflict and negotiation in the marshrutka sphere by describing shifting and challenged actor-networks in increasingly problematised assemblages of concern. The thesis uses Marcus' research strategy of a multi-sited ethnography and tries to describe the emerging conflicts from different perspectives while following in different chapters things, persons and metaphors in order to comprehend the various tangles of negotiation and struggle within the marshrutka sphere. Furthermore, Bruno Latour's concept of a 'parliament of things' is applied in order to expose competing interest groups in the field and draw potential development scenarios of the near future. Within, the marshrutka appears as a conflicting social arena, where different actor-groups articulate their propositions and try to build prominent alliances with crucial system-relevant actants around the conflict lines. Following these struggles in the public sphere, I try to lay out in detail the recent reformation and modernisation attempts as well as the manifold reactions and counterstrategies of different actor groups in the urban public sphere in Volgograd and Rostov on Don. ; Die vorliegende Dissertation beschäftigt sich grundlegend mit dem weitverbreiteten post-sowjetischen Nahverkehrsangebot Marschrutka, auch bekannt als Sammeltaxi, welches bis heute den städtischen Nahverkehr im post-sowjetischen Raum entscheidend prägt und realisiert. Ausgehend von der Beobachtung, dass kommerziell organisierte Marschrutka-Mobilität trotz mannigfaltiger Kritik aus der Bevölkerung sowie zahlreicher verkehrspolitischer Reformierungsversuche ein unverzichtbarer Nahverkehrsdienstleister in post-sowjetischen Städten bleibt, fragt die Arbeit nach der Grundkonstitution des Mobilitätsphänomens, welche eine operativ beeindruckende Flexibilität und Anpassungsfähigkeit zu ermöglichen scheint. Die Studie nimmt die Entwicklung von Marschrutka-Bussen in den zwei russischen Städten Rostow am Don und Wolgograd in den Blick und versucht durch die Auswertung anthropologischer Feldforschung relevante Organisationsstrukturen, interindividuelle Lebenswelten aber auch vorherrschende Konfliktlinien und Problemstellungen des städtischen Marschrutka-Marktes zu benennen. Dabei entpuppt sich die in der Öffentlichkeit oft als chaotisch und unkontrollierbar beschriebene Marschrutka-Organisationsstruktur als streng hierarchisiert, basierend auf interpersonell aufgebauten Vertrauens- aber auch finanziellen Abhängigkeitsnetzwerken, die eine zuverlässige Institutionalisierung des Marktes ermöglichen. In einer detaillierten Untersuchung zeigt die Arbeit Defizite der aktuellen Organisationsstruktur auf, die vor allem zu Lasten der meist scheinselbständig beschäftigten FahrerInnen wirken, was wiederum weitreichende Konsequenzen hinsichtlich der allgemeinen Angebotsqualität (veraltete oder überfüllte Minibusse) aber auch der alltäglichen Sicherheit aller NutzerInnen (übermüdete FahrerInnen, riskante Fahrmanöver) hat. Die Analyse der Arbeit ist in zwei Teilen realisiert. Zunächst ermöglicht die Exposition des empirischen Materials einen induktiven Einblick in die Arbeits- und Lebenswelten der involvierten Akteure (FahrerInnen, DispatcherInnen, UnternehmerInnen, Passagiere, LokalpolitikerInnen) rund um das Akteur-Netzwerk Marschrutka. Die fluide Konstruktion von determinierenden Strukturen in privatwirtschaftlich organisierten Verkehrsunternehmen einerseits, aber auch die individuellen Handlungsspielräume der strukturell stark benachteiligten FahrerInnen in der alltäglichen Realisierung ihrer Arbeit beschreibt die komplexen Interdependenzverhältnisse innerhalb der sozialen Welt Marschrutka. In einem zweiten Analyseschritt werden die öffentlich artikulierten Probleme und Reformierungspolitiken in Rostow am Don und Wolgograd vorgestellt und diskutiert und um die Erkenntnisse aus dem ersten Teil erweitert. Im Sinne einer multi-sited ethnography versucht die Arbeit den Narrativen der etablierten Akteursgruppen zu folgen und den Prozess einer sich herausbildenden konfliktbeladenen Öffentlichkeit nachzuvollziehen und kritisch zu reflektieren. Dabei wird immer wieder Bezug auf die theoretischen Erkenntnisse von Bruno Latour und Michel Foucault genommen. Des Weiteren greift die Arbeit anhand der lokal spezifischen Empirie grundlegende Fragen postsowjetischer Stadtforschung auf, diskutiert aktuelle Beiträge der Mobility Studies und erörtert den empirisch relevanten Begriff der informellen Mobilität im Rahmen aktueller wissenschaftlicher Auseinandersetzungen.

Mit dem Ende der UdSSR brach in Zentralasien - zumindest außerhalb der Hauptstädte - auch der staatlich geförderte Personennahverkehr weitgehend zusammen. Minibusse, besser bekannt als Marschrutki, übernahmen vielerorts die Hauptlast des Verkehrs. Sie befördern seitdem täglich Millionen von Fahrgästen und sichern als Einkommensquelle für Fahrer, Reparaturbetriebe, Importeure oder Verkehrspolizisten und als Mobilitätsdienstleister für Beschäftigte, Studierende und Händler das Überleben weiter Teile der Bevölkerung. Die Entstehungsgeschichte sowie die aktuelle Funktionsweise der Marschrutki, aber auch die Reformpläne für neue, alternative Verkehrsformen sind dabei von den sozialen, wirtschaftlichen und politischen Entwicklungen in der Region nicht zu trennen. Am Beispiel der nordtadschikischen Großstadt Chudschand werden im folgenden Artikel Einblicke in dieses facettenreiche Mobilitätsphänomen gegeben.

The COVID-19 pandemic exposed crucial tensions related to urban public infrastructure. Among those, questions regarding urban mobility, and public transport (PT) in particular, have received widespread attention in media and political debates. Stigmatisation, ridership slumps, funding problems and system closures have placed public transport systems in the centre of public debate about urban infrastructure. In this paper, we discuss three dimensions in which PT, as a site of urban armature, linking service provisions with individual needs, has been affected by COVID-19. First, we look at the user experience. Considering PT as public space shaped by encounters and emotions, we bring to the fore its contentious and complicated nature, affected by increasing or emerging anxieties and disturbances due to COVID-19. We further underline the inequity of transport provision and access: while some users have easily switched to alternative mobility options, others have remained dependent on PT, and had to navigate new and unevenly distributed challenges. Secondly, we refer to government responses, particularly in terms of funding arrangements, fare systems and controls, and labour organisation. Around the world, PT operators have faced unprecedented financial challenges, pressed to adapt their system to a, "new normality" while observing passenger flows decline drastically. As these problems have been particularly dire in transport networks that depend on a high share of fare-box revenue, a growing number of municipalities is considering a shift to fare-free PT. Thirdly, we discuss possible futures: While some commentators argue that PT faces an imminent decline due to mid-pandemic mobility needs and requirements, we argue that the role of urban public infrastructure is more vital than ever before, especially for underprivileged but recently acknowledged workers in the social and service sector. The paper brings together findings from an online study on mobility behaviour during COVID-19, interviews and policy analysis conducted by the research team from May to August 2020. In-depth investigations on Tallinn, Brussels, Stockholm and Berlin are brought into discussion with global scholarly and practitioners' reflections.

Cities play a major role in tackling the COVID-19 pandemic as many measures are adopted at the scale of cities and involve adjustments to the way urban areas operate. Drawing from case studies across the globe, this book explores how the pandemic and the policies it has prompted have caused changes in the ways cities function. The contributors examine the advancing social inequality brought on by the pandemic and suggest policies intended to contain contagion whilst managing the economy in these circumstances. Offering crucial insights for reforming cities to be more resilient to future crises, this is an invaluable resource for scholars and policy makers alike