Questioning Versailles: National-Cultural Autonomy in the Post-revolutionary Siberian

The concept of cultural autonomy became relevant in the discussion on the management of national minorities at the very beginning of the XX century and it accompanied the falling apart of the European Empires. Part of the broader discussion concerning the realization of the principle of self-determination, it entered the political debate in Russia in the immediate afterward of the October Revolution. On this basis, the actual formation of non-territorial National-cultural autonomies in Siberia and in the Far East Republic between, respectively, 1918-1920 and 1920-1922 coincided with the ongoing structural re-organization of the Russian political system. The chapter describes National-cultural autonomies from a theoretical point of view and the effective use of National-cultural autonomies in Russia in the afterwards of the October Revolution, addressing in particular the Siberian case. In its conclusive paragraph it debates this historical model and its potential role as instrument of representation for national minorities in complex multiethnic societies.