Transience, Residential Persistence, and Mobility in Moscow and St. Petersburg, 1900-1914

Abstract

A sizable literature on the temporal and spatial dimensions of urbanization in Russia has appeared during the past decade, and it is probably fair to say that we now have a reasonable understanding of the process in general terms. What is needed is much closer scrutiny of the impact of the gathering of people into towns. Urbanization inevitably brought change to social organizations, institutions, behavior patterns, and perceptions; in short, to the social geography of the city. But prerequisite to understanding how quickly and with what consequences such social changes took place is an understanding of the dynamics of urban population growth itself.