Authors:

Jakub Swiecicki [1]

Instead of a prologue

 “Forgive me, the city, that I did not love you for a long time. But how could I love you among the ruins and broken bricks… I was flesh of the flesh of those soldiers who took your fortresses by storm. Could I cry over your ruins, when my native city in the Pskov county was wiped off the face of the earth? I came to you, my city, not by my own free will. I was sent to the shipyard, where the working day ended in the working night, and I had no energy enough to stroll along your deserted streets. You have no right to take offence with me.

Once, after half a year on the sea, I saw the silhouette of the city in the light of the rising sun, as the city of a fairy tale. I realized that during the whole sea journey I was dreaming about this minute. And the embankment was crowded with women with flowers, cars. Hold on, my city! I recognize your right to my fate…”

Oleg Glushkin, Kaliningrad writer, worker, sailor, and the founder and the first Editor-in-Chief of the journal “Zapad Rosii”

How my interest in Kaliningrad was born

In early 1990-ties (I think it was 1993) I came to Kaliningrad for the first time as a consultant, trying to bridge the gap between the western-minded market consultants, and the post-soviet enterprise leaders in Kaliningrad. It was the so-called Kaliningrad 2000 Regional Development Project, sponsored by a United Nations agency UNIDO. Within the project, I visited Kaliningrad some ten times, traveling all over the oblast.

In late 1990-ties, I paid numerous visits to Kaliningrad, as a consultant for the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA).

But my first contact, and interest in Kaliningrad, was born much earlier, back in 1960-ties when I was a young boy in Poland.

I spent several summer holidays in the Polish Masurian Lake District, just south of the Russian-Polish border. And also just to the west from here, in Krynica Morska, on the Kaliningrad Spit, in Polish: Mierzeja Wislana. I always wondered what was there, on the other side of the border, what people lived there, what these people thought, and so on. At that time the border was sealed off, it was an impenetrable barrier, impossible to cross and visit these people.

So, when I came to Kaliningrad for the first time in 1993, I had a special personal feeling like visiting old though unknown friends, cut off by borders for many years.

Resuming my duties at the SIIA in Stockholm in mid-1990-ties, over the last ten years, I wrote several articles and brochures about Kaliningrad. I participated in numerous seminars and conferences about Kaliningrad, and more widely, about Russia and the EU, and about the Baltic Sea Region, with Kaliningrad in its middle. I also had a reason to study the history of the region, the period when the city was called Königsberg, and the region was German Ostpreussen.

My attitude to Kaliningrad today and to its future

Kaliningrad is now part of Russia. It is an obvious fact. But still, unfortunately, there are reasons to reiterate this. Any suggestions as to possible changing this status in the future should be immediately counteracted. There should be no doubts about the question. All shadows, even the smallest uncertainties, clouds, over the status or over the sovereignty of the region are very detrimental to its healthy development.

Because, I believe, the Kaliningrad region has very promising development prospects. 

Despite its clear disadvantages, as its small size, its detachment from the Russian mainland and so on, the region has a lot of advantages. Kaliningrad can play an important role as a pilot region in the cooperation between Russia and the EU. The geography and the history predestinate Kaliningrad to the role of a bridge between Russia and the West (which is the EU).

Russia and the EU are two very different entities in almost all aspects: their formal structures and governance, their culture, politics, economy, and judiciary.

Cooperation between these entities is a tricky issue. Misunderstandings and frictions are common. Both on the top level and on the very grass-roots levels; both in general matters, and in very practical, concrete, day-to-day matters.

Very often, this cooperation could be smoother and better if first tested in a small scale.

Let me take just one example, border management. An efficient border management is of outmost importance to Kaliningrad. As a small detached exclave, it is dependent on smooth border crossing and on transit in its trade, transportation, cultural exchange, etc. Sometimes, while others have no borders to pass, Kaliningraders have to pass several borders as part their usual business.

One could think: an integrated border management should be rather easy to achieve. Just to cooperate with the neighbors on the other side of the border. But it is not so easy.

An integrated border management involves:

•  Legal matters – legal systems and legal cultures on the both sides of the border are very different. They are, in fact, incompatible.
•  Border guard training, which is very different.
•  Technical equipment, technical standards, which are very different too. They are incompatible.
•  Computers, data bases are also incompatible. It is impossible to communicate.
•  And also political goals and economic interests are different. On the one side, the concern is to stop illegal immigration, to stop smuggling of drugs, to prevent an inflow of untaxed alcohol and cigarettes. On the other side, the priority will be to protect the internal market, to shut the holes for illegal money outflows and so on.
•  Mutual lack of confidence is a great problem. There is also a problem of corruption on both sides.

Russian and EU leaders have agreed recently that both sides will work towards the abolishment of visa regime. It is a long-term goal with many difficulties and pitfalls towards it.

It is here where Kaliningrad comes in. Kaliningrad offers an experimental field to introduce this cooperation in the small scale. To start with. To test and to try. If the experiment will be positive, it can be extended to Russia – EU cooperation on the whole. Kaliningrad offers an opportunity to tune up this cooperation. And also an opportunity to abandon it, at a low cost, if the experiment fails.

Integrated border management is just one example. Kaliningrad can be a bridge between Russia and the EU, as a pilot region in Russia-EU cooperation in many different areas: culture, research, education, health care, economy, trade, tourism, environment, and many, many other areas.

This would be very beneficial to Kaliningrad itself, to its inhabitants, and to all neighbors, the whole Baltic Sea Region, Sweden not excluded.

Another Kaliningrad writer, Valentin Zorin wrote that “On the Kaliningrad soil, there are two memories confronting each other. The spirit here has two shapes.” And he asks: “Is Kaliningrad still a Kaliningrad? Are Kaliningraders tired of being Kaliningraders? Do they want to taste to be Königsbergers?”

Oleg Glushkin’s answer is: “The city of an extraordinary fate, the city of European flavor, the city revealing Russia to the western world, the city of non-freezing harbors. The city, which deserves your falling in love with!”

At the seminar with the students of the Russian State University of Immanuel Kant, which was held in Kaliningrad in November 2005, we spent the whole day discussing Kaliningrad identity. We discussed memorials, architecture. old one and new one, the castle which does not exist any more... among other topics. Material remains are very important.

Even more important are memories of the people: German refugees, their descendants, the new comers, first Russian settlers, the graves.

But of the topmost importance is the future. The children who are born here. The ability to shape the common future, economic and political conditions for development…

My belief is that the city, and the region, which nourished these writers writing such things has a very promising future.

 

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