Conducting a study of contemporary Soviet society based upon interviews with recent immigrants now living in the United States.
Promoting the involvement of young scholars so that the field of Soviet studies developed.
Making the data and research products developed available to all interested scholars.
The Soviet Interview Project had its origins in a meeting at the Kennan Institute in August 1979, where senior academic scholars and U.S. government specialists discussed the feasibility of such a project. One of the main obstacles was the "Kissinger rule", named after U.S. secretary of state Henry Kissinger who had established a policy against the use of federal funds for studies of emigrants from the USSR.[3] The Kissinger rule was revoked after a successful lobbying effort, and a design phase proposal was funded by the National Council for Soviet and East European Research in November 1979.
The research team was headed by James R. Millar, economics professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign. The team completed the draft of a general survey for the project in September 1981, developing an interdisciplinary questionnaire. The researchers decided to focus on the last “normal” period of life in the USSR, as applying for emigration could lead to marked changes in the applicant's life, thus introducing a possible bias.[4]
The sampling frame for the SIP general survey was defined as all Soviet emigrants who arrived in the United States between January 1, 1979 and April 30, 1982, and who were between ages 21 and 70.[5] 33,618 persons met the criteria, and 3,551 were included in the final sample. There were 2,793 respondents.[6]
Among the Soviet Interview Project's findings were that there was a positive relationship between education and unemployment in the USSR (as opposed to in the United States, where it was a negative relationship),[7] that the Soviet wage system rewarded and penalized external political behavior,[8] and that popular support for the Soviet regime was linked to the sense of material satisfaction and the perceived capability of the KGB.[9]
↑Gregory, Paul R.; Collier Jr, Irwin L. (Sep 1988). "Unemployment in the Soviet Union: Evidence from the Soviet Interview Project". The American Economic Review. 78 (4). American Economic Association: 613–632. JSTOR1811163.
↑Gregory, Paul R; Kohlhase, Janet E. (February 1988). "The Earnings of Soviet Workers: Evidence from the Soviet Interview Project". The Review of Economics and Statistics. 70 (1). The MIT Press: 23–35. doi:10.2307/1928147. JSTOR1928147.
↑Bahry, Donna; Silver, Brian D. (December 1987). "Intimidation and the Symbolic Uses of Terror in the USSR". The American Political Science Review. 81 (4). American Political Science Association: 1066–1098. doi:10.2307/1962579. JSTOR1962579. S2CID147685439.