2. How did they retain their german culture and language there for so long?
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This was due to a settlement pattern in largely autonomous communities, with a private schoolsystem.
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Czarist colonial politics in the 19th century had favored this development, since it decreed such a system of settlement for immigrants. The rulers were convinced that social harmony, economic productivity and of course the self-sufficiency of the communities would be guaranteed if they didn’t mix with the surrounding population. This strategy was welcomed by the Mennonites also, because they could practice their well known way of life, inherited from their home in Prussia, without interference. The model of a proper civil administration within the colony, came to be tradition precisely in Russia.
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