How Russian Society is Developing at a Time of Economic Crisis: A Contextual Approach (Article 1)

Abstract

The article presents a multidimensional contextual analysis of the status and trendline of the development of Russian society in the new reality, which is influenced by external and internal threats and risks that are in turn intensified by the current economic crisis. The empirical basis of the article consists of the results of three waves of a nationwide sociological monitoring survey (N = 4,000) conducted in 2014–2015. The author devotes particular attention to the population’s adaptability and an analysis of the practices of economic and political behavior of Russians in crisis situations. He takes note of the presence in Russian self-awareness of an understanding of the co-dependency of internal and external factors that affect the socioeconomic situation of our compatriots and the development of social processes in the country. The article identifies the primary forms in which the crisis impacts everyday Russian life, as well as strategies of adaptation by members of various occupational groups and inhabitants of various territorial and settlement entities, which have been predetermined by the diversification of their earnings and nature of their employment. It concludes that Russian society is strongly trending in the direction of a modern consumer society, in which the population’s dependency on the government is gradually diminishing and personal interests are beginning to prevail over public interests. It verifies Russians’ choice in favor of “great-power” institutions, which makes it possible to describe the institutional trust in society as not only hierarchical but also holistic.