Social well-being as evaluated by the population of the Far East region

Abstract

The nature and pace of social changes, global challenges and threats, the constant reproduction of social risks – all of these things speak to the problematic nature of the world’s current social portrait. This allows us to point out that today, despite all of civilization’s achievements, certain problems associated with the social well-being of a person, and society as a whole, remain unresolved. Social well-being is a multifactor construct, which itself is the result of a synthesis of causes and effects, a joining of objective and subjective factors; we are dealing with a systemic phenomenon, the categorization of which is distinguished by various facets and components which determine a person’s social well-being, the degree of public safety and modern value-normative implications. In conjunction these parameters define and bring a person’s social well-being to the forefront of the research and political agenda. The authors of this article insist that the study of the effect which objective processes occurring in society have on social well-being must be conducted in parallel with studying its subjective component, namely – a person’s subjective evaluation of this construct’s various aspects. Aside from that, special practical relevance is attributed to matters concerning the study of issues of social well-being in various social groups and cohorts, as well as within the regional context. Primorsky Krai, being part of the Far Eastern Federal District, possesses a distinct geographical, socio-economic and demographical specificity, while being an object of government strategic interests and goals; this is a territory where a plethora of innovative solutions aimed at stimulating the region’s socio-economic development are being initiated and implemented. Nonetheless, despite the government’s best efforts, the social effectiveness of these measures is not as pronounced as the current situation calls for them to be. The region is still in a state of demographic depression, with there being distinct sector-specific socio-economic and management issues. The article cites data collected by its authors while studying the subjective evaluation of the social well-being of Primorsky Krai’s population. A regional-scale quantitative study was conducted in May of 2019 by means of questionnaire survey (n=780). The results of this study of the population’s satisfaction with various aspects of life are generally favorable, with certain disparities having been recorded based on age and gender.