Dynamic of the Russian population political-ideological orientations in the post–Soviet period

Abstract

Under permanent transformations in all spheres of life in the Russian society, the dynamics of the political-ideological views of people, their attitudes to the choice and implementation of the strategic directions of social development become especially important. Russian scientists prefer the ideas of the crisis of liberal ideas, growth of conservatism, ‘left turn’, and consider the state ideology a way to overcome the ideological split in the society and to ensure its unity and integrity. At the same time, some opposite tendencies are often ignored in the scientific analysis, which leads to misunderstanding of the real development of the ideological situation in the post-Soviet period. The article aims at filling this gap based on the analysis of the dynamics of the Russians’ key politicalideological orientations in the last quarter of the century. Based on the empirical data of the sociological monitoring “How are you, Russia?” and the authors’ research, the article describes the dynamics of the Russians’ views, ideological and political orientations. In particular, the study confirmed the hypotheses about the decreasing role of ideology, society’s ideological polarization, mosaic ideological views of Russians, and the loss by ideological markers of the political structure of their status of terminal values. The authors conclude that the blurred ideological orientations would not allow the state ideology to overcome the existing eclecticism of ideological views without a contemporary welfare legal state that would replace the ‘hybrid regime’.