The Absence of a Single Ideological and Value Construct of the Image of the State as a Threat to Russia's National Security

Shmygin Vladislav Andreevich Graduate student, Department of Social Engineering HSCSS, Lomonosov Moscow State University 119991, Russia, Moscow region, Moscow, Leninskie Gory str., 1, - shmyginv97@mail.ru Other publications by this author     Shultz Vladimir Leopoldovich Doctor of Philosophy Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Professor, Department of Social Engineering, Moscow State University 119991, Russia, Moscow region, Moscow, Leninskie Gory str., 1 cona01@yandex.ru

Kolomiitseva Margarita Gennadevna Master's Degree, Department of Sociology of Knowledge, Lomonosov Moscow State University 119991, Russia, Moscow region, Moscow, Leninskie Gory str., 1 kolomijceva.rita@bk.ru

Introduction The period of social bifurcation, determined by the chaos in the information space that arose due to the beginning of Russia's special military operation in Ukraine, showed the inconsistency of the phenomenon of pluralism of socio-political ideas.

The absence of a single ideological and value construct of the image of the state in the minds of young people affected the nature of their perception of the current socio-political reality.

 The desire of state institutions to build communication with a young audience does not give the desired result due to the insufficiency of preliminary ideological-oriented work with the target group. Therefore, the key theses broadcast by the Russian media and top officials of the state about the motives for launching a special military operation are not clear to young people, in particular, the main ideological construct - Russia's struggle on the territory of Ukraine against the collective West, whose task is to weaken Russian statehood.

Description of young people's perception of the current socio-political situation in the countryAccording to Federal Law No. 489-FZ of December 30, 2020 "On Youth Policy in the Russian Federation", citizens aged 14 to 35 years fall into the socio-demographic group youth.

The socio-psychological formation of young people, as well as the formation of their political ideas, took place during the period of Russian orientation to Western European values ^[1]. Accordingly, the younger generation did not fall under the influence of narratives about the hostile capitalist West during the Cold War. Also, modern young people were not brought up in the conditions of a single Soviet complex of ideas about man, society and the state. Therefore, the problem of lability-the lack of formation of specific life imperatives that make up the key basis of consciousness, is especially acutely felt among the current generation of young Russians. The consequence of lability is the state of searching for semantic explanations of what is happening in one's own life and in the environment. The absence of social crises and the televised nature of military conflicts have allowed modern youth to focus not on the value of life in general, but on the value of a comfortable life. According to the analysis of the HSE Institute for Applied Political Research, the Covid-19 pandemic became the first global general crisis in the inventory of the social experience of Russian youth. The measures taken in the international space to combat the new coronavirus infection caused a change in the usual life scenarios, limited the mobility of young people and narrowed the scope of everyday comfort. Moreover, during the pandemic, the key ideological concept of Russian youth was not the preservation of a comfortable life, but the question of their own survival. Also in 2020, young Russians faced the phenomenon of social polarization (supporting and not supporting vaccination) ^[2].

The consequences of the pandemic have prolonged the destructive impact on the psychological state of Russian youth. The risks of unemployment, infodemia – the widespread spread of misinformation, forced self-isolation have caused an increase in stress.

The weakening of covid restrictions has caused young people to return to their usual level of social comfort. A new shock for young people was the February events – the announcement by the President of the Russian Federation of the independence of the LDPR and the beginning of a special Russian military operation in Ukraine. The level of clinical anxiety among young people (18-24 years old), whose comfort was put at risk for a long period, increased to 60% in March 2022, and the level of depression to 75% ^[3], which significantly exceeds the results of studies among other age groups. The reason for the current stressful social situation for modern youth is not only the restriction in the usual way of life due to economic sanctions, but also the crisis of perception of socio-political reality.

The signing by the President of Russia of a decree on partial mobilization has become another factor for the emergence of social experiences among young people. According to Rosmolodezh, within a few days after the news of the forced mobilization measures spread, the agency's hotline received more than 16 thousand calls ^[4]. However, according to sociologists, the current reaction of young people to what is happening in the country is not a demonstration of a lack of patriotism. On the contrary, the period of socialization of modern Russian youth fell on a safe time. Therefore, in comparison with older generations, a noticeable contrast in perception is justified by the lack of relevant experience in overcoming general crisis phenomena ^[5]. Moreover, young people demonstrate a willingness to participate in the life of society, as evidenced by the statistics of fundraising campaigns that have increased over 7 years from 3% to 15% of Russians, mainly at a young age ^[6].

So, in the process of socialization of the current generation of youth, an integral set of ideological ideas about the state as a social institution, its role in the organization of society and value orientations, within which the elements of its system function, has not been integrated. Young people perceive the formed socio-political conjuncture through the prism of fragmentary values, some of which are the legacy of global Soviet ideologies, the other - Western European constructs, tightly integrated into the daily life of Russian youth through mass culture. Despite the antagonism of the Soviet and Western structures of value orientations, in the absence of conflict, young people could adaptively perceive their constructs. However, since the beginning of the hybrid war unleashed by the collective West against Russia, the contrast of elements of the Soviet value model and Western orientations has caused moral disorganization of young people, as evidenced by the level of stress perception recorded by surveys. In the absence of a holistic reasoned model of explaining the actions of the state, young people are forced to focus on an intuitive moral and ethical perception of the surrounding reality.

The image of the state in the view of the current generation of young people

In the works of Russian scientists who have studied the issue of the perception of state institutions by young people, there is more often a description of individual value orientations that are relevant in a certain period of Russia's development, rather than a complex image of the state. However, in the study of political scientists of Lomonosov Moscow State University Selezneva A.V. and Evgenieva T.A. "Moral and political in the representations of Russian youth in the context of their socio-political self-identification", the most holistic characteristic of the perception of the state as a social institution by young people is given. From the standpoint of political and psychological analysis, the value orientations of young Russians are described in the focus of the ratio of moral and political. The key question posed to respondents in the study (1,705 Russians aged 18-30 from 63 regions of Russia): "Should moral norms regulate political relations?"

The share of respondents who consider the absolute priority of the moral in political decision-making was 31%, while 40% indicated the relative importance of moral norms.

However, the boundaries of the priority of the moral over the political in the minds of Russian youth are blurred. The percentage of young people who condemn corruption in politics is higher (21%) than those who condemn military intervention in another country and genocide against the people of another state (9.6%). It is noteworthy that only 0.65% of respondents do not consider treason to be an immoral manifestation of political behavior ^[7]. 

Nevertheless, the censure of corrupt acts is reduced if they become an element of protection from interactions with law enforcement agencies. The researchers cite the answers of respondents who are ready to commit a corrupt act for the sake of "saving themselves and their loved ones from the state system": "For the sake of helping loved ones, but if this is a case of injustice, of which there are enough in the Russian penal system." That is, in the ideas of young people about the moral and immoral, violation of the law is permissible if it is an instrument of passive resistance to the state system.

Such a dichotomy of the positioning of the state in the minds of respondents and participants of focus group surveys is interpreted by political scientists through the significance of the figure of the subject performing a political action. T.V. Karaje in his works speaks about the perception of the political phenomenon by the object as a specific conflict zone, where the world is divided into "own", "strangers", "friends", "enemies", "allies" and "rivals". In the view of young people, a close circle of friends falls into the category of "their own": family, friends, study group, Internet community, as well as public opinion leaders, with whose position young people are in solidarity ^[8]. The image of a "stranger" is an opposition to the category of "own", it is not clear, therefore it is hostile. The subconscious need for the emergence of an image of someone else lies in the archaic component of thinking that every person has to some extent. Alien is a convenient explanatory model of the life of unknown and complex systems in which the norms of morality familiar to the subject do not work. In the studies of Russian identity conducted from 2015 to the present, there is an identification of the image of the state with the image of a "stranger" ^[8].

The reason for the formed moral and moral ideas is the superficiality and fragmentary knowledge about the nature of politics and the political system, obtained mainly from popularizers of scientific socio-humanitarian knowledge and other crowbars (opinion leaders) analyzing the current socio-political agenda.

Despite the identification of the state with the image of a "stranger", young people continue to experience paternalistic sentiments. So, answering the question: "who should be responsible for the lives of citizens?" - 54.2% of young respondents count on the support of government institutions.  Experts in the field of political psychology call the formed attitude of young people to state institutions infantile-consumer ^[10]. The infantilism of youth is determined by the existing concept of the image of the state, where a sense of civic duty can be neglected. The individualistic consumer attitude is explained by the antagonism of the key systems of value orientations mentioned earlier - Western European and Soviet, which underlie the process of socialization of young people. The polarization of ideological concepts allows young people to juggle the positioning of the activities of state institutions depending on their own interests and needs. Therefore, answering the question about the limits of personal freedom, young people admit the possibility of committing illegal actions, in particular of a corrupt nature against state institutions, if this "becomes a guarantor of personal security."  

A separate place in the description of the image of the state is occupied by the value orientations of the civic consciousness of young people. The system of elements of civic consciousness is an indicator of the expectations of the younger generation from the activities of state institutions, forming an ideal construct of the image of the state in the eyes of young people. Thus, the most significant values for young Russians are the ideologically devoid ideals of harmonious coexistence of people: human rights, peace, security, freedom, justice, legality and order ^[10]. Further, political scientists note post-material values, namely the value of self-expression, characteristic of generation Z ^[11]. The last group of values in the view of young people, which is based on patriotism and national identity, other traditional values.

Summarizing, the current perception of the image of the state by young people is based on the opposition of the groups "own" - "alien", where "own" is the people/citizens, "alien" is the institutions of power. The reason for alienation from everything connected with the image of the state lies in the absence of unified value concepts about its functioning, integrated into the process of socialization of youth. In turn, the root of the lack of a unified image of the state in the minds of young Russians lies in the combination of antagonistic elements of the Soviet and Western value systems. Accordingly, the ideal image of the state in the view of young Russians is also antagonistic, as is the process of their political socialization. The desired image of the state in the minds of young people is the model of a "night watchman" capable of showing paternalistic traits.

Problems and prospects of constructing the image of the state

The inconsistency of existing ideological constructs opens up space for political manipulation by young people, which is especially noticeable in the context of the hybrid war unleashed against Russia by the collective West. The prism of subjective morality becomes a means of manipulation, through which young people are invited to look at the actions of state authorities. The moral in this case is the categorical apparatus of "good and evil", where "good" is any available to the people (the group "own") ways to combat the actions of the authorities, including violation of the law and the use of violent actions, "evil" is a state policy (the actions of the "strangers" group) that runs counter to the antagonistic ideas of young people about the state. 

Such manipulation becomes a threat to the national security of the country, since the purpose of its application is to realize the protest mobilization potential of citizens through the construction of a destructive image of state institutions.

The protest activity of 2020-2022 can be considered a clear example of the construction of a political agenda and the participation of young people in it on the basis of the dichotomy of the "friends" and "strangers" groups. The case of the Khabarovsk protests, where the "center-region" confrontation map was played out, is interesting for analysis. In the prolonged unauthorized Khabarovsk protests, a phenomenon not characteristic of Russian political reality was observed, excluding individual national republics – spontaneous and numerous rallies in support of the head of the region. In this case, the protests that took place are based on an effective role model embedded in the strategy of communication of interested actors with society: the "own" group - Khabarovsk residents, the "strangers" group - the federal government. The former governor, accused of murder, became "his own" even despite the categorical immorality of the proven act, while the actions of the state"were criticized.

The successful result of constructing the role distribution of "friends" and "strangers" in the protests of 2020-2022 is based on the conversion of online activity into mobilization potential by maintaining a discourse about morality. The specifics of the coverage of protests and the semantic content of the communication strategy with society ensure the effectiveness of the information flow. The study of the basic trends in the transformation of mass political protests in the Russian Federation (2020-2021), conducted by a group of Russian scientists, provides the results of an analysis of the nature of the coverage of protests. In the case of protest activity in the Khabarovsk Territory and the January-February protests of 2021, the activities of the protesters are covered either neutrally or positively. At the same time, the actions of law enforcement agencies are covered mainly neutrally (the Khabarovsk case is 79% neutral, 17% negative, 4% positive. The case of protest activity in January-February 2021 – 49% neutral, 48% negative, 3% positive) ^[12].

Manipulation of the relationship with conventional morality becomes an effective trigger for increased activity in social networks. Thus, violence against women by law enforcement agencies is an information channel that stimulates irritation from the activities of representatives of the state system. The manipulation of the concepts of moral and immoral is most clearly seen in the case of the Belarusian protests, where the alienation of the state from society occurs due to the demonization of the image of law enforcement agencies that performed their duties to ensure the preservation of order in the country.

Since the beginning of the SVO, in the context of the hybrid war unleashed by the collective West against Russia, the nature of constructing the image of the state in the eyes of Russian youth has become one of the main mechanisms for achieving strategic goals. The information campaign of Russia's opponents is focused on building explanatory models where the actions of the state to ensure national security are recognized as immoral. In turn, the target audience's misunderstanding of the key theses of the Russian communication strategy opens up a space for manipulating the public opinion of young Russians.

Therefore, in our opinion, a detailed description requires statements reflecting the objective reality of what is happening in Ukraine, which, due to superficial explanatory models, reinforce the perception of young Russians of the conflict of groups "their own"-"others", thereby forming in their view a destructive and immoral image of the state.

Thus, the application of theses on the brotherhood of the Russian and Ukrainian people requires preliminary preparation of a young target audience, namely, an explanation of the historical retrospective of the formation of the Russian and Ukrainian peoples, as well as the nature of Ukrainian chauvinism. It should be taken into account the fact that young people are not isolated from the Ukrainian information flow, where theses about brotherhood sound quieter and mainly from residents of the southern and eastern regions. According to a survey conducted by the Ukrainian sociological group "Rating" in 2021, in the western part of Ukraine, Russians are considered a fraternal people by about 22% of the population, but in general, 40% of residents in Ukraine supported the thesis of the President of Russia about the historical unity of peoples ^[13]. Nevertheless, the Ukrainian information agenda is being constructed precisely in the western territories. Accordingly, when classifying the Ukrainian people to the "own" group, it is necessary to conduct large-scale communication work with a young audience, showing the origins of the origin of Ukrainian chauvinism.

Young people should know that the ideas of national exclusivity are not new in the Ukrainian cultural discourse. Elements of rejection of Russian imperialism can be seen in the works of one of the pillars of Ukrainian literature, the poet Taras Shevchenko, whose main period of creativity fell in the middle of the XIX century ^[14]. The danger of Ukrainian chauvinism towards Russians lies in its rooted nature in such social institutions of Ukraine as education (socialization of citizens in conditions of native or explicit propaganda of nationalism), the civil service (integration of nationalist ideas into public administration), the army (cultivation and planting of nationalist ideas). Accordingly, the antithesis "we don't need to be saved" appears in the space of social networks on the thesis "we are saving Ukraine from Nazism". This happens because the creation of nationalist ideas by Ukrainians is carried out permanently in the process of socialization and is considered the norm.

Despite the existing imperfections of the strategy of communication with young people, it should be noted the work carried out by public authorities in terms of constructing the image of Russia in the representation of young people through the creation of social realization platforms. Thus, the platform "Russia is a land of opportunities" accumulates 26 competitive projects and Olympiads aimed at supporting young people interested in their social realization ^[15]. The idea of Russia as a human-centered state is read in the very brand of the platform "land of opportunities". The ideological concept of the platform integrates the values outlined in the Decree of the President of the Russian Federation "On the approval of the Foundations of State Policy for the preservation and strengthening of Traditional Russian spiritual and moral values" ^[16]. By participating in the platform's projects, young people create native ideological and value content and simultaneously form an image of the state focused on them as citizens.

Conclusions: The current uncertainty of ideological and value constructs in the positioning of Russia and its role in a special military operation has already led to a noticeable outflow of the young population of military age after the announcement of partial mobilization by the President of Russia.

However, the potential of threats to the national security of the country, due to the reactionary political behavior of young people, is not exhausted. An activist culture of socio-political behavior of young people has been formed in Russia for a long time, which has yielded results – almost 40% of young Russians have experience in coordinating civil initiatives. Nevertheless, such an experience is not based on an understanding of a single ideological and value construct of the image of the state, which can serve as a ground for manipulation of categories of morality in the online space by interested actors in order to activate the destructive mobilization potential of young people.