Happiness in Russia: 1981-2012
Christian Welzel (a leading professor of LCSR) delivered a report on “Happiness in Russia, 1981-2012” at the Yegor Gaidar Foundation.
On the October, 1st Yegor Gaidar Foundation began a series of public discussions on the values of the Russian population. Global researches of values (such as WVS, EVS, ESS, etc.) showed that Russians’ value structure differs markedly from the value structures of the population of other countries - both developed and developing countries. What are the reasons for this difference? Is it possible to correct the adverse components of this structure? And how it affects the political, economic and social climate in the country? These questions were discussed the leading sociologists, psychologists and economists.
Professor of the Laboratory for Comparative Social Research Christian Welzel on the base of an extensive array of sociological data from “World Value Survey” (WVS) described the dynamics of happiness in Russia over the past three decades. According to the study of Prof. Welzel subjective well-being of the Russian population considerably declined during the 1990s as a result of destruction of the socialist system. Recently the situation has changed but the growth of the subjective well-being is still quite slow.
Rich countries usually demonstrate higher level of subjective well-being in comparison to the poor. However, even in the relatively economically good 1982 Russian level of subjective well-being and life satisfaction was lower than in much poorer countries, such as Nigeria or India. In couple with the increasing mortality from alcoholism and reduces life expectancy it clearly indicated impending social crisis. After the collapse of the Soviet Union the level of subjective well-being of the Russian population has fallen to the extremely low mark and reached the minimum in 1995 - time when the overwhelming majority of Russians called themselves unhappy or completely disappointed in their lives. Since 2000 there has been a trend of the recovery but even in 2011 the level of happiness in Russia was lower than in 1981.
Dynamics of happiness in different age cohorts are inhomogeneous. The data shows that the level of happiness of the seniors who lived in time of the USSR after decline in the 1990s is no longer growing. Russian youth easier adapted to modern realities; therefore the level of happiness of younger age groups was growing together with the economy.
A high level of happiness in a country is not only a consequence of sustainable economic development but also contributes to the latter, as it encourages formation of favorable social atmosphere and social capital. Therefore low level of subjective well-being in Russia is a serious challenge for a policy of modernization and requires close attention from the government. However in the course of discussion it was noted that Russian domestic researches reveal higher level of happiness in the country than the data showed by Prof. Welzel. This discrepancy could occur due to a mismatch of different measurement indicators that are used to calculate the index of subjective well-being and happiness.
by Ekaterina Dergunova and Dmitry Zakotyansky
by Ekaterina Dergunova and Dmitry Zakotyansky