Sociocultural and Institutional Aspects of Social Modernization of the Siberian Regions

A report by Anna Nemirovskaya at the regular LCSR seminar 

On June 13, Anna Nemirovskaya (senior research fellow at LCSR) delivered a report on “Sociocultural and Institutional Aspects of Social Modernization of the Siberian Regions” at the regular seminar of the Laboratory for Comparative Social Research . 

Anna’s research project is devoted to an analysis of the institutional and socio-cultural aspects of modernization of Siberia. The project is supported by the grant of the President of the Russian Federation for young scientists (project МК-3359.2013-6, 2013 – 2014)

The region of Siberia is an extraordinary case of an area of large space and significant socio-cultural diversity. The sphere of Anna’ analysis includes 12 Siberian subjects of the Russian Federation. Anna uses the variety of data sources such as World Values Survey, Russian Federal State Statistics Service, UNDP, Zircon, and some others.

The main aim of the project is to investigate the socio-cultural and institutional aspects of Siberia`s social modernization in comparison with other Russian regions, to evaluate existing obstacles and opportunities for Siberia`s development, and to investigate demographical, economical and institutional features of the Siberian regions.

The three sectors with the highest development potential in Siberia are science and education, industrial production, and tourism sphere. However, there is a number of obstacles threatening the modernization of the region, such as harsh climate conditions, distant location, and unfavorable institutional environment.

Moreover, the region of Siberia shows the lowest level of socio-economic development compared with other regions of Russia. The main problems in this respect are significant discrepancy in levels of social and economic development; the outflow of well-educated people substituted by numerous low-skilled workers; low average income; high rate of income inequality; insufficient quality of life; the absence of social mobility; widespread corruption practices; distrust of political institutions; the absence of trust; adherence to traditional values.

Nonetheless, Anna reported a very interesting finding that, despite all these unfavourable conditions, Siberia shows the highest level of subjective well-being among Russian regions.

by Sofia Lopatina