Consolidation of a regional community in a glocal social reality: socio-cultural barriers

The research was carried out at the expense of the Russian Science Foundation, project no. 21-18-00150,

The problem of consolidation of communities of various self-organization levels has been noticeably actualized in recent years. The President of the Russian Federation has repeatedly spoken about its importance in relation to the country as a whole (according to O.V. Zakharova’s research, it is constantly present in his conjunctive discourse in 2000–2015) (Zakharova, 2016). Quite a large number of scientific papers have been devoted to the analysis of contradictions in the processes of consolidation/deconsolidation of the Russian population. Much less often the problems of consolidation are investigated in relation to the regions, which are Russia’s entities. Even less often it is reflected by representatives of regional elites. Some regional leaders tried to declare the need for consolidation as a direction of real policy. For instance, the head of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) declared 2019 the year of Consolidation for the unification of society in achieving the regional development objectives. But the idea was most consistently implemented in the Belgorod Oblast, where the Government approved the strategy “Formation of a regional solidarity society for 2011–2025”. However, the implementation of the strategy was completed by the Governmental Decree of the Belgorod Oblast 340-pp, dated June 6, 2022 “On invalidation of the Governmental Decree of the Belgorod Oblast 435-pp “On approval of the strategy “Formation of a regional solidarity society” for 2011–2025”, dated November 24, 2011, the basis for which was stated the execution of its activities by all participants within the established time frame.

The attractiveness of the idea of consolidation for regional elites and a significant part of the population (a study conducted in 2022 by the Civil Society Development Laboratory of the Belgorod State University in the region (n = 6800) showed: 22.6% of respondents stated unequivocally that consolidation was necessary; another 35.8% chose the answer “rather yes than no”)1 is that it brings an essential element of stability to the development of Russia’s entities, which is extremely necessary in a society, which I. Prigozhin and I. Stengers defined it as a situation of “nonequilibrium turbulent chaos” (Prigozhin, Stengers, 1986, p. 225). In turn, social stability, having a positive impact on public consciousness, not only creates a favorable environment for the development of the economy and the social sphere, but is a necessary condition for regional reproduction, including in a purely “physical” form – population growth. More than twenty years ago, Russian researcher I.A. Gundarov formulated the dependence of population reproduction on the social stability level as the law of “spiritual and demographic determination” (Gundarov, 2001, p. 66).

However, the problem of regional consolidation has not only an internal but also an external glocal (global and simultaneously local) dimension. It is associated with the inconsistency of the globalization process, which, unifying and integrating social reality, does not automatically “nullify” the possibilities of local (primarily regional) communities. Many of them have the opportunity to preserve their uniqueness and remain significant “players” within the global system.

On the one hand, it is expressed in an increase in their activity level, which consists in the desire to develop interregional and transregional connections, manifesting their own subjectivity. The problem of subjectivity is most often analyzed in relation to an individual or a social group. In particular, the concept of youth subjectivity is widely known (Kovaleva, Lukov, 1999, p. 147). In this case, subjectivity is understood by researchers as the ability of society, social groups, an individual to act as an active beginning (actor, creator) of social reality (Kovaleva, Lukov, p. 146). In this context, the region’s subjectivity can be interpreted as its ability to independently determine the strategy and tactics of development, to design and implement models of its future.

Attempts to do this will definitely have external constraints due to the administrative and political dependence of the regions on the federal center, which in an unstable environment is only increasing. But at the same time, the desire of the federal authorities to shift a significant share of responsibility for solving the problems of socio-economic development to RF entities will contribute to the expansion of the degrees of freedom of the latter. And regional elites, in their desire to expand the degrees of freedom, will appeal to the community they represent more often and with more confidence, the more integrated it is. On the other hand, glocality means an increased level of vulnerability of Russia’s entities to numerous dangers and threats, which has been fully demonstrated by the coronavirus pandemic, sanctions pressure and the special military operation. Consolidation in these extreme situations is increasingly defined as a condition of security becoming one of the leading interests of the regions’ inhabitants.

The glocality phenomenon has a distinctly expressed cultural aspect, since it is the specific culture that forms the unique image of any region and largely determines its potential. It is no coincidence that one of the researchers of the globalization process H. Khondker wrote: “Glocalization makes sense when it consists of at least one component, which refers to the local culture” (Khondker, 2004, p. 12). And it is in the cultural sphere, which is based on values and norms, that the constructive potential of the consolidation process in the regions is formed. At least, this is how many residents perceive the situation, explaining the impossibility of its implementation by the absence of unifying values. During the above-mentioned study, 37.1% of the respondents cited this reason, and another 32.8% cited strong generational differences. But if the socio-cultural sphere forms a significant part of the grounds for the consolidation process, it is also where a significant part of its constraints appear. In fact, each restrictor can be viewed as a transformed form of this or that consolidating factor.

The purpose of the research is to analyze these constraints associated with the specificity of value and normative complexes and attitudes of the actors of the consolidation process in the Russian regions.