Youth parliamentarism in contemporary Russia: trends and prospects of development in the regions

Youth parliamentary movement in contemporary Russia had passed through approximately fifteen-year history and had attracted much attention of both government and non-governmental activists. An attempt to raise this movement was inspired by an idea of accommodating European experience of youth activism to the promotion of values like civil identity, non-profit activism and political participation in Russia. The movement was expected to achieve these goals both by state and local authorities, and was sponsored by them. In fact, real activities of youth parliaments matched these goals incidentally and their routine work was seldom linked to social and political activism. At most, they lacked the means for representing youth’s social interests, the means to participate a dialogue with authorities. It is still a question if they had become able to provide opportunities for getting some experience of real politics. The paper brings the analysis of the activities of local and regional youth parliaments in Tyumen oblast’ and KHMAO-Ugra in order to make sense of their present state and the part they play in local and regional social life.