In the previous issue of the Russian Social Science Review we explored some of the historical background to the development of a middle class in Russia. The current issue pursues the topic in the contemporary period. Economists Elena M. Avraamova and Tat’iana M. Maleva lay the groundwork in our first selection, “The Evolution of the Middle Class: Missions and Methodology.” In addition to discussing the educational, entrepreneurial, and associational sources of middle-class status, and the functions of middle-class values and consumption patterns, the article notes the changing composition of Russia’s emerging middle class since 2000—a reflection not only of economic and social trends but also, though less explicitly, of political priorities:
[I]t must be said that substantial structural changes have taken place in the past ten to fifteen years among the potential representatives of the middle class. It is coming to include more and more representatives employed in state administration and the agencies of enforcement and security. At the same time, it still includes a substantial percentage of people employed in sectors that were the most attractive to workers at the end of the 1990s and the beginning of the 2000s. These include the spheres of economics and finance, but at the same time representatives engaged in high-technology work are leaving the economy. In principle these processes confirm that representatives of the middle class are striving to implement the most effective models of economic behavior adaptable to the conditions in place “here and now.”
Clearly, the losers in this shift are the professional and intellectual groups that traditionally have given rise to oppositional activities.
The next four selections, all by sociologists, examine the various factors introduced above, in greater detail. Svetlana V. Mareeva writes on middle-class values. Articles by Natal’ia Tikhonova discuss consumption patterns and social mobility—both in decline. We close the issue with an overview of survey findings by Mikhail K. Gorshkov, director of the Institute of Sociology of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
—P.A.K.