Youth Development Report: Condition of Russian Youth Authors: Mark Agranovich, Natalia Korolyova, Andrei Poletaev, Igor Sundiev, Irina Seliverstova, and Anna Fateeva 1 Contents Foreword..............................................................................................................3 Introduction.........................................................................................................5 1. Youth education..............................................................................................8 1.1. Levels of education ...............................................................................8 1.2. Equal access to education .................................................................13 1.3. Quality of education.............................................................................25 2. Health.............................................................................................................34 2.1 Disease ...............................................................................................34 2.2. Sexual and reproductive health of young people................................44 2.3. Traumatism .........................................................................................47 3. Youth and labour-market .............................................................................34 3.1. General characteristics........................................................................49 3.2. Level of employment ...........................................................................57 3.3. Work and study ...................................................................................65 3.4. Unemployment and job placement.....................................................72 4. Youth and society.........................................................................................87 4.1. Participation of young people in the political life and social initiatives 87 4.2. Criminality and asocial behaviour......................................................101 5. Youth development index ..........................................................................113 Conclusion ......................................................................................................120 Annex...............................................................................................................123 List of abbrevations ..................................................................................123 Tables to sections ....................................................................................125 2 Foreword Both Russian society and the Russian state authorities pay special attention to young people living in modern Russia. The draft of the Program for Social and Economic Development of the Russian Federation makes a special mention of the fact that “it is necessary to put into the foreground all kinds of measures designed to bring up competent and responsible young people who enjoy moral and physical health, and to draw attention of the regulatory bodies on all levels of government to the importance of social development of children and youth, to the maintenance of their rights to quality education, creative development, and meaningful diversions in their free time. Various institutions existing in our society must play an important role in achieving these goals.” Today’s situation in the realm of developing the new generation of young people is twofold. On the one hand, young people in modern Russia are more self-dependent, practical and mobile than ever before. They feel responsible for their own destiny and are thus very interested in getting high-quality education along with first-class vocational training, which does influence their subsequent job placement and their future careers. Young Russians aspire to further integrate into the international youth scene, and to participate in global economic, political and humanitarian developments. On the other hand, however, young people have shown lower levels of interest and participation in political, economic and cultural developments. Also, death rate of unnatural causes is on the rise among young Russians. In the main risk group are those between 15 and 24 years of age: this group shows the largest increase of deaths due to unnatural causes, including those resulting from drug abuse and AIDS. On the average, the criminalization of young Russians is rising, too, plus various destructive subcultures and groups have been increasing their influence on Russian youth. Social integration of young people with disabilities, of orphans and of disadvantaged teenagers living in troubled families is still a very acute issue. The Government of the Russian Federation has recognized the importance of developing and effectively implementing policies aimed at improving the condition of the young people, and, as part of its administrative reform in 2004, assigned this task to the Russian Ministry of Science and Education vesting it with a higher authority in the matter and, consequently, fixing it with respective responsibilities. The Ministry is currently developing a document under the title Strategy Of The Russian Federation For State Youth Development Policies In 2006-2010, which is, first of all, aimed at both supporting positive tendencies in youth development and strengthening countermeasures to negative tendencies. Basic priorities of this Strategy for the next five years are defined by the existing situation in the realm of youth development in Russia and by the goals of the social and economic development of the country as a whole, but, first and foremost, by the stated task of “developing human potential as a matter of paramount priority for raising the competitiveness of Russia in modern post-industrial era.” This Strategy envisages developing and implementing a whole complex of measures aimed at solving objectives of better integrating the young people in social, economic, political, and cultural relations. 3 Objective assessment of conditions, problems and tendencies as they are today in the sphere of education, job placement, health, and other key areas of developing the potential of the young generation will play a special, significant role in this activity. In this respect, the Youth Development Report: Condition of Russian Youth initiated by the UNESCO makes its contribution to developing youth development policies, clarifying targets and directions of finding answers to these problems. It is worth noting that this report was issued very timely, just as work on completing Strategy Of The Russian Federation For State Youth Development Policies is in its final stages and thus the material used in this report as well as its conclusions could be used today for selecting the most effective venues of problem solution. The report contains a thorough analysis of the condition of the Russian youth based on statistical data and on the results of sociological research. Of special importance is its orientation towards interregional differences and regional features as related to developing the potential of the young people. The Ministry of Science and Education agrees, generally speaking, with conclusions and recommendations of the report and considers them well-founded so that they are of undeniable practical interest. We would like to express our gratitude to UNESCO, to the German Society for Technical Cooperation (GTZ) and to the authors of this report who prepared this very informative and very up-to-date document on the condition of Russian youth. 4 Introduction This report was prepared at the request of UNESCO with the assistance of the German Society for Technical Cooperation (GTZ) and it is dedicated to defining the conditions of the young people in modern Russia. This issue is of great concern to any society. What is it, that we call “modern youth”? How is it different from the previous generation? What are its pursuits, its aims, and its potential? Modern Russian youth is, practically speaking, the first generation that was born and raised in the new, post-Soviet Russia. This generation was growing up in a very complex environment, in which previous behavior patterns were destroyed and the social and economic transformation featured quick changes that sometimes led to certain difficulties. This is why the questions regarding what is today’s Russian youth like and what is its potential are especially relevant for modern-day Russia. Too often one can hear people say that today’s youth is quite bad, or ill-mannered, or non- patriotic, or that the young people do not like working, that they mind only their own interests or its own diversions, and so on and so forth. It is quite probable (and there exist many proofs to that) that parents were saying something of this sort to their young for the last several thousand years. This is why the authors of this report made a conscious effort in avoiding moral or ideological issues and, instead, have concentrated their attention on such aspects of youth development and such characteristics of its potential that could have been assessed quantitatively, so that such analysis would provide credible enough statistical information. In this report interested readers will find the following issues are discussed: education, health, conditions of the young people at the labor market, participation in the public life, and their asocial behavior. Education is the most important element of human potential, and as applied to youth, it may be regarded in two aspects.