Khomyakova Anna

№ 3, 2019

• Religious Self-Identification of Respondents in Mass Surveys: What Is Behind Declared Religiosity?

  The article presents the results of the research study Measurement of the degree of value solidarity and the level of social trust in the Russian society conducted by the ZIRCON Research Group in late 2018 — early 2019. The main goal of the study was to identify value orientations of Russians, determine the unifying potential of diverse values and measure the level of social trust. A special section of the study was devoted to religious values, which made it possible to compare the religious identity of respondents with their value orientations, ideological attitudes and opinions on the current issues of the socio-political agenda.

  The empirical data obtained in the course of the study indicate that the declared religiosity of Russians is often superficial (nominal), unstable, and is not supported either by appropriate religious practice or ethical views and value orientations. Its influence on the ideological and political choices of citizens is minimal, and religious institutions do not seem to possess a serious potential for mass political mobilization.

  According to the authors, the public consciousness of Russians is highly fragmented. If earlier it was possible to spot large groups of people with a holistic, logically consistent, internally connected worldview that can be regarded as a common set of ideological views (for example, Russian — Orthodox — loyal to the Russian Orthodox Church — against abortions, etc.), nowadays such integrity is absent. Ideological chains no longer unite people into large communities. The society is divided into quite narrow and at the same time very different in terms of their internal parameters groups. Any combination of three or four dimensions (issues, value ideological constructs) of public discourse divides the Russian society into small fragments.

  DOI: 10.30570/2078-5089-2019-94-3-161-184

  Pages: 161-184