Social and cultural potential of modernization in Russia

The prospects for a Russian society modernization refer to the study of a social space, that is, a social reality, which means a structure of social positions according to Pierre Bourdieu. In general terms, this structure includes households, the representatives of small and medium size enterprises, officials, civil servants and the employees of state corporations. Each of them has a heterogeneous structure. Only 20% of the households have a power (by P. Bourdieu), which can transmit the modernization practices to the whole society. As to business representatives (entrepreneurs), they have their own egoistic interests, so they cannot take the lead in the direct militant actions. The representatives of the state authority bodies (officials, civil servants), the employees of state corporations also cannot always be the initiators of a modernization development because they are most interested in stability. In order to characterize the sociocultural potential of the Russian modernization we focused on the population's income flows (both official and hidden ones). From 2000 to 2010 the share of income from business activity declined, the share of property income also decreased, while the share of the social benefits and remuneration of the salaried employees' labour increased. As it is generally known, only incomes from the market sources (from property, business) can be a considerable modernization resource, nevertheless, in Russia they are feasible only for 8% of the population (in developed countries for 20-25%). Currently, the main resource of the modernization development in Russia is salaried employees, especially those of them who are highly paid professionals. For account of them the modernization resource can be increased to 50-60%. But in a real social space of the present Russia there are some informal forms of remuneration of labour that, in essence, change the assessment of this resource. Therefore, the modernization development, first of all, requires institutional transformations. The quality of the institutional space determines the dynamics of the society development as well as of the person development, which manifests not only in a human capital but also a social capital. The social capital is expressed with the existing in the society level of confidence. A social inequality (general and gender) reduces the social capital significantly. The specifics of the modernization development are based on the personality characteristics of the Russian population. These characteristics are quite adequate for the development of the small and medium size businesses. All that is needed is a political will.

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