Repesentation of the Russian Youth Civil Activity in Social Media

Abstract

The article presents the results of analyzing the digital infrastructure of civic engagement of Russian youth, characteristics of social media segments of opposition and loyalist digital communities, and their youth audiences.

Firstly, the relevance of the analysis is in comprehending the coverage of Russian young Internet users by social media that have a different focus (critical or loyalist about the current government) and develop a predominantly political or civic agenda. Secondly, in the study of the identification preferences of young Russians, reflected in their belonging to the audiences of these digital communities, finally, in establishing the relationship between controllability and uncontrollability of shaping the civic engagement of young Internet users.

The research objectives predetermined a hybrid model for implementing the applied study. The study included 1) cognitive mapping of social media documents reflecting the dominant meanings and meanings invested by Russian youth in online civil practices; 2) automated social media analysis using online services for monitoring social media (IQBuzz, Popsters), aimed at identifying the structural and content aspects of information flows of civic topics in which Russian youth are involved; 3) social graphing of connections between members of online communities of civic orientation, focused on identifying the density of interactions within communities of various types and strategies for managing the audience of digital hubs of civic engagement.

Based on the research, we conclude about the prevalence of moods opposed to the authorities with the focus on human rights and environmental issues; the prevalence of opposition activism among young men; the active circulation on the Internet of such triggers of protest mobilization of young people as events related to resonant violations of civil/political rights.

Acknowledgments. The article was prepared based on the results of research carried out at the expense of budgetary funds on the state order of the Financial University under the Government of the Russian Federation.