The Resource Potential of Social Optimism in Modern Russia

The article presents the results of a socio-political analysis of the phenomenon of social optimism in its connection with the ideas of Russian citizens about a positive image of the future. The problematic situation is caused by an urgent cognitive demand for awareness of the optimal stable political perspective of society and a predictable personal life strategy of citizens, which should be relevant to socio-political attitudes and social ideas of society about the successful future of Russia. At the theoretical level the authors rely on the provisions of the cognitive theory of "expected value", the concepts of collective efficiency and self-development, mental attitude, political culture, sustainable socio-political development of society as the conceptual scientific foundations of research on modern social reality in the system of objectively established global social and political relations. At the empirical level the authors attract arrays of information from the sociological monitoring "How are you living, Russia?" of the Institute of Socio-Political Research of the Russian Academy of Science, the analysis of which makes it possible to understand the dynamics of social optimism in society, correlations between levels of social optimism and socio-psychological, socio-economic and socio-political resources of Russian society and the state, contributing to or hindering the activation of resource zones of social optimism. The dysfunctions of the formation of a stable state of social optimism are revealed: the preservation of a dominant position in the problem field of factors of material status and security, the blurring of ideological preferences and political attitudes, the short horizon of planning for the personal and the country's future. The socio-psychological and political resources influencing the change in the nature of social mood in general and social optimism in particular, and creating prerequisites for the preservation of the historically established political culture of Russian society are highlighted: national-state identity, social trust, value-semantic component of historical memory and the vector of modernization of state policy. Among the recommendations of scientific and practical priorities, the theoretical search and practical development of effective mechanisms for forming the image of a fair, sustainable multipolar future are highlighted.