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Executive Summary:
Thirty-six million young people between the ages of 5 and 20 are inheritors of the Russian transition to a market economy. These young people, who make up roughly 24 percent of the nation's population, find themselves on the verge of two cultures, Soviet and post-Soviet. As such, they are faced with uncertainty, poverty, and increasing "social differentiation," which excludes a majority of youth from economic, cultural, and social opportunities and limits their ability to realize their potential.

The transition has created new and very pressing problems for young people such as deteriorating health, poverty and unemployment, the breakdown of the family, crime, and substance abuse. It has left children, such as the child victims of armed conflict in Chechnya and of the Chernobyl disaster and children living in the remote North of Russia, in desperate conditions with fewer supports. It has also created an inauspicious vacuum of civic consciousness among youth. If, as some experts say, the sustainability of the reforms hinges on youth, they are not well prepared to take up that mantle.

The health of young people in Russia has deteriorated rapidly during the transition. In "post-perestroika" times, the situation has become dangerous. Doctors and demographers speak of the destruction of the national genetic stock that might be unrecoverable. Practically all the parameters relating to the health of children and young people are negative. For example, according to forecasts, by the year 2015 healthy babies will account for only 15 to 20% of all newborns. The percentage of healthy children by the time they leave school is only 20-25%. And the death rate among teenagers has increased over the last three years by 36%. Suicide among 10- to 19-year-olds has increased over 80% from 1987 to 1992. The incidence of other "social" diseases, such as contagious and parasitic diseases, tuberculosis, dipsomania, drug addiction, toxicosis, and venereal diseases, has also escalated. Syphilis transmission has also reached epidemic proportions. While the number of sick adults grew from 1990 to 1995 by 33.4 times, the number of sick teenagers increased 51 times.

Russian youth now suffer living standards that are among the worst in the "second" world. It is difficult to determine the actual proportion of young people below the official poverty line (estimates range from 33% to 60%). In any case, the problem has gotten worse since 1990 when the proportion was 25%. In addition, other than an exceptional few, young people are not entering the job market equipped with the right values and skills needed for the new realities. Education is no longer a ticket to employment: 26% of secondary school graduates are not able to find a job now. In some regions, the vast majority of youth are unemployed, e.g. 80.2% in Ingushetia; and 80.2% in Tuva republic.

The most important factor influencing the life of a Russian family with children is social differentiation. It has created a "poverty culture," a sphere of socialization for the considerable number of children and teenagers who are below the official poverty line of $50/month per person. Income differentials have made social integration for children difficult and have created fewer opportunities for richer and poorer young people to come into contact. For example, the explosion of new types of entertainment in urban areas are available only to the few who can afford them. And opportunities for advancement for poor children are becoming more limited since the best schools are private and too expensive.

On top of this, the family in Russia appears to be collapsing: a majority (68%) of parents in 1997 think it is better to live separately from their children. The number of single parent households (usually headed by mothers) has increased to 20%, and the vast majority is headed by mothers. In addition, more and more children are being born to single mothers: from 1990 to 1995 the rate increased from 14.6 to 21.1% of all births. Since over half of single mothers are poor, this does not bode well for young people's economic well being. The number of children who fled from their homes and registered in orphanages in 1993-5, reached 58,000. Thirty to 40% of serious crimes are committed inside the family, mostly against children.

An increasing number of children have left their families and dropped out of the other remaining institutions that focus on youth such as the formal education system. There are about four million homeless children today, approaching the number in the 1920s after the Civil War. According to the Committee on Women, about 1.5 million children are neither studying nor working.

There are few surviving social institutions that help youth get access to the resources they need. This is the result of three forces. One is the transformation of the powerful Youth Communist League structures, Komsomol (for young people from 14- to 28-years-old) and Pioneers (for young people from 9- to 13-years-old). These institutions used to be the main implementers of Soviet youth policies and shapers of youth consciousness. Today they have split into several semi-governmental organizations, among other nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). Related to this is the low proportion of government spending on youth: in the 1996 budget, allocations for government sponsored children's programs were nearly 25 times less than that for armaments and military equipment purchases.

In addition, privatization of state-owned enterprises has resulted in the closing of many schools, clubs, and clinics that were meeting young people's critical needs. For example, in the context of worsening youth health, the numbers of beds, health-centers, and hospitals for children have decreased, e.g. over the last 3 years, 50 children's hospitals closed and 7,000 pediatricians were fired. Approximately 30,000 teachers left state schools due to low salaries and overwork and now teach at private schools. School services are deteriorating. Higher levels of education are becoming increasingly inaccessible to children of the working classes or those living in rural areas, contributing to social differentiation.

In 1996, the government budget provided only 1/7 of the funds required for the traditional summer vacation, which is considered a necessity for youth development by Russians. The parents of 15 million children cannot afford to pay. While the number of ways to spend leisure time has increased, for most Russian youth, the new sports centers, hobby clubs, night clubs, and travel options are out of reach. The price of attending such a club is now higher than the monthly income of a state-employed parent.

Lack of leisure opportunities contributes to crime and substance abuse. Although most crimes are committed by adults, the youth crime rate increased by approximately 28% between 1990 and 1995. Traditionally young people in Russia have used alcohol, which is still the case. But the age at which young people first drink alcohol is decreasing and the age of alcohol addiction is getting younger. Youth are also becoming increasingly involved with new forms of substance abuse: drugs. Unlike alcohol, drug abuse has not been a problem in the past in Russia, but it is growing and is primarily a youth issue. From 1991 to 1995 the number of teenagers diagnosed as "drug addicts" increased by 617%, while the number of young people diagnosed as alcoholics increased by 32%.

In addition to physical and financial limitations on youth institutions, traditional, paternalistic attitudes towards children dampen possibilities for youth participation. As participants in IYF's Moscow roundtable in April pointed out, no new modes of establishing dialogue with youth have been developed. In addition, state policies can have limited impact today in part because they are based on a patron-client relationship with youth and do not solicit young people's active participation. State policies are still oriented toward maximizing the numbers of children involved in programs rather than the quality and impact of programs and creating intermediate bureaucratic links between the authorities and youth. There is neither feedback nor an efficient way to control how the funds are distributed. This lowers the effectiveness of state authorities in their efforts to solve the problems of youth.

Youth are suffering from "post-Soviet culture shock," which manifests itself in a distrust and disrespect for the law and authority structures and individualistic and materialistic definitions of social success. Experts highlight the "erosion of civic identity" among youth-the disruption of the links between individual and society.

Young people have a very vague idea of how laws and public institutions should "work" in practice to guarantee freedom, equality, social justice, and the social security of the citizens. They feel government is irrelevant. The vast majority (approximately 99%) feel they do not participate in the ruling of their own society, even more than in 1987 (97%). According to the results of an opinion poll among students which was published in "Argumenty i Fakty" in 1994, most of the respondents answering the question: "What would you like to say to your Government?" wrote "Nothing, there is no use of that anyway."

The results: young people in Russia today are indifferent to politics and misunderstand the significance of law and social solidarity in the routine practice of a democratic society. They value complete freedom and rights but do not recognize their civic responsibilities. They do not expect the state to respect their rights and, in turn, do not feel compunction about violating the law. In 1997, 27% of 17-year-olds questioned said that it is acceptable to earn money violating the law. Ninety percent of 17-year-olds consider it appropriate to use public transportation without paying for it, a little bit less than half approve of taking a bribe and approximately 60% approve of not paying taxes.

Another aspect of culture shock is new definitions of social success. Young people identify social success mainly with money and complete independence from society. Many of them think the only way to reach these goals is through improper and illegal means, and that "everyone is doing it." Faced with the need to build civic consciousness and responsibility among young people, the education system, among other government structures, has not helped form new rules or meanings to deal with a "democratic," pluralistic society.

Civic organizations and NGOs have emerged in Russia to address these youth challenges. Some are initiated by youth. They address such pressing needs as civic education and empowerment, youth leadership development, teen health, and reforming the education system. But the sector suffers from limited networking and coordination, as well as weak governance, management, and financial systems.

A near non-existent funding base constrains the NGO sector's ability to leverage its successes and reach across the vast country in a sustainable manner. Most youth NGOs rely heavily on foreign funding from foundations and bilateral aid agencies. One of the greatest challenges NGOs face is mobilizing new and sustainable sources of funding, especially from the local private sector. A diversity of funding sources is needed to allow NGOs to provide alternative approaches that supplement state youth policies and focus more on long term, holistic, and positive youth development.

While in some cases NGOs cooperate effectively with local government, there is much more government can do to improve the enabling environment for NGOs, especially regarding financial sustainability. To date, Russian individuals and companies have not taken a strategic approach to long term investments in the youth sector.