Trends and Opportunities for the Development of Social Communications at the Russian Regions Level
The modern world is often called a network (M. Castells), where communication plays a special role. The author of the article follows the understanding of social networks like space nodes and flows between them (J. Turner). Threads can be tangible, symbolic and emotional. It is important that the production, storage, sharing and structuring of these communications is largely determined by technology and digitization. An important feature of social networking is the competition between the nodes for the significance level. Given that the world is growing rapidly, is creating global networks of influence and power and excluding minor or weak nodes from the network, the regional society runs the risk of staggering behind in this competition. Backlog at the communicative level is equivalent to the structural marginalization. Therefore, an assessment of how fast, in what way, and under the influence of which factors the regional society is included in the global network of communication, allows us to estimate its competitive opportunities. <br></br> This article is an attempt to analyze the social development of communication processes, whereas social communication is understood as identifying and understanding the relationship networks. Social communications are known to quickly and easily enter the network, if the counterparty is perceived as a “friend” and the communication process is free of national, religious, territorial, mental or other barriers. <br></br> The empirical base of research was obtained in the process of 10-year socio-cultural monitoring by the sociologists of Tyumen State University, with the financial support of the Russian Humanitarian Foundation. The database includes the details of the “Social and cultural portraits of the Russian regions” project led by the Center for the Study of Social and Cultural Changes in the Institute of Philosophy. The article tests the hypothesis that the level of society's preparedness to be included into the global communications network is directly related to the relationship “trust” - “communication” -“identification” on the scale of ‘friend” - “alien”. Direct citizen participation in Russia as a country with a developing democracy, reduces the level of institutional trust, but increases the level of network communications.