RUSSIA'S DEMOGRAPHIC FUTURE
The article considers challenges and prospects of demographic development of Russia in social and economic as well as geopolitical contexts. The authors propose a coherent approach towards advancement of national demographic policy. They analyze possible developments in strategy formulation, legal regulation and institutional building in this field. Measures for improvement of demographic policy of the country taking into account geopolitical realities are offered. Estimates are given to various components of possible compensation of population of Russia from the geopolitical point of view. Decreasing effect from policy aimed to stimulate demographic growth, which was adopted in the mid-2000s makes it urgent to promote new initiatives in this field. Results of sociological studies confirm that social and economic challenges are major limitations to the growth in birth rate. Significant part of Russian population is signaling its desire to have more children than they have right now. This is one of the major reserves for demographic growth in the country. Meanwhile, record of Western states testifies that development of the notion of “avoidable death” enables to increase significantly life expectancy of citizens. Comprehensive approach towards national health, which sees national health care system as only one element of the broader policy targeting decrease in death rate, was just recently introduced in Russia. The authors pay hightened attention to the impact of migration on demographic and political situation in the country. The foreign record of compensating migration reflects ambiguous outcomes of this process as well as significant social and political risks. However, the article confirms that efficient management of migration could promote benefits from it. It concludes that coherent improvement of demographic policy could help in reversing the current negative trend of depopulation in Eastern regions, which poses challenges to Russia's territorial integrity