Is Russia a class state?

Historically Russian state is considered to have a class system of society. But, the coming of the
Bolsheviks to power, at the state level equality between all members of society was announced, equal
rights were established and thus, it seemed to mark the death of the class system of the state, while
consolidating developed social mobility. The Russian Federation is the main successor of the USSR, but
does this mean that Russia has preserved this absence of class division? And if not, how could this
happen, given the proclaimed class equality in the USSR?

In my essay, I will try to touch simultaneously on three historical epochs on the territory of the Russian
Federation: Tsarist Russia, Soviet Russia and modern Russia, in order to try to trace the evolution of class
as a phenomenon in the country. At the same time, the main focus will be on the last two epochs in
order to answer the question of the existence of class division in the current historical realities and to
answer the question of the reasons for this.

Before starting a detailed consideration, I will try to define the concept of a class as such.. Here I will use
two definitions: according to Karl Marx, class can be defined as social relations between the subjects of
society on the basis of economic relations (employee, employer). At the same time, class as a
phenomenon defines concepts such as inclusion and exclusion, which draw a line of demarcation
between classes and create a certain social space of its subjects. If we try such a definition on Tsarist
Russia, then there is no doubt about its class structure. The structure of soslovija It can also be
considered from the standpoint of class restrictions, as well as applied in the meaning of class identity
and to describe membership in a community through a network of social connections (Alison Smith, For
the Common Good and Their Own Well- Being: Social Estates in Imperial Russia (Oxford and New York,
Oxford University Press, 2014). 296 pp.): peasants, even at a late stage, for the most part did not have
the rights to study at the university, about the restrictions on marrying serfs, the literature allows us to
roughly assess how landlords could beat their serfs and not receive proper censure for it.

At the same time, if we define class from the point of view of Karl Marx, it turns out that there really was
no class system in Soviet Russia, since there was no exploiter of labor, since there were no private
property companies and every worker had the right and power to use the benefits. Note that the
establishment of production and production standards were established at the state level, that is, we
can say that the exploiter was actually the party that set the standards? In this case, can we again talk
about the existence of two classes: the working class and the class of the party, which set wages, the
length of the working day, standards, and so on? To try to answer these questions, a more complex
scheme is needed. M. Weber suggested that class affiliation is only one of the dimensions of
stratification as well as power and prestige(status). Thus, the party employee really stood higher within
the framework of stratification, due to the presence of political power that gives him the right to
regulate the country's economy and, accordingly, the work of the employee. At the same time, the
division concerned not only those who have political power and those who are deprived of it: we can
also talk about the class gap in the meaning of the gap in skills, qualifications and some kind of expertise.
Indeed, a man who had lived for a long time as a serf could not afford to go to the city to study and
improve his social status. While remaining on the collective farm, he continued to secure for himself a
modified class of worker who did not possess skills that could be highly appreciated in society. At the
same time, the existence of some tension can be said thanks to the language and established structures
of speech. Children were scared that "If they don't study well, they will become janitors," thereby
putting people who have this profession on a rank below themselves. In the person's mind, the idea still
remained that some work is "dirty", "low-skilled", which makes the person performing it a person of a
lower stratum in society. At the same time, can we say that those persons who assessed their position
high enough in the existing hierarchy were also not restricted in their rights and had the opportunity to
move freely on the social ladder? I will not answer using the proclaimed ideals here, but I will try to refer
to some statistics. According to the data table compiled by Carol Nekimais in 1917-1977. according to
her own research and data from G. Lapidus, D. Lane, the percentage of women in the CPSU and the
CPSU Central Committee ranged from 2.2 to 8 percent over the marked time range. (Nechimais
Women's Participation: From Lenin to Gorbachev). This is a very low indicator, which may tell us about
some kind of discrimination, and therefore restriction in power. However, it is not entirely clear which
restrictions played an important role here: self-restrictions or restrictions on the part of the authority.

Let's try to move on to modernity: the transition from a planned to a market economy has worsened the
situation of citizens. However, the statement that it led to poverty, stigmatization and discrimination is
impossible, let us recall the existence of works in Soviet times that were rated as low-skilled. However,
this class struggle process has been accelerated several times. If we use Max Weber's concept, we can
see how exactly at the time of the capitalist turn in Russia these three dimensions (power, prestige and
property) are interconnected and the person who has economic power has also political power(through
the lobbying of laws) and prestige as one creates the other and cause a higher position in the system of
stratification, thereby creating an even greater gap between classes. This is exactly what we can observe
in the Russian state today: oligarchs can promote laws for more favorable conditions for themselves.
The so-called competitive environment, which promises payment depending on the level of knowledge
and skills and the possibility of choice, aggravates the situation of those who do not have sufficient skills
for a more prestigious job. Let's go back to the example with the "dirty" work and the janitor /cleaner.
Previously, this employee could count on a salary that could guarantee him coverage of some basic
needs and save him from absolute poverty. At the same time, we do not forget that there was still some
discrimination and division, although not fixed at the state level. What is happening now. This person,
on the one hand, still remains a representative of a "low-skilled" profession, but now his remuneration is
determined not by the state, but by a company that can determine the level of payment as minimum.
Since there are quite a lot of such workers, it turns out that the janitor / cleaner cannot choose a more
paid job due to the great competition. Thus, in a relative sense, after Russia's transition to its current
state, this person has become even poorer. Such a limitation of payment leads to the subsequent
inability to acquire knowledge and skills that can be paid for above due to the lack of any financial
opportunity. This again shows how the three stratification branches in modern times intertwined with
each other. Such a statement denies the death of the class system in Russia and at the same time calls
into question the reality of social mobility for all strata of people. It turns out that mobility is available
only for people who make up the middle and higher classes as such, and for people from lower strata, it
is not available.

Why do people continue to adhere to the class system of the state, realizing their place in it and the
limitations that a person may face? On the one hand, we see that social mobility actually exists only for
people who have some capital, property. At the same time, we can talk about self-restrictions, which I
have already touched upon when describing the statistics of women who are members of the CPSU
Central Committee. Such self-restrictions lead to an even greater consolidation of the class, as they
create a system of self-reproduction, recursion, which is based on a person's awareness of his position in
society and by embedding him in the system of society in which he exists. Bourdieu also made an
assumption about the importance of people who create the social space of an individual, thus showing
that socialization and conformity play one of the significant roles in the preservation of the class system.
Indeed, considering the experience of both the USSR and modern Russia, we can notice how young
people can refuse to study at a prestigious university in Moscow or St. Petersburg due to the fact that
they consider themselves "out of place", singling out the inhabitants of these cities in a certain class to
which they do not belong. By staying to study at universities/schools in the region, they, thereby,
independently limit their opportunities for social mobility, in a sense, dooming themselves. However, it
is not so much stereotyping that is harmful for self-restraint, as, in my opinion, the influence of mass
culture is also. If we consider the television programs that are on Russian television today, we will
almost never see a woman working as a programmer or holding a high position at work there. This
determines a certain image, which can eventually be demonstrated by statistics of female students in
technical specialties (Rosstat statistics: https://journal.tinkoff.ru/ptu-stat/). Thus, it turns out that the
preservation of class differences is also preserved thanks to the learned norms and rules that are
dictated by the society in which a particular person is located, following them strengthens them and
strengthens the class gap. An individual's class affiliation may change, but the process of continuous
socialization allows a person to be integrated into society and accept the norms prescribed for his new
class, thereby maintaining his existence.

So, the statement about the horizontal nature of the society of the Russian Federation and the
possibility of social mobility is quite reckless and in some sense false. Indeed, comparing the division
into estates (classes) with the history of Tsarist Russia It is not fixed at the state level, but the capitalist
realities of Russia today form a giant gap between people who were discriminated against or stigmatized
in the USSR and those who were lucky to be born, for example, in Moscow. At the same time, those who
do not belong to the lower stratum of society may also face difficulties that are accepted along with the
process of socialization and integration into society, thereby reproducing this process.