The support base of integration processes in the Eurasian Economic Union

• Main Author: G I Osadchaya
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Peoples’ Friendship University of Russia (RUDN University) 2019-12-01
• Series: RUDN journal of Sociology
• Subjects: eurasian economic union; integration; support base; unity; solidarity; social-humanitarian cooperation
• Online Access: http://journals.rudn.ru/sociology/article/viewFile/22088/17331

This article focuses on the conceptualization of the support base of the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) as an indicator of solidarity, unity of the member-state population around the integration concept and condition for the EEU successful development, and also stresses the importance of social-humanitarian aspects in the construction of the EEU. Based on the results of sociological studies (1), the article identifies the dynamics of the social support of integration processes by the member-state population in 2014-2018, and notes its decrease in the majority of member-states, differentiation in integration moods by age, and factors responsible for the decrease of the EEU’s support base. The author considers main directions, practices and instruments to enhance the social support for integration, and emphasizes that the concept of solidarity is interconnected with the ideas of social stability and justice. The author refers to the works of contemporary Russian and foreign scholars who developed the methodological grounds for promoting solidarity, and identifies ways to extend the EEU’s support base. The article shows that the resource of social solidarity, unity and structural-functional integration of the EEU is in the everyday efforts to strengthen it together with the economic efficiency, and this resource can be ensured by the political and civil discourse of the member states in the field of social-humanitarian cooperation. The development of the support base for integration processes includes such practices and resources that ensure interiorization of symbols, norms, values, and solidarity of the peoples and elites of the Eurasian Economic Union.