The Axiological Grounds of Social Engineering: Prospects for the Modernization of Russian Society

Abstract

This article analyzes the problem of the connection between values and knowledge in the social engineering process. It examines the limitations and possibilities for interference in the natural functioning of social orders in the context of the modernization of society. Using materials from sociological studies, this article looks at the cognitive and methodological potential of a model of interaction between values and knowledge and discusses an algorithm for how this model might be applied in administrative and educational practice. Our analysis of the results of the survey revealed the social determinants of Russian youth that form the value structures and models of social practices. It also revealed young people’s ideas about Russian society, paths to its modernization, and mechanisms for relating terminal values to instrumental values. Finally, it shows the contradictions between individual concepts of social reality and ideas about Russia’s development. This kind of imbalance could hinder the social engineering of reality.