Russian.teens.3.glasnost.teens [portable]

In many ways, the Russian teens of Glasnost were the first truly modern Russian citizens: cynical about power, hungry for authenticity, and aware that the world is not black-and-red but a thousand shades of gray. They traded their pioneer scarves for leather jackets, their school debates about the Party Congress for arguments about democracy and market economics, and their certainties for questions. The Third Wave of Glasnost teens did not build the new Russia—the oligarchs and political hacks of the 1990s did that. But they were the ones who, for one brief, brilliant, terrifying moment, believed that a teenager’s opinion could matter. And for that belief, they were both the triumph and the tragedy of Gorbachev’s great experiment.

Prior to Glasnost, Soviet teenagers were funneled into state-sanctioned youth organizations like the Pioneers and Komsomol. Media from the 1993 era documents how quickly these institutions dissolved. Teenagers shifted away from collective state goals toward individual expression, skepticism of authority, and personal financial survival. 2. Westernization and Counter-Culture Russian.Teens.3.Glasnost.Teens

“What if they take it?” he asked.