The article considers the evolution of social changes and the peculiarities of the development of socio-gender processes in Russian society in the conditions of Russia’s transition to a market economy, changes in the social structure and in the activities of women’s public organizations. It analyzes transformations in the social space of the activities of women’s non-commercial organizations, their relevance, changes in the social base and political attention of women’s organizations to the changes taking place in the world. The article also reveals the peculiarity of social space as a field for integration of new gender norms in social interaction amid the formation of a new gender order.

Based on the results of the repetitive by its nature project sociological study “Women, democratization and gender equality in Russian society 30 years later”, the author discloses the social shifts in the process of forming a new gender order, the degree of understanding of its essence, the perception of certain norms and orientation by the mass consciousness of women and students, the reaction of the population to the changes that have occurred in society over thirty years. The issues of reformatting a number of activities of women’s organizations, taking into account the changed social and political situation, the actions of National projects and Sustainable Development Goals, are raised. Special emphasis is placed on social changes in the structure and leadership of women’s non-commercial organizations, on the potential for expanding the socially active practices of women’s organizations when forming a national gender order.

The issues of women’s political participation, which are considered in the article, allow not only to predict the general course of the political process in Russia, but also to identify the degree of women’s influence on the electoral results. The article is written on the data of last wave of Monitoring “How do you live, Russia?” (June 2021), launched by the Centre of strategic social and political studies of the Institute of social and political research of Russian Academy of Sciences.

The author analyses the features of the legitimization of the Russian political regime by the female part of society, which are determined by the level of trust in various public and political institutions and the level of satisfaction with the political system. Analyzing the political parties sympathies and features of the declared political behavior of women, the author concludes that there are minimal differences in the assessments of the content and specifics of the political system in the opinions of men and women, discrepancies were found in the assessment of the activities of some political leaders, as well as in political parties sympathies. Given the absence of a split between the sexes in the assessment of political issues, it is possible to predict the preservation of the existing gender order, which is characterized by traditional ideas about the role of women in society.

The article compares the so-called political face of women in Western, Eastern countries and Russia. The main characteristics of women politicians in Western countries are: common descent and personal qualities as means to achieve a high position, specialized education and a good place to work before entering politics, early and late political careers, strong family ties with a minimum of children, and the high effectiveness of political decisions with a low failure rate. Women politicians in the Eastern group of countries are determined by heredity and continuity of political power, specialized or humanitarian education, a rather late start of a political career, often relying on a spouse, strong family ties and small families, a high percentage of political scandals, corruption charges and low management efficiency. Women politicians in Russia are more often characterized by a common descent with high personal qualities as means to achieve a political office and a specialized education, including at the level above the bachelor’s degree, they have to enter the political path early, sacrificing the opportunity to have an alternative job, the possibility of having more than one child or interrupting the career of a politician, while the effectiveness of the work of Russian women politicians is high, although political scandals are not rare.

Thus, with a greater orientation of women politicians in Russia towards the West, they have both Eastern and their own personal characteristics associated with various reasons, the elimination of which will improve the political sphere for the advancement of women in this area.

The article considers the United Nation Sustainable Development Goals in particular the goal No.5 – ensuring gender equality. It analyses differences in the implementation of those goals and objectives in different countries. A critical assessment is given of the “Voluntary National Review of the Implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development” and provides data not used in the report related to the situation of women in the Russian Federation.

The implementation of the following goals in relation to women is described: the ubiquitous elimination of all forms of discrimination; and violence; elimination of all harmful practices; ensuring the full and real participation and equal opportunities at all levels in political, economic and public life; ensuring universal access to sexual and reproductive health services. Conclusions are drawn about the main issues in ensuring gender equality in Russia, associated with the existence of different gender orders.

The article analyzes the reports of publicly traded Russian companies with a high level of capitalization Sber, Gazprom, Yandex and SIBUR for their gender policy and ESG goals. The incompleteness of non-financial information provided by companies means that when there is information about the ratio of women to men in the company, reports are not an accurate and comprehensive source of understanding how gender policy develops within the company. Reporting Russian public companies are consistent in their history of opening non-financial information, though there is a lack of direct recommendation and instruction from Russia’s adjustment organizations on how to make the process of reporting to be accurate. However, there is a lot of potential for improvement in terms of mainstreaming gender policy priorities and ESG goals: companies do not disclose the full amount of data specified in key documents describing global gender policy priorities; they do not always take into account Russia’s reporting to the UN on the progress of development the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development; rarely declare measures to deal with gender inequality issues.

The subject of the article is the Russian people’s attitude to gender neutrality as the norm of new gender order. Majority of the Russians associate the new gender order with the achievement of real equality of men and women in various spheres of social life, elimination of all kinds of gender discrimination. At the same time they keep binary approach to gender awareness. The paper notes that currently Russian people demonstrate one of the most conservative worldwide attitudes toward the gender norms and relations. No one from the Western new gender norms: same-sex marriage acceptance, right to choose sex both by a child and his/her parents, etc. are not accepted by majority of Russians. Moreover women, responders in marriage, having children, responders with higher education demonstrate the most conservative approach. When compared with other countries Russian people are close to Chinese in their attitude to non-traditional gender norms. The author concludes that the new gender order formation in Russia is going on in the frame of binary gender model not assuming any gender neutrality.

The practice and theory of the political process show that the specific of the behavior of men and women in politics is different. Coupled with gender stereotypes, that causes a difference in the portrayals and images of political leaders of different genders. The study of the peculiarities of women’s leadership in the formation of political elites is complicated by several theoretical issues related to the influence of gender stereotypes on it, including the role behavior. However, the influence of such stereotypes on the perception of female leadership does not mean that female political representation “automatically” leads to the humanization of the political process and contributes to the softness in the work of political institutions. The quantitative and qualitative analysis of the political courses of prominent women leaders in Great Britain of the 20th– 21st centuries shows that the real political courses of women leaders have little in common with the gender stereotypes that were attributed to them, what did not prevent them from being widely recognized as decisive leaders in their positions. More than 100 years of experience of women’s presence in the British politics allows us to highlight the common and special in their activities. Using the algorithm of SWOT-analysis of the successful growth and self-realization of the personality of iconic female politicians of Great Britain, the authors trace the strengths and weaknesses, opportunities and threats for female leadership in the political process of Great Britain in the 20th–21st centuries.

In the year 2015 the document “Transforming the World: An Agenda for Sustainable Development 2030” was adopted. At its core there is the notion of gender equality, which is not only a fundamental human right but also a necessary foundation for peace, prosperity and sustainable development. It is about the need to adjust realized solutions by taking into account the differences between women and men, and recognizing the difference between Millennial Generation Y and Generation Z. Such an approach would eliminate adverse effects and minimize risks. In addition, the possibility of a more efficient use of natural resources is emphasized.

The article deals with the analysis of the specifics of attitudes towards assisted reproductive technologies, assessment of the scale and need for the use of assisted reproductive technologies (ART) in Moscow based on the data of the author’s study “Demographic well-being of Russia” conducted in late 2019 – early 2020. The analysis shows that Muscovites stand out against the background of Russians by their attitude to the use of methods of abortion and contraceptive behavior, assisted reproductive technologies, assessment of their reproductive health. The need for ART in Moscow is lower than in many regions of the country. That is caused by the assessment of their state of health, which may affect the need for the use of ART and by a model of reproductive behavior of metropolitan residents, characterized by lower reproductive attitudes against the background of all-Russian indicators. The leading role among the obstacles to the use of modern reproductive technologies in the capital, in contrast to the situation in the regions, is played by psychological motives and doubts about the safety of ART. Muscovites – Women are more favorable than Muscovites – Men to the use of modern reproductive technologies. The existing trends suggest that in the future the need for ART may decrease. Voluntary childlessness becomes a socially approved strategy. Such a trend is still most pronounced in large megacities, an example of which is Moscow.

The article studies how feminist pedagogy in gender education is used to transform the mindset of students, their families and ultimately society. Brazilian theorist Paul Freire describes the oppressor-oppressed (discriminatory) relationship in society in the Pedagogy of the Oppressed. According to Freire, education is a direct political act and can transform society as well as a libertarian style of pedagogy where everyone speaks, expresses their opinions and attains their rights. In feminist pedagogy inspired by Freire, the structures and systems that sustain the discrimination against women are identified as early as the school level and are subsequently transformed to minimize negative attitudes toward girls.

 Feminist pedagogy, started to take its place in academia as a field that supports the critical thinking structure after the 1980s in Turkey. It aims to strengthen the student’s self-esteem, independence and questioning abilities, especially to criticize the patriarchal social structure and to promote the gender equality. Feminist pedagogy is applied in the state and private universities in Turkey. The paper focuses on the author’s teaching experience of “Gender Studies” course with 348 Turkish and foreign students in a private university in Istanbul between 2019–2022. Feminist pedagogy was applied in terms of the content and method in the classroom and the survey that was conducted to measure the impacts of the method in terms of transformation. The paper contributes to gender studies of scholars with a feminist perspective on how to apply that methodology. Based on a study of the effectiveness of teaching the mentioned discipline, recommendations for improving the pedagogical content were made.

Today, the issue of violence against women is being actively discussed throughout the world. International community emphasized, that domestic violence is regarded as one of the most widespread and gross violations of human rights and freedoms. Attention to the issue is very high due to the fact that every human life recognized as the highest value. Without preventive measures and proper response the issue of violence against women is becoming very frightful. The mass media have become an important mechanism that can have a meaningful effect in drawing attention to that issue. Their influence on the formation of social space today is very great, because they are used not only to convey information, but also serve as a means of forming a picture of the world. Therefore, it is important to analyze how the Russian media cover the issue of the family violence and form a public Russian discourse on the situation.

In the family and marriage sphere of the Dagestan peoples, polygamy was widespread, although it was not a mass phenomenon in the recent past of the history of the peoples of Dagestan. According to the results of the study, it was found that the interviewed Dagestani women categorically do not accept the status of a “second wife” for themselves, moreover, they demonstrate a negative attitude in general to the emergence of the institution of polygamy at the present time. Empirical material shows that the marriage attitudes of the interviewed Dagestani women are not influenced by religion and attitude to religion (believer / non-believer), although Islam allows the possibility of having four wives for a follower of Islam. The author’s hypothesis about the positive attitude and assessment of polygamy by the followers of Islam was not confirmed by the results of the study, what indicates an unwillingness to fully accept the precepts of Islam in the family and marriage sphere. In addition, the survey data show that the interviewed Dagestan population has a negative attitude to the decision of their own children to have a “second wife” and to be a “second wife” with different argumentation.  

The issue of religiosity and resulting from it religious behavior manifested itself vividly in the post-Soviet period against the background of secularization of Russian society. There is no doubt that religion in society as a whole and in the personal life of an individual plays an essential role, which may be ambiguous in different historical periods. Therefore, the vector of development for religious revival will determine the positive/negative scenario and the climate in society. The marker for diagnosing the religious behavior of the Dagestan population is the content of the concept “true believer”, which defines normative religious practice. Verification of the empirical material shows the existence of certain differences in the attitudes of the interviewed men and women in the designation “a true believer”: the latter focus on the moral and moral attribute, the presence of certain moral properties that allow identifying a person as a “true believer”.