The article analyzes the state of mass political consciousness of Russian youth based on the results of the study conducted in the spring of 2019 in four regions of the Russian Federation: Altai Kray, Leningrad and Novosibirsk Regions, and St. Petersburg. As a result of the analysis, the authors were able to identify several groups of young people that significantly differ in their attitudes regarding their potential political activity and the methods they actually use to realize the interests of their socio-demographic group, as well as trust in political and social institutions. Young people are differentiated into 8 groups according to the dominant type of political behavior and into 4 groups according to their level of institutional trust.

The article deals with the peculiarities of the models of political behavior of young people, which can be attributed to the middle class. The relevance of the study is in the combination of a well-founded review of the main directions of research of the role of youth participation in the social and political process and the involvement of a specific empirical study conducted in the autumn of 2018, which allows to highlight various aspects of the situation. The empirical part of the study is based on the study “Ideas of Youth about Possibilities of Youth Leaders and Youth Organizations in Russia”, which was conducted in late September and early October 2018 in four regions of the Russian Federation: Altai, Leningrad and Novosibirsk Regions and St. Petersburg. The method of research was a personal standardized interview, the sample size was 1000 respondents (250 in each of the regions), who were representatives of young people aged 14 to 30 that permanently reside in the territory of the studied subjects of the federation. Based on factor and cluster analyzes, the research presents the main models of the political behavior of young people belonging to the middle class. The article is of interest to researchers of interconnections between the real political process and youth as a significant group of the population.