Grooming the next generation: harmonisation of youth laws in post-soviet states

This article provides a comparative analysis of laws on youth policy and patriotic education in Belarus, Kazakhstan, Russia and Ukraine (as a control case), as well as model laws developed by the Commonwealth of Independent States. These laws are aimed at educating young people and transferring values of loyalty and obedience to authoritarian rule, as well as love and patriotic devotion to the Motherland, as means to legitimise and sustain authoritarian regimes. The article identifies similarities, differences and cases of ‘authoritarian legal harmonization’ in these laws. To compare the similarities and differences in the laws, we use plagiarism software. The software detects words and phrases which are the same or similar, in order to establish the extent to which the texts of laws are harmonised. Our research indicates that levels of legal harmonisation have fallen as new amendments and laws have been introduced, signalling a weakening of Russia’s influence.