Youth Craft Entrepreneurship as a Form of Promoting Ethnic Specificity (on the Example of Kazan)

This article presents preliminary results of niche analysis of youth craft entrepreneurship in the national region and considers what role local specifics play in the choice of ideas for their own business for young people in the Republic of Tatarstan. In the presented article we will talk about youth craft entrepreneurship. In the focus of attention, is the sociological aspect of youth entrepreneurship on the example of Kazan, in other words, how the ethnic component becomes for many aspiring entrepreneurs a kind of business mission, or the basis for the formation of a unique selling proposition for recognition in the market. Self-realization in combination with ethnic business style is realized by young entrepreneurs as an important part of their life strategy. In other words, young people’s understanding of the modern world and their place in it goes hand in hand with the desire to realize their own potential not only as a successful entrepreneur, but also by formulating a specific mission or idea of their business—to preserve and promote Tatar culture. The purpose of the article is to show on the example of Kazan city that youth craft entrepreneurship today is a space of self-realization and the resource for these economic actions has become the national culture of the region. The main question is to understand how young craft entrepreneurs themselves, whose business is connected with Tatar culture, see their future and what their role is for the development of the republic, in general, in the current situation of growing migration attitudes of young people. Within the framework of a pilot sociological study using qualitative methods, the main motives of young craft entrepreneurs and their perceptions of the ethnic specificity of their business and business prospects were analyzed. The ethnic specificity of craft/craftsmanship/handicraft of the studied group of young people consists in the transmission and preservation of traditions and national peculiarities in the process of creating unique products that reflect the cultural heritage and identity of the ethnic group. That is why the author of the presented article draws attention to the social component of economic activity of young people and their impact on the social well-being of young people in the region under consideration. The presented research has demonstrated that craft young entrepreneurs produce new meanings in the understanding of successful activity, which certainly has significance for the socioeconomic development of the region.