Аннотация:Do Italian and Russian youths differ in their perceptions of religious freedom and processes of religious socialization? And if so, whether the latter has predictive power vis-a-vis religious freedom. To answer these questions, this article explores the results from the comparative research on the Social Perception of Religious Freedom (SPRF) conducted in Italy and Russia. The questionnaires were completed by Italian (N = 1035) and Russian (N = 775) University students in 2018-2019. The data show that religious freedom as a societal value sustaining pluralism is perceived similarly in both samples. However, the perceptions differ when young people assessed religious freedom as individual autonomy, an international human rights standard, and a principle of state-religion governance. The data reveal that religious socialization in the families and belief have a key role in constructing the meaning of religious freedom for youth in both countries, while religious education had a significant positive effect only for the Russian sample in the model.
