It should have been a celebration of their success in defending Vladimir Putin's Russia from a democratic revolution.

Instead, the annual summer camp of the youth movement Nashi (Ours) seems a listless affair. The ideologues behind it admit that Nashi has run out of steam now that Dmitri Medvedev is in the Kremlin as Mr Putin's handpicked successor.

The face of Mr Putin, now Prime Minister, still hangs from banners spread across the campsite, on the shores of Lake Seliger, 300 miles (480km) north of Moscow. Mr Medvedev is virtually invisible.

Even the anti-Western propaganda seems half-hearted compared with previous outpourings of hate against opposition leaders such as Mikhail Kasyanov, a former Prime Minister, and Garry Kasparov, the former chess champion.

Nashi's principal “enemy” this time is a pig named after Toomas Hendrik Ilves, the President of Estonia. An Estonian tricolour flies over his sty in protest at the removal of a Red Army monument in the capital, Tallinn.

Fewer than 5,000 activists are at the two-week camp, half the number last time, as organisers struggle to find a purpose now that the presidential election is over. Street protest has given way to support for Russian economic development under the “Putin plan” to 2020.

Patriotism remains a constant theme, particularly the need to produce children for the Motherland. Igor Shuvalov, the First Deputy Prime Minister, toured the camp in a T-shirt with the slogan “Home, wife, children. I love my family”.

Yuliya and Vitali Shuvayev were among 15 Nashi couples who demonstrated their devotion to the cause in a mass wedding. They spent their honeymoon in a group of tents formed in a heart shape under a banner proclaiming: “This is the miracle of Seliger.”

“Nashi means patriotism for us. That's why we wanted to get married here,” Yuliya, 22, said. “We want three children because the first two are for the parents and the third is for growth of the country.”

Nashi has now splintered into different branches that support causes ranging from the Orthodox Church to business innovation. Some of its more muscular traditions remain.

One section, Stal, organises street protests, while another trains young men to form street patrols with the police. The movement revives a Soviet-era tradition of volunteer druzhniki to maintain order.

“A lot of young people have nothing to do and just watch TV, so we tell them that if they want to help the country then here's their chance,” Roman Verbitsky, the Stal leader, said.

Mr Shuvalov laughed as he passed a derelict shed symbolising Mr Kasparov's movement, The Other Russia, which was hounded by riot police during anti-Putin demonstrations before the elections.

Nashi was founded in 2005 as a response to the pro-democracy Orange Revolution that had swept Ukraine and the Rose Revolution in Georgia.

Sergei Markov, a United Russia MP and a key Nashi ideologist, admitted that the movement had “lost its mission”. He told The Times: “The mission was to prevent an Orange Revolution.”

Asked whether Nashi had any place when the Kremlin under President Medvedev was attempting to present a more liberal face to the West, Dr Markov replied: “Nashi is part of pop culture now and they are fans of Putin. Medvedev for them is a bureaucrat, while Putin is a hero.”

Times Recommends

• Green activists 'are keeping Africa poor'
• 'Delayed justice' fear for OJ Simpson
• Sex and the sari