Issues per 2004 yr.

Issue No 1 from 2004 yr.

At the first glance it may seem to be a paradox but Eltsin’s refusal to ban CPRF contributed a lot to consolidation of the existing regime and to discredit the Communists. Nowadays Russia has become a country of directed (or manageable) democracy where elites constitute the principal source of authority. These elites define their politicians and bring to the front of the people like, for example, Zhirinovski who makes the most sensitive issue of Russia, the Russian question exceptionally vulgar and imparts a ludicrous character to it. People who vote for Zhirinovski send a signal to the authorities that they are disappointed with the present politics while results of election to the State Duma indicate that the people demand from the power to take up the national modernization project in serious. A tough reshuffling of elite is needed while the elite has to repudiate the dolce vita style, to change for working casual dress and to subject itself to attainment of the only aim, i.e., the national modernization. The time for revolution from above has arrived.

The Commander’s Strides: From Continentalism to the Messianic Yankee Imperialism (the end)

Those, who believe that the present global hegemony of the United States emerged through a process of the disappearance of the bipolar world avert their eyes from many very important moments in early 20th Century US history, which compose the essence of the so-called «Progressive Era» (1890−1920). In the meantime the beginning of the Century which now went away still has much to tell us. Modern America was born in those early years. A land of family farms was eclipsed by a modern nation of giant corporations and world-wide financial institutions. America has become a world power. Of course americans sought to master the sweeping forces of change by what some of the scholars call «New interventionism». The United States had pictured itself as a moral exemplar to the world. The rapidly industrializing nation expanded its economic interest and began a policy of diplomatic and military intervention abroad. This new interventional activism moved beyond America’s traditional foreign policy of reacting to events. American policymakers — and among them such outstanding representatives of the political establishment as Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson now sought to exert growing control over external forces of change. They used American influence and power to shape the international environment. The two major group of policymakers — adherents of Roosevelt’s Realpolitiks and wilsonian internationalists sought to protect the United States national interests and both believed that American political ideals and principals are in theory universally applicable. Following the predictions of expansionists they both argued that the United States should establish a benevolent global empire but the former emphasized power while the letter — ideology and morale. First emerging before WWI this debate has continued to the present with little change in the basic positions on either side.

The Star Hour of the Russian Pacifism

The history of Nicolas II government’s famous initiative to establish control over armaments which led to the first Hague peace conference (May-July, 1899) is elucidated with drawing in new archive materials. The author’s attention is focused at the unprecedented alliance between the Russian diplomacy and the international peace movement that acquired a great scale. A thesis of the fundamental barring of an imminent world war due to its inevitably disastrous character for all participants was elaborated and set forth in the course of campaign in support of the proposals moved by Russia, even though this thesis contradicted positions held by general staffs of various states. Having received the political and propaganda gains but, at the same time having confronted with resistance of the partners in negotiations the Russian government at the conference repudiated its own disarmament project and took orientation to understandings that covered exclusively the humanitarian issues of the «right of war». After the war of Russia against Japan the Russian government and the Czar personally opposed in principle any attempts to limit armaments. The position of the Russian diplomats at the second Hague conference (1907) is the evidence of this change. The author concludes that the lessons of the Hague is important for the present day. The contemporary experience demonstrates that in conditions of globalization policies of excessive armament combined with methods of resolution of conflicts from position of power leads to the impasse of new wars fraught with threats to the humankind as a whole.

The Incorporation of Georgia into the Russian Empire and Exacerbation of International Relations in Transcaucasus (1801–1804)

The article describes the basic motives underlying St. Petersburg government`s decision to incorporate Georgia into the Russian Empire in 1801. The author suggests that Georgian kings Irakli II and Giorgi XII had no other way to save the nation from impending catastrophe than to subject the kingdom to Russian imperial throne. By taking Georgia under her protection Russia inadvertently challenged traditional interests of Iran and Turkey in Transcaucasia. The early XIX century developments in the region were complicated by ever growing British and French presence in Iranian politics. Eventually the building tension resulted in an open clash between Russia and Iran to be subsequently followed by more pronounced involvement of all powers concerned.

Boris Godunov. Pride and Humility in Medieval Russia

The author investigates the dramatic period of Russian history, the deep cultural crisis that took place at the beginning of the 17-th century and was called by its contemporaries «the Time of Troubles». The historian tries to explore self-consciousness of contemporaries of the time, to reconstruct ideas and notions settled in their minds. Running a historical-phenomenology investigation, he tries to reconstruct the myths of the culture, myths as the way of understanding life and happenings. What ideas will come to light as a result? How did the contemporaries comprehend and evaluate miseries and dramatic events of the time? Trying to reveal the roots of such cultural phenomenon as Time of Troubles, the author offers to investigate the «mythreality» of people of the 17-th century. Could the knowledge, attained here, alter our idea of the past? An effort to answer these questions the author makes in the article, dedicated to the first tsar of the dramatic period, the famous boyar on the throne — Boris Godunov.

Notes from the Invisible Jews Community’s Life

The article deals with changes in demographic situation at the Arabia peninsula that occurred in the course of a millenium and a half. Initially the peninsula had a dense Hebrew population. Displacement of Hebrew people began after their defeat in the war with the Ethiopian Axum state. The author relates the beginning of the massive persecution of Jews with the emergence of new religion, Islam. By mid-19th century Jews were exterminated in the peninsula, after rise of Wahhabism. This religious current accepts jihad as the only way for resolution of contradictions and applies this methods even to other Moslems, Shiites and Sunnities.

Issue No 2 from 2004 yr.

The situation in Russia is characterized by lack of even an inertial stability for the inertia leads it towards a big bang. However now the president is completely responsible for what is going on. Putin’s strength lies in his vulnerability (consequently, he has to act) while his weakness lies in the fact that he has not acquired the full awareness of his vulnerability as yet. The source of threats to Putin is concealed in the fact that he and the core group he relies on are defined and determined by their affiliation with the KGB. The positively colored expectation is the main content of the masses' attitude to Putin while the elite as a whole hates him. The people do not allow the elite to launch a real onslaught on the president but as the positive expectation will be exhausted a situation of a new quality, i.e. situation of threats' realization will emerge. The first threat proceeds form the parliament: having won a situational victory at the election of December 7, 2003, in the final analysis Putin has suffered a strategic defeat for he has got a Duma able to declare impeachment and modify the Constitution. The second threat lies in the constructed power system’s sheer inability to fight against loyalty: the system is becoming relaxed when it is being licked all around. The third threat lies in the fact that it is pernicious to develop any relationships with the present day regressive «aggregate reality». Hence the need in a revolution from above though there is no support to rely on. The fourth threat is the social protest. Earlier this protest was effectively short-circuited on the CPRF and the opposition in the Duma. Now it is squeezed to the streets and is becoming to be a threat of Putin’s power dismounting. One cannot forget global contradictions that require from the president structures and resources that are simply unavailable today.

Regional Elites of Russia: Composition and Trends of Development

The articles deals with the make-up of regional elites in a particular span of time and the dynamics of the extent to which members of these elites exercised influence on the social, political and economic situation in every particular region which has its own, often unique specific characteristics. The article also demonstrates peculiarities of mechanisms that defined formation of regional political and economic elites in terms of influence factors. This approach allows comparing regions with each other on one hand and on the other hand getting the result which is representative for the Russian Federation as a whole. The experts' opinions poll made in the research of 2000 covered 54 regions while the similar poll carried out in 2003 covered 66 regions. The poll of 2003 is not a mere extended repetition of the research of 2000 but its qualitatively new stage. The novelty of the poll made in 2003 lies in the conceptual comprehension of the very mechanisms of influence at the regional level.
Upon redistribution of the «material and technical basis of Communism» it’s high time to redistribute intangible resources of Russia, reconstruct its semantics, secure its long-term strategic orientation, define and privatize its social-cultural fields. The format of post-industrial redistribution implies a greater attention to the intellectual and management resources rather than to mere material wealth of «Russia Inc.». Gradually people are getting to understand relationships among social cultural, political economic and technological aspects of the new statehood construction. Prerequisites for actions in the sphere of value system and semantics of the national statehood that are aimed not at readjustment of its practical mechanics are emerging alongside with the plans for modernization reconstruction. An intriguing probability of appearance of new influential players including some version of an ambitious corporation and political organization of the «new class» also appears. One of the issues often repeated in discussion of the political landscape, and not just by the professional political scientists is the issue of the historical dynamics' vector. Dullness of the Russian political landscape poses the ultimate threat of collapse to the public politics' feeble and unstable political culture and to the very fundamentals of representative democracy. The issue of an alternative political independent agent able to carry out a cultural revolution and to express justified social ambitions in a long run is also debated. One more aspect of the problem is the matrix of social political and cultural construction marked with traits of a post-modernistic performance and pragmatic technologic mentality.
Despite the existing tradition to make use of any ancient text which explains results of archeological research a «new archeology» which negates use of Biblical texts for interpretation of archeological data has appeared within chairs of Israeli universities. Real archeological findings have convinced even those scientists who had been sceptical about the Israeli historical tradition in authenticity of the Biblical text. The «new archeologists» cast doubt on the Biblical narrative about forefathers of the Biblical nation, about exodus from Egypt and the conquest of Eretz Israel. Typically scepticism of this kind is demonstrated by the researchers who, for the sake of their political aims, argue that the Scripture has been used by Zionists for justification of expulsion of Arabs from their land.

Worse than a Сonspiracy

If D. Hazoni's articles deals with methodological principles of the «new archeology» D. Kontorer exposes the political underlying reasons of the «new archeology». The present day Israelis have demonstrated vulnerability to the powerful psychological pressure which has always exercised on the Jews and begot many renegades who assimilated the image of Jewry the anti-Semites instilled. The author concludes that when there is a social demand for ideas of certain kind these ideas find a place in any science. The Israeli scientists cultivate the intellectual soil for the forthcoming genocide of Jews.

Russian Fascist Рarty in Manchuria (1920-1940)

The Far Eastern emigration, the integral part of the post-October Russian emigration, had a lot in common with the Russian emigration in Europe. However there were serious distinctions. A well organized and active fascist party in Manchuria is one of the peculiarities the White emigrants in China demonstrated. The author undertakes an effort to reveal reasons for emergence of a Russian fascist organization precisely in Harbin. The author analyzes the main program documents and the principal directions of this organization’s activities and provides characterization of the VFP leaders. The Russian fascist had quite clear ideological program (based on anti-Communism, anti-Sovietism and anti-Semitism. They waged struggle against the Soviet state vigorously and got a support from similar bodies in other countries and the Japanese military administration. The principal targets of the party were: accomplishment of the national revolution in Russia, overthrow of the Soviet power, establishment of the fascist dictatorship. The VFP succeeded in creation of its own subsidiary structures (women, youth, children organization) and in exercising of some control over emigrants' professional associations. However the White emigrants as a whole were obviously hostile to the VFP because of its unconcealed resemblance with the notorious Black hundreds, unscrupulous use of methods (including murders) and faithful service to the Japanese authorities.

Misunderstood Lessons of the Past

The author compares four Russian reforms: The «Great reform» of 1861, Stolypin’s reform of 1906, the «Black redistribution» which was launched by the Decree on Land of 1917 and the New economic police introduced in 1921. The authors argues that the first two of these reforms were very well thought out from the scientific point of view and calculated but absolutely disregarded opinions and notions of the peasantry. These reforms were carried on by a clumsy and cumbersome bureaucratic apparatus and by violent means. Thus their implementation was delayed and their were doomed to failure. Reform of 1861 became a prologue to revolution of 1905 and Stolypin’s reform became a prologue to revolution of 1917. The Decree on Land was composed on the basis of village general meetings' resolutions that were made by peasants themselves. The Decree met and satisfied peasants' interests. That made it possible to carry out redistribution of land in a few months and thus to settle the land issue, even if by cruel methods. The same should be said of the NEP. The NEP which took into account demands of the peasantry allowed drawing Russia out of the profound crisis in the shortest time. According to the author these historical lessons have not been understood by the present day Russian reformers. The fact to a considerable extent explains the low efficiency of these reforms.
Despite its characteristically sharp essayistic tenor and scoffing passages, this article is a quite serious attempt at defining an historical-sociological meaning of the present moment of our history. More particularly, the subject matter is, on one hand, the debacle of «democratic forces» and strengthening of autocratic rule, and on the other — a rehabilitation of the normal, civilized ethic, human at large as well as in economic behavior, which was repressed by an ethos of the so called «primary accumulation». An organic interconnection of the two tendencies is demonstrated, along with an exposure of fundamental falsity of the «parochially liberal» outlook on the development of modern civilization, which prevailed up to now in the mind of Russian powers that be and which largely retains its sway.

Issue No 3 from 2004 yr.

The authors discuss the issue of what the world power centers are building nowadays: whether an order is being constructed or the chaos? To answer the question the authors consider infrastructures of usual, traditional type such as extraction and transportation, transportation communication lines as well as military political, economic infrastructures and infrastructures of the social control. The analysis demonstrates that the world power centers introduce greater chaos in all mentioned infrastructures. Under the guise of struggle against terrorism the world power centers bring various weapons (up to nuclear ones) in regions they are interested in; they are removing, part by part, the existing state structures under the pretext of «nations' right to self-determination» and human rights protection; by means of financial and credit system they are intensifying poverty and economic chaos that bring about the political instability. Infrastructures that are created, first of all, by the US are designated rather for managing chaos and not for ensuring an order. Creators of such «new world order» try to mystify the problem and conceal their real aims. In fact, they need the world chaos that is the symbol of the utmost, ultimate lack of freedom. Russia has to learn how top live in situation of chaos, to learn how to manage chaos in such a way that allows it to become in a order of a kind as it happened during realization of the «Red project». In the USSR the power of ideas charged the masses for implementation of great changes and helped to overwhelm fascism. Nowadays Russia is a test field for any forms of regress and Russia' entering into the «new world order» described above will mean that our national sovereignty and our historical future will be ended forever.
«…Ife», the para-poem performed in the end of April, 2004, at «Na doskakh» («On the planks») theater served as the cause for organization of the «roundtable». The chief of the creative center and the stage manager of the theater opened the discussion and indicated the problems to be discussed. Is the theater nowadays capable to create new forms of the social being? What phenomena, processes, events of modern Russia can and ought be reflected? What is the aim of such reflection? Can the theater form a new elite, identify a social stratum which has ability to unite itself and prevent the society from enthropy and disintegration? Social scientists, writers, lecturers of Moscow higher education institutions, librarians took part in the discussion.

Computer Accounting of Little Flying Crocodiles.

Introduction of the Common State Exams (the Russian abbreviation for them is «ЕГЭ») is one of our principal «educational reforms». Its differences from the system of knowledge checking traditionally adopted in the USSR (and Russia) include the following characteristics: the school-leaving exams are combined with the entrance exams to a higher education institution (or, to be precise, to all higher education institutions simultaneously); questions are substituted for tests and an examiner is replaced with a computer. About 2 billion rubles are spent on introduction of the CSE since 2001. It is an amount comparable with the amount that presumably was lacking for devices, reagents, salaries and even for the simplest fire alarm systems and fire extinguishers in elementary and secondary schools. It should be added that the very concept of the CSE does not find support among scientists and educators. The article demonstrates the true nature of the Common State Examination on the specific discipline: basics of social sciences. It’s impossible to evaluate knowledge and abilities of youngsters on the grounds of such exam’s results. However, as the author thinks, it’s possible to evaluate knowledge and abilities — not of pupils but the «reformers» who invented and introduced the new system.

When Did Russia Begin To Be Perceived as the «Threat» to the West?

The article deals with the time reference point from which onwards ideological, cultural and civilizational confrontation of Russia and the West began. This confrontation found its expression in the propaganda myth about «Moskovia as the threat for the Christendom» which was invented in Renaissance Europe. The author connects emergence of the myth with the Livonian was (1558−1583) which was the first in the succession of wars Russia fought against a coalition of European states. «The Russian theme» for the first time became a subject of vigorous attempts of the Western intellectuals and politicians of Renaissance Europe to understand the phenomenon of Russia. In the process Russia was attributed with historical phobias generated due to internal European problems as well as by experience of Western communication with the East during the Crusades. In result the image of Russia established in the European propaganda literature poorly corresponded to the reality but it embraced many political and cultural phobias of Europeans. The image of Russia was invented in accordance with principle of «anti-world» modeling. Creators of this image tried to embody all «non-European» traits, that is everything barbarian, non-Christian, infernal. Many of phobias generated in Renaissance epoch are still effective assumptions of the policies of the West toward Russia. It should be emphasized that Europe needs such «anti-mirror»: it places its own sins in this «anti-mirror» without long thoughts whether the resulting picture corresponds to the reality or not. One of historical roles Russia performs in «West-East» system of civilizations is brought to the role of the «anti-world» without which Europe will not feel itself the supreme top of the global community.

Influence of Nicolas II Сourt Environment on the Political Orientation of the Russian Supreme Power during World War I.

The court environment of Nicolas II is the subject of intense attention of several generations of historians. There are many valuable sources on this span of the Russian history. Materials of the Provisional interrogative commission established by the Provisional government are among the most interesting among these sources. On the grounds of these materials the author traces influence of various country groups on the domestic and foreign policies of the last Russian emperor. The author considers several serious issues of the Nicolas II reign including the issue of Rasputin’s infiltration into the emperor’s closest circle and the issue of attempts to make a separate peace in the World War I.

Issue No 4 from 2004 yr.

The author analyzes, on the basis of mass media communications about events in Ingushetia in night from June 21 to June 22, 2004, the very events as well as contradictory evaluations of them made by officials. It is noted that the character of activities and results of the raid do not permit to reduce interpretation of events to lack of responsibility and non-capability of the Federal forces and local law enforcement bodies. Initiators of the Ingushetian events are to be looked for among the people who are interested in escalation of the conflict in Northern Caucasus including some members of the Russian bureaucracy and the Russian military elite. The Ingushetian tragedy proved to be possible because the top authority is cut off the principal social processes and the broad layer of the Russian reality. Its attempts to reduce complexity of the Russian situation to the sphere of simple answers given in language of «technocratic pragmatism» revenge for themselves with the most heavy defeats. The authority has to engage itself in problems of information wars, to monitor transformation of forms in which the ideology revels and develops itself, to manage these forms. The authority is in the desperate need of strategy which gives answers to the issues of the topical issues. A feeling of strategic blind alley is maturing in the society and the authority may speak the pragmatic «language of administrative optimism' as much as it wishes but the society has ceased to perceive this language. Alienation of the «pragmatics» of the authority from ideology must be removed. Otherwise the negative processes in the country shall not be stopped and Russia will perish.
The article is devoted to one of the most topical themes of the contemporary world, i.e. analysis of civilization matrices of the West, The East and the South. It is assumed that the matrix of the Western civilization (Christianity) has been built upon the «developing subject time» and prigress potential is now absolutely dismounted and unable to beget anything but the «model knowledge». In their turn, matrices of the East and the South are undergoing modernization which brings about melting of identities and releases powers of passion for supremacy and domination. Chances of the West in this confrontation are slim. However analysis of «communication breakthroughs» that have occurred in the human history as well as analysis of religious and lay matrices demonstrates that a mechanism of their complementary conjugation is possible. As this takes place the West undertakes production of «models of being» while the East assumes responsibility for sorting these models out according the criterion of their verity. Thus it is suggested to re-integrate the global transcendence which is disconnected now.
The western «Values» is a phenomenon immanently, structurally western. These fundamentally uncertain, necessarily parabolic abstractions serve as the pivotal notions of ideology, or, better, of ethical-ideological discourse, which is the vital nexus of «theoretical civilization» (Northrop's concept for the West), or of a «form of life» whose distinctive trait is (by Wittgenstein) argumentation. Its dimension directly constitutive of the social order is interparty discussion. So, «democracy» is nothing else than the political form peculiar to «theoretical civilization» — that is, to the West in its modern, post-Christian phase. Religion, or, more precisely, myth and the aesthetic generally in its actual socio-constructive capacity are isolated here within the pale of Temple. The today’s world owes its principal drama to the inherently expansive nature of the theoretical. That is, the West’s treatment of its «Basic Values» as all-human (and even, their hopelessly uncertain and parabolic nature notwithstanding, natural!) is, literally, just a reflex blind to any historical reality. The worst thing is that the «post-historical» West is decidedly closed to recognizing power in its historical quality — power, that is, which is not «formalized», not deprived of (in Weber’s terms) «enchantment», or simply of its own value which is (and was in the historical West just as well as anywhere) an aesthetic value. It cannot recognize power in its civilized form, that is, cannot accept it as the constitutive factor of a high-level social organization; e.g., it blindly ascribes to «democracies» modern Japan which is in reality an acme of the hierarchical, or autocratic. And still less can it recognize power as a legitimate, if only because vital, social force in cases less civilized, where power cannot help being at times fairly rude. In a word, the only certain (and obvious) sense of the ideas like «freedom», «democracy» or other current as «Basic Values» is the negation of power in its own positive value. Meanwhile, it is indisputably the main, if not sole, factor of order in places short of the western level of civilization (or organization). Consequently, the sole import of the West’s century-long moral message (not to be confused with things technical!) to the rest of the world is a blind destruction.

February «Revolution from above» or Fiasco of the «General for Pronunciamento»

The result of the participation of Russian Army leader in the February Revolution 1917 is the sum of the historiographical presentations, wich occasionally very far from the historical reality. The researchers examined through this presentations, wich embarrass the creation of the adequate reconsruction of the past, the attitude of Nicolas II and generals to the opposition and the opposition to emperer and the Stavka, the character of general N. Ivanov expedition, the circumstances of the voyage of Nicolas from Mogilev to Pskov, the reasons of the monarch abdication to the benefit of son and then brother. In given article the author, baseing on the analise of the new and new reading of the old sources, permits the new, original treatment of the well-known events.

«... Witnessing His Breaking Away from the Church...»

Hundred years elapsed since excommunication of Leo Tolstoi but the interest to the event has not extinmguished as yet. The author undertakes the attempt to reconstruct Tolostoi own thoughts and feelings aroused by his excommunication. To attain the goal Tolstoi’s attitude to the Church and faith in general is considered. The author comes to conclusion that the basis of L. N. Tolstoi’s own ethical and religious teaching is the belief that a human being has to treat other persons in a way he would wish to be treated by other people. It is a rule which is easily explained by the reason, and Tolstoi elevates this principle to the universal law level, to the level of irreal belief. Following his convictions Tolstoi would have to regard the Synod’s decree with a contempt and indignation. And his «Reply to the Synod» proves that Tolstoi reacted to the decree precisely in this way. However the author points out that it is wrong to explore Tolstoi’s outlook only on basis of «The Reply». Such approach would be too one-sided, biased, distorted. The author finds signs of deep spiritual movements experienced by Tolstoi in his diaries and correspondence. The author is disposed to suggest that the cause of the inner shock experienced by Tolstoi were doubts in the system of moral values created by himself. Tolstoi’s diaries for the period contain information on these doubts.

Issue No 5 from 2004 yr.

The Warning that Wasn't Heard: from Nazran to Beslan and Further Calling at Every Stop

The article is an analytical investigation of the events that took place in Russia in August-September and were connected with the terrorist attacks. It is pointed out that the authority has finally admitted that Russia was declared a war. The author of the article emphasizes that the developing war is a special, political one, and the minute details of its technologies have already been thoroughly elaborated. The scenarios are well-known. They are: first — to let Islam capture Russia and to fence off China with the help of this space, second — to make Russian «hot points» international and then proceed to some soft forms of relative occupation. The talks about the death of Russia are not groundless and we all are guilty in its fading, but the authority and its leader are the first to blame. As far as the war against Russia is admitted it is necessary to understand who our enemy is. The most important thing in the war that came to us with the terrorist attacks of Nord-Ost, Nazran, Grozny and Beslan is the existence of the terrorist infrastructure. The powerful international clans with the definite character of intelligence services are at war. They start the battle by creating a number of critical political situations after which everything changes in the state. Even the future existence of the state becomes doubtful after their appearance. To have Russia survived one needs first of all to obtain the understanding of the global context of the war.
How did the U.S. diplomacy, intelligence and propaganda deal with the end of American atomic monopoly in 1949 — a development of major historical significance foreshadowing an emergence of a bipolar world? Using new primary sources from American and Russian archives the author addresses this question by first exploring the policies of both sides leading to this event: American build up and intelligence estimates of Soviet atomic program as well as the Kremlin’s diplomatic and propagandistic cover up of its efforts to catch up with the U.S. in atomic arms race. The article also deals with an impact of Soviet atomic bomb on the U.S. policy and strategy with the main emphasis on American government’s perception of the new Soviet challenge and it implications for both Soviet and the U.S. policies. The author contends that despite some penetrating insights into the future responsible behavior of the Soviet Union as a nuclear power, the «worst case» logic of American military and political planners led to further escalation of nuclear arms race which reached it next crossroad only by 1970-s
The author presupposes that a woman is in the center of the «material space» though sometimes she deviates from this position. Her immanent sovereign senses and power as well as responsibility, linked to it, are investigated in the article. In the first part of the article the author interprets the parable about Adam and Eve as a reflection of the fact that Adam placed Eve higher then God and His will. It is emphasized that a woman plays the key-role in religions, and that women cult communities have the initial and closed status. A woman has the leading role in keeping fire, domestication animals and plants, staying away from men’s feasts and regulating the conjugal relations. She realizes humanitarian function that is a real «nerve of a culture». A lot of questions are analyzed: the polygamy as a men’s effort to escape from women’s reign, inferior springs of feminism, the difference between women’s problems in developed and developing countries. The author defines the family as a unit where the man’s mission is to serve woman and woman’s mission is to care about her man and support him.

The migration Revolution and its Regulating in Europe

The consequence of the globalization is the intensive removal of people throughout the planet. The migration floods have reached such an intensity that they can be characterized as a real «migration revolution» (the term of author). The migration floods go into the states of the «gold billion» and shake them. The problem of migration overgrew the national level and became the international problem. It can be solved only on the international level. Different questions, linked to the migration politics in Russia and EU countries, first of all the biggest of them -- Germany, are analyzed in the article. In its second part the author examines the possibilities of cooperation and transmission of the accumulated experience, evaluates the perspectives. The investigation is based on the data of the official statistics, special scientific works, but first of all on the daily-upgraded information of mass media, including the Internet. In conclusion the author emphasizes that it is necessary to work hard to bridle the migration revolution and to direct it in the way which is preferable for the society. Only the joint efforts of the European countries and the countries from where the migration floods go (and will go in future) can help us to face the challenge and to solve the most acute problem of the present.

The Creator of the «coming-age Europe»

The article is dedicated to the analysis of the European ideology of Valery Giscard d’Esteing — ex-president of France and the creator of the European constitution, the first one in history. The question of its acceptance is now on the present-day agenda of the EU countries. The author examines the problem of the leadership in Europe and the closest targets of the European foreign policy. He makes an analysis of the variants Giscard d’Esteing suggested for realizing economical, war-protective and political unions in Europe. One of the important themes is the problem of federal or confederative arrangement of the future integration system. Besides the author analyzes the projects of possible configuration of the European area (creating of the «solid base» of European states, of the «Europe form Atlantic to the Ural mountains» etc.)

From Baba into Lady? The Transformation of Evdokiia Kulikova

This article addresses questions concerning the impact of rural-urban migration, the market economy and the new consumer culture on the lives of peasant women who moved to a major city. Its focus is Evdokiia Kulikova, born to an impoverished peasant household, raised in rural Tver' and unhappily married to a fellow villager, who sought to escape that marriage by petitioning the tsar. The dossier generated by her appeal sheds light on the opportunities that urban life might offer an intelligent, literate, enterprising and attractive young woman in the sphere of sexual relations, self-presentation and social mobility. The testimony of individuals across the social spectrum demonstrates Kulikova’s success in transforming herself from a village woman (baba) to a lady (baryshnia), and in making taste, rather than birth, the marker of her social position and character. At the same time, however, her history illuminates some of the ways that restrictive laws and arbitrary administrative practices continued to restrict mobility and retard individual autonomy even in the context of a major city.

Issue No 6 from 2004 yr.

A Liquidation Committee? Russia Is Expecting Other Bad News

The author analyses the events that prove the possible disintegration of Russia and tries to find the ways to fight it. The author describes the liquidation process and how it is being brought into life. This project has a foreign customer, but no foreign order can exist without inner infrastructure. This infrastructure involves those who are interested in the disintegration. If the leader of the state cannot break the situation he has to be responsible for associating. The struggle against the liquidation goes hand in hand with the Project. Only mobilization can oppose the liquidation.

The innovational Russia as the political project and the strategy of development

The «great shakes» of the XXI cent. became not only the Russian’s property, but the property of the whole world. The current events, as well as the forecasts indicate the possible development of economical (and political) turbulences. One of the forecasts from the modern Pandora’s trunk has already been realized. The matter concerns the digital-economics crisis that is linked to the considerable overestimation of its assets. Another wildly discussed subject is the possible troubles in the field of the world finance. The third rider of the economical Apocalypses is the shadow of the global energetic crisis. In the modern situation politics have to deny the habitual models. Probably the brightest mistake is the idea of the explosive development of innovational processes on the edge of the third millennium. Russia is a peculiar geo-economical space; its economy unites in a paradoxical way the structural features of the row-material South as well as the highly technological North. The national project «Innovational Russia» is aimed at saving and developing the progressive element of Russian society — its creative ability as a solid resource of its economy. In case of a proper historical chance it will be able to alter the situation in the country in a healthy way. The elaboration of the «Innovational Russia’s» initiative as the base of the national strategy presupposes the number of additional actions about the development of the culture of «the new Russian class» whose life is closely linked to the post-industrial reality.
The idea that communism and Nazism are but the variants of the same «totalitarian» ideology has spread on the ruins of the USSR. It is supposed that one can hardly find any important difference here. The author of the article yet thinks that there is a strong difference between them, as well as between a Soviet and SS soldier. It is not a matter of nationality (Russian or German) — there were different people among the Hitler’s chasteners, including not-Aryans; it is a matter of the ideology. Communism and Nazism do not simply differ in some points — they are totally incompatible ideologies. That is why the fall of the USSR could not but turn into the revenge of the powers that were defeated in 1945. It happened not only in the Baltic countries and Western Ukraine. The idea: «let's beat Nigers!» (Azerbaijanians, Armenians, Jews, Russians — underline the necessary one) appears in an empty shaved head not from nowhere. It is the natural reaction of the lower classes to the fact that the radical anti-communism reached its climax in the higher circles, circles of big money and philosophical degrees. The word «internationalist» became dirty in the 1990-es. The «white spots» (censorship's shades) of the history that was written by soviet historians turned into the brown points of the new conjunction.

The Migration Revolution and Its Regulating in Europe (the end)

The consequence of the globalization is the intensive removal of people throughout the planet. The migration floods have reached such an intensity that they can be characterized as a real «migration revolution» (the term of author). The migration floods go into the states of the «gold billion» and shake them. The problem of migration overgrew the national level and became the international problem. It can be solved only on the international level. Different questions, linked to the migration politics in Russia and EU countries, first of all the biggest of them – Germany, are analyzed in the article. In its second part the author examines the possibilities of cooperation and transmission of the accumulated experience, evaluates the perspectives. The investigation is based on the data of the official statistics, special scientific works, but first of all on the daily-upgraded information of mass media, including the Internet. In conclusion the author emphasizes that it is necessary to work hard to bridle the migration revolution and to direct it in the way which is preferable for the society. Only the joint efforts of the European countries and the countries from where the migration floods go (and will go in future) can help us to face the challenge and to solve the most acute problem of the present.

The sociology of a woman (the end)

In the second part of the article the author affirms that a woman «makes» a man and then takes the responsibility for him in the society. A child is her exclusive field of creation. It is necessary to settle back in people minds the idea that children are not the burden but happiness and blessing itself, that bringing them up is a very important work. A woman cannot abandon her duties for a long time because the comfort of a man and children depend on her. If this comfort gets misbalanced a family and the activity of men and children come to the deep crisis. The «masculinisation» of women strengthens the processes that let the world upside down, provoke the transference of the sexual poles and finally lead mankind to death. The author reckons that the target of any revolution is to break a woman. The suffragettes’ leaders, pursuing interests of their families, achieved the enslaving of other women with the help of the labor market. The happenings of 1991 in Russia brought back in our life the basic female values. It is important for a woman now to realize anew her responsibility and to use the modern opportunities of her creative activity.

Did the «Golodomor» Take Place Indeed?

The article deals with one of the most important aspects of the Ukraine Nazi’s ideology: the so-called «golodomor». Currently it’s the Ukraine name for the starvation of 1932−1933, but it’s not just «starvation». «Golodomor» is an ideological concept, the powerful tool for influencing the mass-consciousness. This arm is used by the Ukraine Nazis and establishment as well as by foreign enemies of the USSR — Russia. These circles present «golodomor» as the ethnocide — the purposeful exterminating of Ukraine people carried out in practice by the Moscow leaders. It came that far that they call it «Ukraine holocaust». According to the ideologists' plan the «golodomor» phenomenon must become the solid ground, on which the still unformed Ukraine nation will strengthen its national idea. The main point of the idea is the statement that Russians and Ukrainians are totally different peoples, alien to each other; the «golodomor» phenomenon is aimed to blacken Russia and accuse it of the oppression of Ukraine. The author shows that the idea of «golodomor» is but the political and ideological myth that has nothing in common with the reality of the past. The starvation of 1932−33 struck all the USSR, caused the sufferings of all the peasants and had nothing to do with any national differentiation. The starvation was caused by totally different social, political and economical reasons and wasn’t the consequence of the Soviet leaders' will to annihilate the Ukrainians as a folk.

The Nest of the Chernosotentsy near Moscow (A Law Suit of 1928 in Sergiev Posad)

The author describes the suit of 1928 against the «former people» who were chased by the Soviet government and tried to hide at the walls of Troitse-Sergiev monastery. The suit started with the article «The list of personnel of the Church Committee of Sergiev-town» that appeared in the magazine «Atheist at a machine» («Bezbozhnik u stanka»; № 3, 1928). The main idea of the article was that the «former people» took the leading posts in the offices that were responsible for the cultural life in town. It was the starting-point of their chasing in papers and magazines of Moscow and Sergiev. At night of the 11/12th of May they shoot in Kostomarovs’s window (Kostomarov was the chief of an agitation and propaganda local committee of the Communist Party). This shot was put down to chernosotentsy. At night of the 21/22th of May 150 «former people» were arrested. 80 of them were sentenced, many people were expelled for 3 years. After the suit the churches of Sergiev were closed, the monk communities were abolished. This suit forestalled the year of the «great breaking» (1929).

The Transitional Ages in the Interior of the World History: Musing on Pages of the Unique Book

The article is dedicated to the problems of the place and role of transitional ages in the interior of the world history. Written in a free manner of a historian’s thoughts, it is based on the data of the collective work «The transitional ages in the social aspect. History and the present» (publishing house «Nauka», 2003). The book united the works of the 28 specialists — historians who specialize in different countries and times from Antiquity and the «great migration of folks» (the 4th-7th cent.) to the second «great migration», caused by the disintegration of the USSR. The concept of a transitional age is studied in the article as a complicated, many-sided inner contradiction. It is a very contrasting phenomenon of the «recoding» of a social system from one condition into another. There is an inner logic behind its individual unique demonstrations — the logic of the development of transformational processes. According to the authors opinion it can be called the «genetic code» of the social transit.