Articles

In the early 1990s in the Soviet Union, legislation was changed regarding the procedure for emigration abroad. This led to an increase of the fl ow of immigrants to the territory of Germany, where appropriate legal and social conditions for Russian-speaking immigrants were created in the 1980s. Publishing operations among the group became increasingly active in the “new” homeland. Currently, the Russian-speaking segment of the German media is one of the most numerous. A study of these Russian-language media shows that the ideological and political views of the Russian-speaking ethnic group in Germany have not fundamentally changed since the 1990s. The evaluations of political events have remained quite manipulative throughout the period under examination. Furthermore, the essence of this manipulation of the consciousness of the Russian-speaking population of Germany lies in shaping the image of Russia as a potentially aggressive extra-legal national entity with a weak economy — a state that represents a danger to other countries and to Germany in particular.

This article is devoted to the identifi cation of the specifi cs of blogging as a technology of public and political communication at the level of the Russian region. The authors address three research tasks: a comparison of the use of blogging as a tool and as a socio-communicative technology; identifi cation of the features of the event-thematic agenda in the blogosphere of the region; and a segmentation of the audience of political blogs in the province. Blogging in the region is characterized by identifying and analyzing the activities of the subjects that most shape the eventthematic agenda online. The authors demonstrate that the tendency of using blogging as a technology of political communication is becoming increasingly characteristic for Russian regions; this implies a signifi cant expansion of the tools used. The article further maintains that elections are becoming a kind of “growth point” for the political blogosphere of the region, a platform for testing new formats of political communication in the online environment. Further, the limitations of blogging as a socio-communicative technology in terms of the impact on regional communities are discussed and a defi nition of blogging is off ered that accounts for the subjective interests of bloggers.

Liberal democracy theory allows for the existence of the dominant party in the system recognized as a competitive democracy. Being an integral part of actual liberal democracies, dominant parties make a considerable impact on the theoretical underpinnings of such systems and their functioning, which is a justifi cation for studying their features and behaviour patterns with the aim of uncovering their emergence, development and decline mechanisms. The article looks into the phenomenon of the dominant party drawing on the seven widely acknowledged and signifi cant cases (Italy, Germany, India, Japan, South Africa, Ishuv-Israel, Sweden) and puts forward a new defi nition of the dominant party grounded in empirical data. The article also provides an analysis of the internal structure and the essential features of the functioning of dominant parties and presents conclusions about the causes of the emergence and development of dominant parties and the reasons for them retaining this status.

This article is devoted to the study of the food regime, a concept little known in Russian academic literature. The author identifi es the “theoretical and methodological platform” of the concept using a comparative approach and retrospective analysis. The ensemble of a comparative-historical approach, a method of analyzing secondary data and a forecasting method contributed to the consolidation of the concept of the food regime as a tool capable of streamlining the global stages of production, consumption and distribution of food in historical retrospect as well as in the foreseeable future. The author demonstrates that the consistent transformation of food regimes comes about due to the confl ict between two principles, “protectionism” and “ free trade,” which are eff ectively adapted to diff erent political and economic realities. The identifi ed “sequence” is consistent with the general position of the theory of Karl Polanyi (the Double Movement) and allows us to assert that the foundation of the Fourth Food Regime will be based on a modifi ed version of protectionism. This is confi rmed by the growing popularity of the transnational movement La Via Campesina and the growing demand for its revolutionary strategy of Food Sovereignty.

The purpose of this article is to clarify the term “historical myth” and to defi ne its relation to the notion of “political myth.” The goals of the research are to determine the content of the concept “historical myth,” to understand the essence of the concept “political myth” and to compare the meanings of the two terms. The author uses traditional and typological analysis, and also applies the method of expert interview. The article argues the position that the historical myth is a particular form of the myth of the political. Accordingly, the historical myth initially represents an artifi cially constructed form of perception of the world, based on an appeal to the sphere of emotions and aimed at manipulating the public consciousness. At the same time, it has the property of acquiring autonomy over time, infl uencing its own creators. The specifi c factor diff erentiating the historical myth is that it is constructed with the help of historical facts and changes the perception of reality by changing the model of perception of events of the past.

The historical events of May 1968 have a rich intellectual history. A reexamination of the theoretical discussions that preceded the famous slogans allows us not only to explore the socio-cultural context of the student protests but also to critically revisit the foundations of their means and ends. In this article the author reconstructs key premises of the theory of Henri Lefebvre, who actively participated in the intellectual and political life of the Gaullist France. Representing heterodox Marxist philosophy, Lefebvre was also a close ally — as well as a critic — of the Situationist movement. While today Lefebvre is mainly associated with urban studies, the main subject of his interest was always the socio-critical theory that exists without separation from political practice. So the critique of everyday life, the theory of its temporal organization and the reinterpretation of romanticism allowed Lefevre to formulate a critical and positive program in line with “phenomenological Marxism” — a program for changing those historical circumstances, the answer to which was the student revolution.

The article examines the philosophical bases and utopian features of transhumanism. Transhumanism is considered by the author as an ideology. The author sees the transhumanism as a kind of late humanism including the characteristics of the secular worldview of Modern times: materialism (immanentism), progressivism, technologism. The article also shows how the birth of transhumanism was promoted by the aesthetic principle that has dominated the culture of the Western world since the Renaissance. The author characterizes the transhumanist utopia, that is used as a motivating force to transforms philosophical ideas of transhumanism into transhumanist ideology. It is noted that the discussions about the realization of the transhumanist utopia is not so important for modern society, because transhumanism at present does not create a world of transhumanoids (beings physically and biologically diff erent from modern people), but a world of transhumanists, i.e. individuals committed to the transhumanist worldview. Like any ideology, transhumanism forms its supporters. Therefore, the study of the infl uence of the ideology of transhumanism on the human worldview should precede the criticism of specifi c “transhuman” technologies and the discussion of bioethics.

The new state formations of Eurasia at the turn of the millennium were faced with a number of problems, with the periodization of their recent history fi guring prominently among them. Political processes in the newly independent states played an important role in their transition to a market economy and the development of interstate contacts, primarily in foreign policy orientation. In the Republic of Kazakhstan, one of the largest Eurasian states, these problems developed in a particular way as the republic gradually moved from a parliamentary administration to a presidential one. The President of the Republic of Kazakhstan, Nursultan Nazarbayev, has repeatedly published books in which he expresses his views on current changes in the political landscape. In his latest volume, The Age of Independence (2017), Nazarbayev proposed a new concept for the evolution of an independent republic, suggesting that it be viewed as a three-stage modernization. Scholars deemed the appearance of the book “a methodological breakthrough in modern Kazakhstani historical science.” This article examines the fi rst part of the work by comparing the proposed ideological bases of modernization and practical solutions adopted by Nazarbayev in the process of ensuring the sustainable development of independent Kazakhstan. The author of the article, emphasizing that the ideology of modernization helps in understanding the realities of Kazakhstan’s political life, maintains that it is necessary to use alternative methods of historical and political studies.

Analyzing China’s energy security strategy in the framework of its national development goals and the modern system of international relations is extremely important in understanding the future course of international developments. This article presents a comparative analysis of the Chinese and American energy security strategies, an analysis of offi cial Chinese documents in the sphere of strategic planning, as well as an examination of existing forecasts regarding China’s energy system. The facts show that China has a comprehensive vision of its own positioning in the world energy system and the system of international relations in general. In contrast to the ideologically motivated approaches of the dominant power, China off ers cooperative solutions that allow it to reach its national goals and can become the key to a truly balanced multipolarity.

Transnational corporations (TNC) are today increasingly intensifying their infl uence on the shaping of world politics. Their status as non-state actors in international relations makes it possible for them to actively join in the resolution of the most important issues and problems of world politics — functions that were previously left to the competence of nation-states. TNCs sponsor, lend to and invest in national economies, and in some cases manage them directly. Russia hosts both its own TNCs, which consider the Russian Federation their country of origin and home base, as well as representations of foreign transnationals. The activities of these cross-border entities, which have extensive capabilities and resources with which to infl uence the national economy and policy, need special forms and methods of state regulation. In order to eff ectively regulate the activities of TNCs in the political system of Russia, a system of institutions or specialized bodies is required to perform these functions.