Articles

This article analyzes the phenomenon of unfriendly attitudes towards the United States — attitudes which are today defi ned as “anti-Americanism.” The immediate object of the study is numerous issue-related discussions in the Russian Internet space in which the participants express this or that understanding of American actions towards Russia and present and explain their subjective assessments of these actions. The article draws attention to the narrowing of the subject fi eld of anti- Americanism; it is noted that the latter today focuses on crisis-level international processes and events related to the interests of the two countries and the contradictions of these interests in the fi eld of bilateral relations in their most important areas: the confrontation in Syria and NATO’s approach to Russian borders, economic and political sanctions, the dramatic events in Ukraine and others. The “reactive” nature of anti-Americanism can be easily traced through a large amount of empirical material fr om the discussions in the Runet space, wh ere outbursts, both transitory and substantial, are associated with specifi c international events that have received wide publicity in the media. In the context of information warfare, the online community, one way or another, reproduces the maxims drawn directly from the media or from other posts that ultimately go back to the same media sources, and very rarely off ers any individual reasoning indicating the presence of a personal message by the authors. The article analyzes the rational and emotional constituent elements of the issue-related posts and identifi es their radical components.

This article examines the nature of the origin and functional principles of socalled fake news — reports that are deliberately false in nature which can create a stir in a society around a non-existent informational case born of the same news source. In combination with viral technologies and mechanisms of distribution in the media and social networks, fake news in modern political campaigns is becoming a dangerous tool for infl uencing the mass consciousness of societies. The main task of fake news in modern political campaigns and processes is the interception of the political agenda, with its subsequent closure to the news feed generated by the fake news itself, as well as the creation of general excitement around the given news story. In some cases, fake news can be used by extremists to create socio-political tensions, provoke panic and raise protest sentiments, which can create signifi cant threats to national security.

This article attempts to analyze the evolution of the political identity of the Soviet Union in the context of the transformation of humanitarian discourse. This discourse can be defi ned as a set of ideas transmitted in a political language about the sociopolitical identity of a person, his rights and freedoms. Analyzing the development of the system of ideas about man, rights and freedoms in the offi cial Soviet discourse, the article demonstrates how such ideas formed the collective political identity of the Soviet state at various historical stages. The author concludes that Soviet ideology and offi cial political discourse throughout the entire period of existence of the Soviet state reproduced the concept of humanitarian universalism, which was an alternative to Western humanitarian discourse and constituted both the Soviet strategy of foreign policy and the international identity of the Soviet state overall.

This article presents a comparative analysis, using Boolean algebra algorithms, of the prerequisites for color revolutions. The author off ers for verifi cation a hypothesis on the infl uence of four factors — ideological division of the political elite; unity of the opposition; participation in the political process of forces external to the political system; and support of the population — on the outcome of the color revolutions. Based on the confi gurations of factors obtained, a conclusion is drawn for each country-case of the necessary and suffi cient reasons for the color revolutions. Some of the analyzed scenarios of color revolutions (mainly in former Soviet countries) were realized under the infl uence of all four factors, while other cases — mainly events in the countries of North Africa and the Middle East — were caused by combinations of two or three factors. A necessary but not suffi cient reason for the emergence of color revolutions is “support of the population.” In combination with other causes, it forms two compositions of factors that are suffi cient for the emergence of a color revolution. The first is a combination of the factors “support of the population” and “ideological division of the political elite”; this is suffi cient even in the absence of “support from outside” and “unity of the opposition.” Secondly, a combination of the factors “support of the population,” “support from the outside” and “unity of the opposition” is suffi cient even in the absence of the “ideological division of political elites.”

This article discusses the formation of the Christian Democratic movement in Europe after World War II. Despite the existence of objective conditions for the success of either left-wing political parties or at least the left wing of the Christian Democrats, only conservatives could take over the leadership of post-war European countries for many years. Moreover, their coming to power allowed the implementation of the largest integration project on the European continent, ultimately leading to the creation of the European Union. Examining the main reasons for the success of the Christian Democrats, the author concludes that chief among them were Christian values as such — in contrast to previous people’s parties more signifi cant reliance on the Catholic Church and its teachings — and the absence of obstacles from the Holy See towards the participation of Catholics in political activities.

The appearance on the political arena of the peculiar fi gure of Donald Trump appears to be an accident only at fi rst glance. In fact, though unrecognized by many it represents a pattern stemming from radical changes in various countries of the world and relations between them that occurred mainly in the last decade and that signify a radical change in the world order: the transition from a unipolar to a multipolar world. It is clear that this could not but aff ect the position of the United States in the world and the situation in America itself. The burden of the sole and exclusive world leader, which the Americans have been striving for since the founding of their state, turned out to be, though voluntarily shouldered, more than their powers could bear. That is the reason the “Russiagate” scandal, with accusations against the incumbent president and his people of collaboration with Russia, has been promoted to the forefront in this war. All this is happening in an environment of a new Cold War, unexpected both for us and for the United States — and more dangerous for both countries and all of humanity than its predecessor. An additional complicating factor is the unpredictability and uneven governing style of Trump himself. In any case, with this president and under his leadership, the country has entered into a state of deep internal crisis, at the same time provoking an external crisis, primarily in US-Russian and US-Chinese relations.

This article analyzes the specifi cs and causes of migration processes in the era of globalization. Attention is focused on the eff ect of the introduction of digital technologies that allow modern immigrants to gain detailed information about the recipient country in advance as well as constantly maintain ties with the Diaspora. The application of the systemic method by the authors makes it possible to form not only a holistic view of migration movements in the Mediterranean, but also to reveal the specifi city of the example of Italy. The ambiguity and even concern in the perception of immigrants in the Italian environment is emphasized. Attention is focused on the formation of a rather negative image in the media of an immigrant, who is viewed as a competitor in the economic sphere, as an additional burden in the social sphere, as a potential lawbreaker in the legal sphere and as a “destroyer” of traditions in the realm of things spiritual. The features of the ascent to power of right-wing populists on the wave of antiimmigration rhetoric are likewise analyzed. The article states that Islam in Italy is the second religion. The necessity of legal regulation of the situation of Islam in the country, in order to maintain stability and ensure the security of the state, society and the individual, is particularly underscored The authors note that only joint eff orts by the state and civil society along with interreligious dialogue can condition the integration of migrants (in this case, Muslims) into the host community.

Alongside globalization regionalization is considered the most important socioeconomic and political process of our time. The emergence of regional studies as a new scholarly fi eld for the study of internal and external factors in the development of territorial communities was a response to the need for studying the nature of regional processes and their infl uence on many aspects of international life and international relations. In the part of the subject fi eld designated as political regionology, where internationalized actions of regional social actors are considered, this area of knowledge is closely intertwined with the problems of the regional sociology of international relations. The relevance of research in this area is determined by several factors, including the increased activity of social processes at the regional level; the emergence of new social actors reaching the regional level; a non-linearity of global processes that requires regional instruments to counter global crises; and an understanding of the signifi cance of all aspects of spatial development.

The Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) is one of the most important international institutions ensuring the protection of Central Asia. One of the key areas of its work is countering the terrorist threat. The priority issues of the CSTO are suppressing the activities of terrorist and extremist organizations, countering terrorist recruitment and countering terrorist propaganda. The purpose of this article is to identify the features of the CSTO anti-terrorism strategy, primarily in the context of ensuring security in Central Asia, and especially under the threat of the movement of militants from defeated terrorist groupings in the Middle East to the Central Asian states. Particular attention is paid to the analysis of the regulatory and legal basis for the cooperation of the organization, including in the context of reconciliation of the legislation of the participating states in the fi eld of countering terrorism. In particular, the signifi cance of adopting a single list of terrorist organizations is underscored. The features of the functioning of key institutions ensuring the implementation of CSTO anti-terrorist policy, as well as permanent operations and anti-terrorist exercises are considered in detail. The author comes to the conclusion that the CSTO has established itself as an eff ective mechanism for countering terrorism. However, there remains a need to work out such activities as countering the fi nancing of terrorism and combating the propaganda of terrorist ideology.