Ivanov Andrey Vladimirovich

This article analyzes the key ideas and thematic approaches presented in the collective study “Россия в формирующейся Большой Евразии” (“Russia in the Emerging Greater Eurasia”). This volume was prepared by a team of geographers, economists, political scientists, historians and specialists in international relations representing various regions of Russia. The article analyzes the ideas and arguments of the authors of the collection as they assess the prospects of strengthening the eastern vector of Russian politics. The author emphasizes the importance of a position that links the activation of Russia’s policy in Greater Eurasia with the need for accelerated development of the Siberian region. Also signifi cant here is the reliance of a number of contributors on the economic ideas of the Eurasianists. That said, some of the theses and methodological guidelines on display in the collection need to be critically clarifi ed and developed, the author maintains. In particular, for a holistic understanding of integrative processes in Greater Eurasia, it is necessary to bring to bear the civilizational approach developed by the Eurasianists. This makes it possible to objectively and critically assess China’s international integration potential and to fi nd Russia’s fi rm geopolitical allies in the expanses of Greater Eurasia — primarily India and Mongolia. On balance, the author concludes that this interdisciplinary analytical work, prepared by a large team of authors, deserves high praise.

This article analyzes the relationship between the national, cultural, civic and civilizational identity types. The originality of the relationships among them in Russia is compared to Western civilization. For Russia, because of the vastness of its spaces, its specifi c geopolitical position between East and West and the multinational composition of the population, the processes of collective self-identitifi cation have always been extremely complicated. The authors lay out the thesis that the national-cultural, civil, and civilizational types of identity in Russia correlate hierarchically and noncontradictorily with each other. Moreover, without one another, none of these types of identity could be either comprehended holistically or consistently implemented practically. The article further demonstates that Eurasian civilizational identity makes it possible to accentuate the positive aspects — those that unify peoples and nations — in the processes of forming national-cultural and civic identity. The example of the Altai region is used to show that Eurasian civilizational identity also allows for the formation of an adequate representation of regional identity as well.

The article adopts the civilizational approach in its diachronic aspect, which considers the development of human civilization as a consistent change of various types of global world order. The authors analyze the crisis of the modern technogenic-consumer civilization associated with its key explicit and implicit values. The essential features and lines of formation of a new type of civilization, which has already been called spiritual and ecological, are outlined. The article analyzes the emerging civilizational shifts in the sphere of culture, politics and economy. The key argument of the article is that the formation of new civilizational relations has a point-like spatial character of origin and an embryonic period of maturation. According to the authors, one of the key ‘locus’ in the transition from the technogenic-consumer civilization to the spiritual and ecological civilization can be identified in the Siberian region due to its objectively inherent spatial, climatic, historical and cultural features. The peacemaking and cultural-synthetic potential of Siberia, which lies at the intersection of transport, energy and civilizational corridors of Greater Eurasia, is of particular importance in the current situation of crisis. The article concludes by providing specific recommendations for the implementation of the Siberian spiritual and ecological civilizational project.

The article substantiates the incompatibility of the Western institution of political parties with the Russian civilization, its own democratic traditions of public administration and self-organization of people’s life. This is manifested in the current negative attitude of the population towards the institution of political parties, as well as in the critical attitude towards it from the most diverse ideological trends in Russian socio-political and scientific thought. Its criticism can be found in the works of V.O. Klyuchevsky and D.M. Mendeleev, V.I. Lenin and N.A. Berdyaev. Such a critical attitude is quite understandable. In the traditions of Russia, as a Eurasian state, there were its own democratic forms of state self-organization, dating back to the nomadic Kurultai, then Zemstvo councils and, finally, to the Soviet government, which were based on the territorial-corporate principle of the representation of the people in the Authorities. The absolute advantages of the Soviet system of democracy in comparison with the current party system are shown, especially in times of crisis in the life of society, requiring the mobilization of human and material resources. It is concluded that the old slogan “all power to the Soviets” is again becoming very relevant in connection with the prospects for the end of the conflict in Ukraine.