Russian Social Research Articles

Online Communities in the Public Space of Politics: Subjective Features and Possibility for Control (Exemplified by “ВКОНТАКТЕ” Russian Social Networking Platform)

The article presents the study researching the potential of political subjectivity of online communities functioning in the online space of Russian public policy. The empirical object of the study is action-oriented communities functioning as hybrid networked entities having a complex of identifications and values that allow them to maintain stable interactions and being the basis for real political action. The authors identify operational characteristics of online communities and political subjectivity profiles, and single out social-discursive, civic-discursive, collaborative, socially proactive, and politically proactive types. Interpretation of data allows the authors to assess the potential of these communities to actualize their subjectivity in politics, both online and offline, and technological capabilities of their management.

The Ultimate Bolshevik

Abstract Ron Suny’s Stalin: Passage to Revolution traces Stalin from a young revolutionary in the Caucasus to his ascent to the top of the Bolshevik hierarchy. Discovered and promoted by Lenin, the young Stalin agitated among the workers of the giant factories in Baku, Tiflis, and Batumi as Russian socialists split between Menshevism’s social democracy and Bolshevism’s Marxist revolution. Between 1902 and 1917, Stalin was arrested or exiled six times, escaping five times. Rushing to Petrograd in the wake of the abdication and formation of the coalition government, Stalin managed the Bolshevik press and served as the main Bolshevik figure in Lenin’s absence. Although not among the most popular political parties, the Bolshevik’s “ground game” among workers and soldiers proved decisive once Lenin concluded to begin the Bolshevik coup.

Bishop Andrey (Ukhtomsky): Church Comprehension and Criticism of Ideology and Practice of Socialism

The question of the attitude of the famous church publicist Bishop Andrey (Ukhtomsky) to the theory and practice of socialism in Russia and the USSR is considered. For the first time, the views of the bishop on the similarities and differences between socialist ideology and the Orthodox faith, starting with the events of the First Russian Revolution and ending with the Soviet period, are reconstructed and analyzed. Particular attention is paid to Andrey (Ukhtomsky)’s criticism of socialism, professed by left political forces and attempts to oppose it with a different socialism, which the church publicist called Christian and ecclesiastical. The legitimacy of classifying the bishop as a supporter of Christian socialism is questioned and a view is proposed according to which Bishop Andrey’s opposition to political socialism was forced and was intended to deprive the socialists of the monopoly on knowledge about the just reorganization of society, as well as to conduct polemics with the adherents of socialism in a way they understand language. It is argued that changing political views and attitudes towards various forms of state power throughout his life, Andrey (Ukhtomsky) remained consistent in upholding his views, both on the nature of socialism and on the ways to overcome it.

Значение Ф. М. Достоевского в отечественной и мировой философии

The author presents the main views and ideas of F. M. Dostoevsky, which determine his significance for Russian and world philosophy. The article analyses the relationship between such key concepts for Dostoevsky as humanity and all-humanity and his ideas about the pochvennichestvo, the Russian idea and Russian socialism. It is shown that the three main achievements of Dostoevsky are: 1) the study of man on three levels — humanism, humanity and all-humanity; 2) the combination of polyphony with symphony as the basis of artistic and philosophical synthesis; 3) the combination of his three main philosophical concepts — pochvennichestvo, the Russian idea and Russian socialism. These results can serve as a basis for creating an alternative project for the development of Russian and world civilization, which is very important in the current critical era. This project can be based on the domestic experience, taking into account the Russian national character, and rely on the works of such geniuses of the past as F. M. Dostoevsky.

The 1905–07 Russian Revolution as a ‘Moment of Truth’: An Overlooked Contribution from Menshevism

This article is the first exposition of a projected five-part Menshevik study of social forces in the Russian Revolution of 1905, only four volumes of which appeared in 1907 covering reaction, the proletariat, the peasantry, and the liberal and democratic bourgeoisie. This collective effort marked perhaps the first attempt to present an overall analysis of the revolution from within one perspective, that of the Menshevik variety of Russian Marxism. Despite the centrality of perceptions of revolution to participants and future historians of Russian socialism and of 1905, this project has been largely overlooked. This is to be regretted, for the volumes contain interpretations now familiar on the nature of the 1905 revolution and why it failed. Furthermore, there is continuity between the works and authors of 1907 and the subsequent (1909–14) much more famous Menshevik history of social movements in Russia at the beginning of the twentieth century.

Opposition from Abroad: Emil von Qvanten and Finnish Scandinavism in the Mid-Nineteenth Century

Abstract Scandinavism was a political idea in the nineteenth century that strived to unite the Scandinavian countries into one state. In Finland, Scandinavists were few in number but formed networks with Scandinavists in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark, networks that have been largely ignored hitherto in Finnish historiography. This article focuses on the Finnish Scandinavist Emil von Qvanten, who proposed a Nordic federal state including Finland in 1855 in the pamphlet “Fennomania and Scandinavism” (von Qvanten 1855a). Moreover, his correspondence reveals an influential exiled Finnish patriot, who became a Nordic politician and a trusted person to the Swedish King Karl XV. Von Qvanten corresponded extensively with the Finnish architect Nestor Tallgren, European dissidents such as the Russian anarchist Mikhail Bakunin, the Russian socialist Alexandr Herzen, and Polish separatists like Josef Demontovicz and Walerian Kalinka, as well as Swedish and Danish politicians and Scandinavian intelligentsia. An alternative option of Finland having a Scandinavian political dimension during the age of autonomy will be discussed here with a focus on the letters that Nestor Tallgren wrote to Emil von Qvanten.

Pre-Eurasian Motives in Russian Social Thought of the Nineteenth Century: Intersections of Chinese Influence as a Far East Culture and Egyptian Influence as a Mediterranean Culture

Pre-Eurasian Motives in Russian Social Thought of the Nineteenth Century: Intersections of Chinese Influence as a Far East Culture and Egyptian Influence as a Mediterranean Culture

Pre-Eurasian Motives in Russian Social Thought of the Nineteenth Century: Intersections of Chinese Influence as a Far East Culture and Egyptian Influence as a Mediterranean Culture

Without proper understanding of Russian pre-Eurasian thought of the nineteenth century, we cannot have a full picture of Russian Eurasianism as a political movement of the 1920-1930s. I analyse the ways in which Chinese and Egyptian cultural influence shaped pre-Eurasianism of Russian nineteenth-century social thinkers Vladimir Solovyev, Nikolay Danilevsky and Vasily Rozanov.

Дискуссии о сущности капитализма в русской общественной мысли конца XIX века

Дискуссии о сущности капитализма в русской общественной мысли конца XIX века

Расстановка политических сил накануне выборов в Рязанскую городскую думу 1917 года

The paper aims to identify the role of the major political parties in social life of Ryazan city in the first half of 1917. The study focuses on analysing the parties’ activities ahead of 1917 elections to Ryazan City Duma. Scientific originality of the research involves a comprehensive analysis of the regional political landscape ahead of 1917 elections to Ryazan City Duma. The research findings are as follows: the author proves that elections to Ryazan City Duma were accompanied by violent struggle of the major political parties - the Constitutional Democratic Party, the Socialist Revolutionary Party, the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (Mensheviks) and the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (Bolsheviks).

Отражение политической культуры социал-демократов Сибирского союза в литературе 1960-1980-х гг.

The article presents a survey of the Soviet literature of the 1960-1980s on political culture of representatives of the Siberian branch of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party. Scientific originality of the study lies in the fact that the author for the first time provides a historiographical analysis of the problem. The paper reveals conditions, tendencies and problems of developing the Soviet historiography of regional social democratic organizations in the period before and during the First Russian Revolution. The conducted research allows concluding that in the mentioned period, the source base of the historical and political science was considerably enlarged, the number of scientific staff increased, new coordination centres appeared, but methodological basis remained the same, so conceptually new studies could hardly appear.

Liberal Socialism in Russia: Genealogy of the Idea (Herzen and Mikhailovsky)

Liberal Socialism in Russia: Genealogy of the Idea (Herzen and Mikhailovsky)

Georgy Ivanov on the “Vial of Poison” by Konstantin Leontiev

The article is devoted to the analysis of G. Ivanov’s judgments about K. Leontiev. The sharpness of Ivanov’s statements is explained by the similarity of Leontiev’s views with the ideology of a new generation of emigrants, including members of the fairly mass party of “mladorosses” (young Russians). From the point of view of Ivanov, Leontiev’s political convictions in many ways contain a danger for the formation of the worldview of contemporaries. Leontiev’s idea that liberal-egalitarian progress would lead to the collapse of the Empire was combined with his belief in the possibility of protective socialism in Russia and a socialist monarch, blessed by the Church. The “mladorosses” were social monarchists who believed that with the older generation of Bolsheviks leaving the political arena, Bolshevism would come to an end; they saw the Soviets without the Bolsheviks as a promising form of self-government. In the political activization of the younger generation of emigrants, their way of thinking, Ivanov was not satisfied with the opposition to the ideals of the old emigration. He considered the ideas of the “new Russian people” contradictory and illusory, and expressed his beliefs in a number of articles. The deceptive hope of emigrants for the Soviets without the Bolsheviks is the motif of the famous poem “The way is Free under Thermopylae...” Ivanov created a complex, contradictory portrait of Leontiev; he is partly close to the opinion of N. Berdyaev, S. Bulgakov, V. Rozanov in his assessments of Leontiev’s human qualities and judgments.

Метафора свободы или аллегория самоубийства? «Америка» в художественном мире Достоевского

For the Russian socialists, “America” was the promised land — a kind of metaphor of absolute freedom, making possible full self-realization of every person. In Dostoevsky's The Demons, Russian socialists Shatov and Kirillov find their way to America, subsequently break with the ideas of socialism, but nevertheless perish — either as a result of his past (Shatov), or his atheism (Kirillov). It is not without reason that even for Raskolnikov in Crime and Punishment America also means the futility of the exodus for a Russian person who is not free from shame and conscience, and Svidrigailov's expression “to go to America” even turned out to be an allegory of suicide. This symbolism is to a certain extent preserved in Russian literature after Dostoevsky. The article demonstrates this by examples of Chekhov's play The Seagull and Gazdanov's story “Black Swans”. Although plots and images of the Crime and Punishment, Demons and The Brothers Karamazov differ, the similar artistic dialectics is observed in Dostoevsky's last novel, which, according to some researchers, allegedly ends with Dmitry Karamazov's flight to America. Unlike Herzen and Chernyshevsky, “America” in Dostoevsky's works appears not so much as a metaphor of freedom, but rather as an allegory of suicide.

Economic Growth as a Driver of Transformation of Russian State Economic and Social Policy

The purpose of the article is to identify the problems of sustainable development of Russia in the context of modern globalization processes and, based on a study of the factors of institutionalization of sustainable development, to propose directions of state policy to ensure it. The institutional methodology allowed the authors to study the genesis and development of the concept of sustainable development, as well as to highlight the structural features of Russian model of sustainable development. The logic of the article is focused on the analysis of the theory of sustainable development evolution, that made it possible to identify anomalies of Russian model and to develop public policy tools.

Черный кот, розовые лягушки и «некрологи на память»: вологодская ссылка А.А. Богданова

The purpose of this article is to collect together separate pieces of information about A. Bogdanov’s exile in Vologda and retrace the conditions under which his formation as a politician and a thinker was taking place in those years. An outstanding scientist, philosopher, physician and revolutionary, Alexander Bogdanov spent three years in exile in Vologda (1901–03). A. Lunacharsky, A. Remizov, N. Berdyaev, B. Kistyakovsky, P. Shchegolev, B. Savinkov and his wife V. Uspenskaya, and many of the future prominent figures of the Bolshevik Party were in exile in Vologda during that period. For a year and a half, Alexander Bogdanov lived in the village of Kuvshinovo near Vologda and worked as a doctor at a psychiatric hospital, the description of which he later used in his science fiction novel Red Star. After leaving the service and obtaining permission for private practice, he used his practice as an excuse to visit his associates. He helped the Vologda exiles by giving them medical examination certificates to be submitted to the police, which allowed the exiles to stay in the governorate city rather than be sent to the remote settlements of Vologda Governorate. In the course of numerous discussions between exiles belonging to different philosophical and political camps, Bogdanov’s skill as a philosopher and polemicist was honed. Thanks to the tremendous dedication, hard work, and concentration on his scientific activities, Alexander Bogdanov had strengthened his reputation as a famous Marxist writer by the end of the exile. Moreover, due to his illegal correspondence with the editorial board of the Iskra newspaper, he established contacts with the leading circles of the emerging Bolshevik faction of the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party. The time Alexander Bogdanov spent in exile in Vologda paid off and produced a great effect on his formation as a researcher and a political activist.

СОЦІАЛІСТИЧНА ІДЕОЛОГІЯ У ПОГЛЯДАХ С. ПЕТЛЮРИ НА ПОЧАТКУ ХХ СТ.

The article considers the peculiarities of the social-democratic views of the prominent statesman Simon Vasilyevich Petliura in the period 1902-1917, that is, at the stage of forming his political worldview. The role of S. Petliura as one of the leading ideologues of the Ukrainian social democracy of the beginning of the XX century is determined. The attitude of S. Petliura to the Russian variants of marxism is analyzed, his views on European social democracy, the main issues of development of the Ukrainian people, and solving them through the prism of socialist ideas. His views on party building are studied, relations between the Ukrainian Social Democratic Workers 'Party and the Russian Social Democratic Workers' Party. The key positions of the Russian Social Democrats have been identified, which became the subject of sharp criticism of S. Petliura. It turned out that Simon Petliura was a supporter of the European version of Social Democracy, in particular on the issue of the right of nations to selfdetermination. S. Petliura entered into a sharp controversy with representatives of the Russian Social-Democracy, argued the falsity of their views on non-recognition of the right of the Ukrainian people to autonomy, appealing to the works of Karl Kautsky. S. Petliura did not share the centralizing policy of the Russian Marxists regarding party building, defending the right of the Ukrainian Social Democratic Workers' Party to an independent organizational structure. Socialist ideology in views S. Petliura was dominant, but had bright national features. The key stages of formation of the worldview of the figure are determined. The transformation of its ideological foundations is determined.

Ex-Socialists as Human Resources for the Communist Party between February and October Revolutions (March — October 1917)

At the end of the 19th century and the first quarter of the 20th century, political parties became the main actors for Russia’s social and economic processes and events. During the last three decades, they have been the focus of scholars’ efforts since classified sources of the Soviet period were opened for public access at the end of the 20th century. Intense scholarship shaped two main approaches to the topic. One focuses on each political party individually, and the other focuses on interactions between all of them. The second approach, even considering its merits, remains limited because relationships are explained mainly through competition between political parties, whereas in reality, connections were more diverse. This article makes a first attempt to show at personal and group levels the transition of former socialists to the Bolshevik party between the February and October revolutions. It identifies specific party leaders and groups that changed their political views and positions; establishes the time and motives for their break with their former parties to join the Bolsheviks; and clarifies the impact of their joining the Bolshevik party. Based on an analysis of questionnaires of delegates who participated in the Sixth Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party (Bolsheviks), the article concludes that by the end of the summer of 1917, the Bolshevik political elite consisted of almost 43 % of former socialists, among whom there was a large proportion of professional revolutionaries. Such human resources, mostly consisting of “left-socialists,” contributed to the radicalization of the RSDLP(b), reorienting the political struggle from democratic and political methods to violence and militarism.

A. S. Lappo-Danilevsky and Methodological Issues of Studying the History of Russian Social Thought

В статье в ракурсе проблематики социальной ментальности рассматриваются некоторые аспекты творчества А.С. Лаппо-Данилевского, воплощенные в двух его главных сочинениях – «Методология истории» и «История политических идей в России в XVIII веке в связи с общим ходом ее культуры и политики». Выявляется корреспонденция между идеями Лаппо-Данилевского и понятием «менталитет». Показаны противоречия исследовательских установок Лаппо-Данилевского: положение о целостном (коллективном) субъекте как «главном объекте исторической науки» и фокусировка на конкретных исторических персоналиях и их идеях; понимание важности изучения особенностей отечественной ментальности и преимущественное внимание к заимствованным «интеллектуальным продуктам». В этих противоречиях следует видеть отражение специфического состояния духовной сферы российского общества, отличающейся слабой состыкованностью ментально-психологических пластов, что требует изучения как в содержательном, конкретно-историческом, так и в методологическом плане, включая выработку соответствующего концептуального аппарата.

Virtual State: Scoping Review of Russian Political and Social Sciences

This review focuses on analysis and determination of problematic field based on phenomena and related concepts such as micronation, cyber-state, virtual state and others. Actualization of this topic is carried out due to the technological development of modern society, the emergence of new social, political, economic and other actors, the concentration of a large amount of resources by them which could make them an influential power or an alternative of social and political organization. Using scoping methods, comparative and content analysis, as well as services of network and statistical analysis the article examines the level of virtual states embeddedness into Russian political and social sciences, the formation of the corresponding research field, direction or school. Special attention is paid to the Russian segment of world science in the framework of the study of virtual states and problems are faced by Russian researchers. This will allow researchers to see the context, the most relevant areas of work, help to correctly use the concepts in Russian and English academic texts.