Why Russia always competes with everyone – a lecture by Alexei Peskov
Alexey Peskov “The Competitive Paradigm of Russian History”, which he read as part of the “Public Lectures of Polit.ru” in 2006. The full text is available at the link.
Sorevnostnova is the psychophysiological basis of social life and a key feature of Russian history, Peskov argues. The confrontation between Europe and Russia, the Western struggle and the Slavophiles, individualism against collectivism are the main events in the history of Russia.
Alexey Peskov – Doctor of Philology, specialist in Russian history and books of the 18th-19th centuries. Author of the books “Bualo in the Russian book” (1989), “Chronicle of the life and work of E. A. Boratynsky” (1998), “Paul I” (1999).
We translate that today it is important to create a space for conversation, so we continue to organize public lectures. On April 21, Vitaliy Naishul, an economist, the Institute for the President of the National Model of the Economy, will come out at the Club Club. The topic of the lecture is “Butovo polygon and Black Square”. Registration desirablebut not required.
The competitive idea of Soviet power was not invented by Lenin, Stalin or Khrushchev. Its origins date back to the beginning of the 18th century, to the back reform of Peter I.
Then, however, the word “competition” was used quite rarely, and the concepts “jealous”, “jealousy”, “imitation”, “zeal”, etc. were more common. <...> Here is how he wrote about it. Florensky in his book “The Pillars and Foundations of Truth”: “The concept of “jealousy” in Russian as strength, strength, tension. And jealousy is the same as zeal.”.
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What Peter treated at the beginning of the 18th century is a process that can be called Westernization. The beginning of this Westernization can even be dated to the Great Embassy of 1697-1698, when Peter I arrived from a delegation of 60 people in Western countries. True, the goal was not just to see what was being done there, but the goal was quite practical, it was necessary to organize a coalition for the war against Turkey. The coalition is not swallowed up, the natural fashion brought is reduced. And, in general, they brought from Europe a lot of things that, for some reason, in serious pores educated by people, the state passed from one state to another.
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This time can date the beginning of the change in the cultural chronotope. The cultural chronotope is not a system of ideas about a surface located somewhere outside the borders of the country, and not even about how this relates to a geographical map, but about the surface of thought, value-signed. <...> This valuable signification became the contemporary reform of Peter the Great from impulsiveness to competition. Now not only Peter himself believes that it is necessary to imitate and be jealous of Europe. Jealous in the sense of not just withdrawing from there, but jealous, trying to compete, compete, taking from Europe what is there, to overtake it. Now, even this subjects were imbued with the imperative and decided that in the near future Russia would be able to create “its own Platos and fast-witted Newtons.” Those. Russia (in terms of those people who thought about it) has embarked on the path of the cultural revival of Europe.
However, there was a fight, the war began in 1700, and later in the fall with phenomena at intervals almost to the end.
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Speaking in significant terms, it is fundamentally possible to identify the difference between the Russian Empire and Holy Russia. Holy Russia is a conceivable space, unreal. The space conceivable by educated, religious people of the XV-XVII centuries. “Holy” publishes thoughts as an earthly Christian kingdom, which stands on the threshold of eternity, awaiting the Last Judgment. Everyone remembers that in the Middle Ages <...> in the assessment of the educated strata of society, doomsday emissions are expected with or greater. And in such years as 7000 from the creation of the world (this is 1492 AD) or in 1666 AD, or before countless years of educated religious people, especially those who arose, that the end of the world will soon come.
And then it happened that in 1453 the modern Orthodox kingdom – Byzantium – Italy was under the rule of the Turks. And already at the beginning of the XVI century. the idea was drawn up according to which the Muscovite kingdom is the kingdom on which the sacred charism of the second Rome, Constantinople, passed. It was at the beginning of the XVI century. such a mythology as Moscow – the Third Rome was built.
And this same Holy Russia, which adopted the charisma of the first Rome and the second Rome – Constantinople, is thought not in relation to others with other external manifestations, but in the obvious with eternity. It is she, Holy Russia, who has a chance to be saved during the Last Judgment, respectively, the subjects of the Moscow Tsar have such a chance.
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The Russian Empire is conceived in competition with other countries, and here the main principle is not strict in relation to eternity, but the principle of superiority and largeness in comparison with other countries. And this impact of primacy and significance, of course, is largely military victoriousness.
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Already at the beginning of the XIX century. replicas are heard that Russia does not use itself culturally, that Russia only reproduces. <...>
And the next generation is already the Pushkin-Decembrist generation. This generation unanimously said that in Russia there is nothing national, in Russia everything is residual, Russia is no different from other peoples, we sucked with mother’s milk the lack of people and surprise only to someone else. <...>
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In 1834, a short preamble was published in the first issue of the “Ministry of Public Education” as a preface to a new new journal. It is clear that anyone who read it guessed that the author or, according to the scene, the editor of this preamble was Minister of Public Education S.S. Uvarov. And in this preamble, the very doctrine of Orthodoxy-autocracy-nationality was put forward.
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In this preamble, it was stated that the direction of development of Russian culture, which was set by Peter I, the direction of the game and competition with Europe, has already exhausted its culture, that Russia has a consciousness of its own dignity, and therefore Russia has nothing more to learn in Europe. That is, in principle, it was the ideology of isolationism. This does not mean that Russia has cut off contact with the Western world, it was <...> ideological rhetoric. Nevertheless, this rhetoric, just within the framework of the very same event with the West and the place, i.e. Russia finally, in the words of Uvarov, won the competition with the West. It stands firm and steady at a time when the West is rushing about, and now Russia is already refusing the services of Western teachers.
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Several years passed, and already in the late 30s – early 40s. The movement began with the Slavophiles on the one hand and the Westernizers on the other. <...> There is a competitive special. Westerners were deeply convinced that Russia is also a European country and that Russia only chronologically lagged behind Europe and, ultimately, inevitably influenced the same European norms of cultural life, there are. And the most important norm is respect for the rights of the individual.
As for the Slavophils, they, of course, laid the foundation for the notion that Russia turned out to be different from Europe, first of all, by its unanimity and unity. Later, in the second half of the 19th century, the word “sobornost” appeared, and in the 20th century. the word came to be used widely and broadly. The Slavophils did not yet use it, they had unity, like-mindedness, unanimity, and so on. And in the works of the Slavophils, the idea was born that the Russian people are a people distinguished by a penchant for unity, collectivism, and fraternal associations. In the past of the Slavophiles, the Russian people were nothing but a truly Christian people.
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This idea of Russian collectivism, what could be formulated as a Russian idea, is opposed to Western individualism. <...>
In essence, this is nothing else than the mythologem of Europe that flowed immediately from the desire to oppose Russia, which collapsed almost as soon as the existence of the empire ceased. Due to the fact that competitiveness is a psychophysiological instinct, it manifests itself with the manifestation of egoism, the will to strength, the desire for superiority. And this competitiveness often has no practical use; it is necessary to excel not in order to obtain some practical benefit. Economic primacy, I repeat, is an idea that does not imply the realization of any practical benefit.
In the same way, the fact that the Russian people are distinguished by catholicity, unity, communicativeness is useless from the point of view of the practical and common sense of the discussion, since nothing in the world changes from the fact that the Russian people are like that. And when the Slavophils or Slavophiles that the Russian people in Europe had the idea of fraternal unity and brother love, did not think about how to concretize the nature of the introduction of fraternal ideas and universal love.
The idea of the Russian idea, which is different from the Western idea of Russian collectivism in opposition to Western collectivism, is generated precisely by the competitive spirit.