Ideas and Ideals

The key issue of the article is the ability of Europe with all its post-Christian values and neo- liberalism handle the present situation that has been created due to “great migrations”. The aim of the article is to show the metamorphoses in the spheres of religion, ethics, and politics (started in the era of Reformation and Enlightenment) and to describe problem-solving scenarios, concerning migration and the EU migration policy. As a result of this process, the European countries created a union based on transnational secular values (peace, freedom, stability, prosperity, common economic market, multiculturalism and human rights). In this union all kinds of issues are presumably solved through dialogue and consensus, and not on the basis of the biological law – the right of the strongest. However, Europe is facing the problem of “great migrations” with terrorism as its possible implication (Paris, Brussels, Nice). The problem of migration and the ways of its solving remain unclear for the EU. Arguably, the current situation coupled with the present neo-liberal migration policy of the EU will most likely lead to drastic changes in the demographic and cultural face of Europe. As a result, in the coming decades, the European identity and the system of values inherited from Enlightenment will likely be gradually superseded by more conservative values of the migrants. The neo-liberal views of the European establishment can be considered the main cause of this coming transition. Only delicate migration policy will help find the way out of this dead end without lapsing into the radical right (nationalism) or the radical left (neo-liberalism).

Representatives of the Russian Neo-Eurasianism, trying to root this intellectual tradition, turned to the identification and analysis of the Eurasian motives in the Russian classical literature of XIX century. This research assumes the presence of the structural components in literary texts that correspond to the Eurasian vision of Russia as the "Middle World" in the East-West dichotomy. The author of the article, using the method of structural analysis, reveals the presence of such components in Nikolai Chernyshevsky novel "What Is to Be Done?" One of them is represented in the structural core of the novel in the form of clear anthropological oppositions using two narrative functions: appearance and character (temperament) of the heroes. Another component is Rakhmetov, one of the main characters of the novel. The author comes to the conclusion that Rakhmetov is the first image of a Eurasian in Russian literature. At the same time, the ideology of this image, imposed to the reader by the author, appears to be inconsistent with the art material used for its construction.This is due to the fact that Chernyshevsky himself was not a Eurasian, he was a typical Westerner, who believed that oriental components in Russian culture hinder the development of Russia and they have to be suppressed.

In this article the author offers arguments in defense of the view that philosophical-historical views of K. Leontiev and his historical vocation of Russia cannot be included in the system of Eurasian views without significant restrictions. The similarity between the views of Leontiev and views of classical Eurasians 20-30-ies of the XX century is only superficial. A comparative analysis of Eurasian concepts with the views of Leontiev, taken in their systemic integrity, on the contrary, reveals the deep contradictions between them. While the Eurasians were concerned to make relevant state-political form peculiar and coherent Russian (Eurasian) culture, Leontiev claimed that Russia is a loose, amorphous and heterogeneous in cultural terms "body", the integrity of which is supported by external bonds of Russian statehood and the Church. "East project" in the process of working out which philosophical, historical and political views of Leontiev became systemic integrity, called for the creation in Russia of a new cultural and political center in Istanbul, around which in the distant future needs to encounter a fundamentally new world civilization (cultural and historical type). This civilization will unite in the synthesis of higher-order Orthodoxy, Catholicism and Islam, would include the Greek, Slavic, Romanian, Turkish, Persian, and other ethnic and cultural components. Russian culture and culture of other peoples of Russia will join this new civilization only along with many other ethno-cultural components. Thus, also the "East project" and the concept of the Eurasian cultural-historical specificity of Russia differ from each other in such essential traits as K. Leontiev considered as a direct predecessor of Eurasianism, in the author's opinion, hardly acceptable.