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coming decades, the European identity and the system of values inherited from Enlightenment will likely be gradually superseded by more conservative values of the migrants.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).

Modern visual culture gives a wide variety of opportunities to represent values, characters, stories and images reflecting cultural diversity of the world and at the same time it is obligatory for the subject of communication to be tolerant, willing to participate in the dialogue, open to the perception of experience and appraisals of others. The authors consider issues of intercultural competence formation by means of animation. Special attention is paid to the animation as a part of modern visual culture. The article states that animation can form and develop cross-cultural competence. The authors define cross-cultural competence as a phenomenon actualized in the context of intensification of intercultural contacts in a globalizing society. Animation is a part of the modern visual culture providing various means for intercultural competence formation. Analyzing historiography data the authors consider the methods of portraying the ethnic element in animation as well as ethno-cultural values. The article presents the results of the conducted study of interpretations (made by high school students) of the animated images from other cultures, as well as their opinions on the ways of understanding other cultures in the context of intercultural dialogue and creativity. The authors point out the factors forming intercultural competence of high school students living in big cities and share the opinions of students (taken from their essays) on the opportunity of intercultural dialogue aiming at understanding people of other cultures.

The starting point for writing this article was a wide circulation of ideas about the identity of such notions as sobornost and collectivism not only at the level of mass consciousness, but also in the research literature. The purpose of the article is to show the fallacy of such beliefs. The original author's position is that sobornost and collectivism constitute two different traditions - if sobornost, being of a religious origin, is related to the Orthodox spiritual experience, collectivism originated from social and political experience. The author draws attention to the fact that this erroneous assertion is based on misunderstanding that sobornost refers to the metaphysical reality, not the social one. The article outlines the key points of the concept ‘sobornost’ in the interpretation of A. Khomyakov, and the development of this idea in the writings of S. L. Frank. If collectivism, absolutizing unity, makes a personality ‘smaller’, thereby destroying it, sobornost, on the contrary, makes a personality “bigger’, allowing him/her to fully develop. It is sobornost that helps self-actualizing of a person. It is emphasized that moving towards sobornost as the highest stage of human development is performed through strengthening of individuality. The author draws a conclusion that such a radical convergence of two concepts: sobornost and collectivism entails various scenarios for Russia's future.

The history of Koreans living in CIS countries shows the unity of regular processes of transformation of their culture in different periods of residence in the Russian Empire, the Soviet Union and today the CIS. The author distinguishes three main stages of the history of CIS Koreans, in accordance with the main areas of their residence in different historical periods. The current stage is characterized by the final formation of the Eurasian community of Koreans, scattered all over the CIS space. At the same time they preserve the unified cultural markers, as well as common historical memory. Eurasian identity implies prevalence of supranational factor over the national one in ethno-cultural identity. In the case with the CIS Koreans the national factor isn’t the cornerstone of their life activities, that is reflected, for example, in their position not to insist on the forming of national regions or creating other territories on the national basis. The article deals with the process of transforming the culture of CIS Koreans, the impact of important historical events on the loss of elements of their traditional culture. Today, in the context of the Eurasian reintegration processes in the post-Soviet space the developing a new concept of a supranational identity is becoming urgent. This concept would be able to fully reflect the current processes. CIS Koreans are an example of the formation of the Eurasian identity.

The article proves the thesis that the philosophy of company is one of the forms of existence of practical philosophy. The author considers the existing ways to formulate the philosophy of company and to define the main components in its composition, with examples from the practice of operating companies. The article argues the thesis about the existence of philosophical knowledge at different levels, determines the place of practical philosophy in the system of philosophical knowledge and reveals its main characteristics. It is shown that practical philosophy performs the basic function of philosophy and can exist as an individual philosophy, a philosophy of the collective subject and macro-groups. The fundamental needs of person and society, which necessitate the existence of practical philosophy, are identified; and the philosophy of company is described as the way to meet these needs at the level of the collective subject. The author concludes that the form and content of the company's philosophy as a whole exactly correspond to the format of the practical philosophy. On the basis of general philosophical ideas about the nature and methods of the philosophical knowledge (recourse to the ultimate ground of being, systematization, unity of different topics, appeal to the due) recommendations to the construction of the company's philosophy are offered.

The article analyzes the implementation of the control by the Party Control Commission of the Central Committee of the CPSU(b) over the political behavior of the Communists in the postwar period. The moral resistance of the members of the ruling party to the authorities’ policy is one of the brightest phenomena of the Soviet era. Documents of the Party Control Commission mostly consist of decisions on appeals of the punished Communists, which allow us to see the characteristic manifestations of dissent from both ordinary party members and the officials. These people denied the brutality of the regime and the limitation of themes available for criticizing. The PCC (the Party Control Commission) brought to justice those responsible for violations of party discipline and ethics. The dissent and perseverance in defending their views were considered to be particularly serious violations of party discipline. The article shows numerous examples of frequent disagreements with the official policy of the backbone of the Communist party: the officials, the old Bolsheviks, army officers, security officers, propagandists. The party punishment was often followed by the charge of a crime. It is obvious that in conditions of terror, the party members tried to hide their views. That’s why the information about different forms of open protest during the period of late Stalinism becomes more valuable, when the numerous controlling structures carefully suppressed intra-party dissent.

In the article the author shares his findings on understanding the uniqueness of Chinese culture. Understanding Chinese culture demands and deserves an innovative approach which helps us to shed light on Chinese culture’s “millions of truth”. And this approach is Yin Yang philosophy. The Yin Yang philosophy suggests that there exists neither absolute black nor absolute white; every universal phenomenon embraces paradox and change. Culture is perceived as possessing inherently paradoxical value orientations, thereby enabling it to embrace opposite traits of any given cultural dimension. Through the examination of eight pairs of paradoxical values in business and social contexts, the authors have argued that Chinese culture has undergone significant change. However, “change” occurs not in terms of old values being replaced by new values but rather that contradictory values coexisting more and more visibly in today’s Chinese society. The article analyses the modern communication characteristics.

This article examines the dynamics of the process of geographical perception of Siberia, in the aspect of the forming of the idea of Siberia as geographical and cultural unity. There are presented, in particular, quite legendary testimonies of foreign travelers who almost up to the end of the 17th century were getting pretty random information from Russian merchants; some data from the proper Siberian Chronicles is also given. Taking into account the idea of empire as a political structure that prevailed in the last 2,500 years of human history, author deals with the cultural and political factors which has determined the integrity of the idea of Siberia as a specific megaregion. Particularly the question of the nature of the development of Siberia in terms of the corresponding type of colonization is examined. It is concluded that the population of Siberia, despite the fact that it was used and even became in the first place famous as a region of exile, the consciousness of Siberians is not typical for colonial territory. Since the end of the 18th century the representation of a Siberian as a special group of the Russian population is firmly established.

In this article a reader can find the continuation of the offered in the previous publications the analysis of the concept Siberia as a megaregion. Understanding Siberia as the megaregion plays an exceptionally important role in contemporary geopolitics, taking into account the position of this megaregion, concerning China and South-Eastern Asia. No less significant appears to be the economic capacity of Siberia, taking into consideration it’s natural resources and also it’s industrial, scientific and educational levels. The concept of the megaregion allows to observe Siberia in it’s entity, from the Urals up to the Pacific Ocean. Such an attitude permits to get rid of the “fragment” approach, i.e. division into separate, weakly connected, regions and national territories. Popular in the Russian economic discourse the notion “macroregion” has purely economic character and in difference from “magerarion” doesn’t involve historic, social and cultural dimensions. In the case of New Industrial Revolution there are new opportunities for Siberia, depending on the rebirth of industrial production on the basis of modernization and innovations, and also launching the original projects. Siberia as Russia in whole needs this innovative impulse not only in the sphere of economics, but also in education and science. The positive results will be possible by saving and renewing basic values and cores of successful strategic projects. To reach ambitious aims it’s necessary to have highly-qualified specialists and investments in R&D. It’s important to shift social responses from the plain consumption to the authentic productive labor thru realizing such values as justice and equality.

The subject of analysis is the article by I.V. Zhezhko-Braun. It is useful to discuss the history of the Siberian city of science, taking into account the present state of the RAS. The author highlights the uniqueness of this historical phenomenon, where the appearance of certain structures of civil society could be even more important than scientific discoveries. The article is based on unique sources, the resources, used by the author, involved oral narratives, interviews with a number of contemporaries and participants in the events described. For further research it is recommended for the author to use more available sources, primarily documents of the party organs. The author has to deeper present the general context in which these events took place. It is very important to substantiate the application of the term «student movement» to the opposition phenomena in Novosibirsk Akademgorodok.