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People community on a nation life culture sustainable. Marxism and the national question. Stalin's definition of the term “nation”

“What is a nation?

A nation is, first of all, a community, a certain community of people.

This community is neither racial nor tribal. The current Italian nation was formed from Romans, Germans, Etruscans, Greeks, Arabs, etc. The French nation was formed from Gauls, Romans, Britons, Germans, etc. The same must be said about the British, Germans and others, who formed into a nation from people of different races and tribes.

So, a nation is not racial or tribal, but a historically established community of people.

On the other hand, there is no doubt that the great states of Cyrus or Alexander could not be called nations, although they were formed historically, formed from different tribes and races. These were not nations, but random and loosely connected conglomerates of groups that disintegrated and united depending on the successes or defeats of one or another conqueror.

So, a nation is not a random or ephemeral conglomerate, but a stable community of people.

But not every stable community creates a nation. Austria and Russia are also stable communities, however, no one calls them nations

So - community of language as one of the characteristic features of the nation.

This does not mean, of course, that different nations always and everywhere speak different languages, or that all speakers of the same language necessarily constitute one nation. A common language for every nation, but not necessarily different languages for different nations! There is no nation that speaks different languages at once, but this does not mean that there cannot be two nations speaking the same language! The British and North Americans speak the same language, and yet they do not constitute one nation. The same must be said about the Norwegians and Danes, the English and the Irish,

But why, for example, do the British and North Americans not form one nation, despite their common language?

First of all, because they do not live together, but in different territories. A nation is formed only as a result of long-term and regular communication, as a result of people living together from generation to generation. And long-term life together is impossible without a common territory. The British and Americans formerly inhabited one territory, England, and constituted one nation. Then one part of the English moved from England to a new territory, to America, and here, on the new territory, over time, formed a new North American nation

So, community of territory, as one of the characteristic features of the nation.

But that is not all. Community of territory in itself does not give rise to a nation. This requires, in addition, an internal economic connection that unites individual parts of the nation into one whole. There is no such connection between England and North America, and therefore they constitute two different nations. But the North Americans themselves would not deserve the name of a nation if the individual corners of North America were not interconnected into an economic whole thanks to the division of labor

Take the Georgians, for example. Georgians of pre-reform times lived on a common territory and spoke the same language, nevertheless they did not constitute, strictly speaking, one nation, for they, divided into a number of principalities separated from each other, could not live a common economic life, and for centuries they waged wars among themselves and ruined each other, setting the Persians and Turks against each other. The ephemeral and random unification of the principalities, which sometimes some lucky king managed to carry out, at best captured only the superficial administrative sphere, quickly breaking down due to the whims of the princes and the indifference of the peasants. Yes, it could not have been otherwise given the economic fragmentation of Georgia... Georgia, as a nation, appeared only in the second half of the 19th century, when the fall of serfdom and the growth of the country’s economic life, the development of communications and the emergence of capitalism established the division of labor between the regions of Georgia and completely undermined economic isolation of the principalities and linked them into one whole.

The same must be said about other nations that went through the stage of feudalism and developed capitalism.

So, community of economic life, economic connectivity, as one of the characteristic features of the nation.

But that's not all. In addition to all that has been said, one must also take into account the peculiarities of the spiritual appearance of the people united in a nation. Nations differ from each other not only in their living conditions, but also in their spiritual appearance, expressed in the characteristics of their national culture. If England, North America and Ireland, who speak the same language, nonetheless constitute three different nations, then no small role in this is played by the peculiar mental make-up that has developed in them from generation to generation as a result of unequal conditions of existence.

Of course, the mental makeup itself, or - as it is otherwise called - “national character”, is something elusive for the observer, but since it is expressed in the uniqueness of the culture, the common nation, it is perceptible and cannot be ignored.

Needless to say, “national character” is not something given once and for all, but changes along with the conditions of life, but since it exists at every given moment, it leaves its stamp on the physiognomy of the nation.

So, community of mentality, affecting the community of culture, as one of the characteristic features of the nation.

Thus, we have exhausted all the signs of a nation.

A nation is a historically established stable community of people that arose on the basis of a common language, territory, economic life and mental makeup, manifested in a common culture.

At the same time, it is self-evident that a nation, like any historical phenomenon, is subject to the law of change, has its own history, beginning and end.

It must be emphasized that none of these characteristics, taken separately, is sufficient to define a nation. Moreover: the absence of at least one of these signs is enough for a nation to cease to be a nation.

It is possible to imagine people with a common “national character” and yet it cannot be said that they constitute one nation if they are economically separated, live in different territories, speak different languages, etc. These are, for example, Russian, Galician, American, Georgian and mountain Jews, not constituting, in our opinion, a single nation.

One can imagine people with a common territory and economic life, and yet they will not form one nation without a common language and “national character.” Such are, for example, the Germans and Latvians in the Baltic region.

Finally, Norwegians and Danes speak the same language, but they do not constitute one nation due to the absence of other characteristics.

Only the presence of all the signs taken together gives us a nation.

It may seem that “national character” is not one of the characteristics, but only an essential feature of a nation, and all other features constitute, in fact, conditions development of the nation, and not its signs. This point of view is held, for example, by the well-known Social-Democrats in Austria. theorists of the national question R. Springer and, especially, O. Bauer

Let us consider their theory of the nation.

According to Springer, “a nation is a union of people who think alike and speak alike.” This is “the cultural community of a group of modern people, n e related with “earth”

So - a “union” of people who think and speak the same way, no matter how separated they are from each other, no matter where they live.

Bauer goes even further.

“What is a nation? he asks. — Is it a common language that unites people into a nation? But the English and the Irish... speak the same language, without, however, representing a single people; Jews do not have a common language at all and nevertheless constitute a nation.”

So what is a nation?

“A nation is a relative community of character”

But what is character, in this case, national character?

National character is “the sum of characteristics that distinguish people of one nationality from people of another nationality, a complex of physical and spiritual qualities that distinguishes one nation from another.”

Bauer, of course, knows that national character does not fall from the sky, and therefore he adds:

“The character of people is determined by nothing other than their fate,” that... “a nation is nothing more than a community of fate,” which in turn is determined by “the conditions under which people produce the means of their subsistence and distribute the products of their labor.”

Thus, we have arrived at the most “complete,” as Bauer puts it, definition of a nation.

“A nation is the entire collection of people united in a community of character on the basis of a community of fate”

So, a community of national character based on a community of fate, taken without any obligatory connection with the community of territory, language and economic life.

But what remains in this case of the nation? What kind of national community can we talk about among people who are economically separated from each other, living in different territories and speaking different languages from generation to generation?

Bauer speaks of the Jews as a nation, although “they do not have a common language at all”

The Jews mentioned, no doubt, live a common economic and political life with the Georgians, Dagestanis, Russians and Americans, in a common cultural atmosphere; this cannot but leave its stamp on their national character; if there was anything left in common between them, it was religion, a common origin, and some remnants of national character. All this is certain. But how can one seriously say that ossified religious rituals and eroding psychological remains influence the “fate” of the mentioned Jews more than the living socio-economic and cultural environment surrounding them? But only with such an assumption can one speak of Jews in general as a single nation.

How then does Bauer’s nation differ from the mystical and self-sufficient “national spirit”?

Bauer draws an impassable line between the “distinctive feature” of a nation (national character) and the “conditions” of their life, separating them from each other. But what is national character if not a reflection of living conditions, if not a bunch of impressions received from the environment? How can one limit oneself to national character alone, isolating and separating it from the soil that gave birth to it?

Then, how, in fact, did the English nation differ from the North American nation at the end of the 18th and beginning of the 19th century, when North America was still called “New England”? Certainly not by national character: for the North Americans were immigrants from England, they took with them to America, in addition to the English language, also the English national character

Obviously, “New England” as a nation differed then from England as a nation not in its special national character, or not so much in its national character, but in its special environment and living conditions from England.

Thus, it is clear that in reality there is no single distinctive feature of a nation. There is only a sum of characteristics, of which, when comparing nations, one characteristic (national character), then another (language), then a third (territory, economic conditions) stands out more clearly. A nation represents a combination of all characteristics taken together.

Bauer's point of view, which identifies the nation with the national character, tears the nation away from the soil and turns it into some kind of invisible, self-sufficient force. The result is not a nation, alive and active, but something mystical, elusive and beyond the grave. For, I repeat, what kind of Jewish nation is this, for example, consisting of Georgian, Dagestan, Russian, American and other Jews, whose members do not understand each other (speak different languages), live in different parts of the globe, never know each other? they will never act together, neither in peacetime nor in wartime?!

No, it is not for such paper “nations” that Social Democracy draws up its national program. It can only take into account real nations, acting and moving, and therefore forcing themselves to be taken into account.

Bauer obviously confuses the nation, which is a historical category, with the tribe, which is an ethnographic category.

However, Bauer himself apparently senses the weakness of his position. Declaring strongly at the beginning of his book about the Jews as a nation

Arguing this way, Bauer wanted to prove that national autonomy could not be a demand of Jewish workers

But Bauer goes further. At the beginning of his book, he decisively declares that “the Jews do not have a common language at all and nevertheless constitute a nation.”

Bauer here wanted to prove that “language is the most important tool of human communication”

This is how the theory stitched together with idealistic threads refutes itself” (I.V. Stalin. Works, vol. 2, M., 1946, pp. 292 - 303).

In the full text of the given section of the article the definition of a nation given by J.V. Stalin appears as having a basis in the historical process, and not simply as a declarative definition of the term in which this or that subjectivism is expressed. This is its merit and this is what distinguishes it from the definitions of the term “nation” given by others.

The Stalinist definition of a nation was an official scientific definition in the USSR in post-Stalin times, although, when citing this definition, the work of I.V. Stalin “Marxism and the National Question” after the XX Congress of the CPSU was not referred to in most cases. Actually, the same signs of a nation that I.V. Stalin gives in his definition are given in the modern school textbook “social studies”4 edited by L.N. Bogolyubov (vol. 2, “Man and Society”5 - a textbook for 10 - 11 classes, M., “Enlightenment”, ed. 8, 2003), although they are not reduced to a strict definition of the term “nation”: the historical nature of the formation of nations (p. 316, paragraph 2), language ( ibid., p. 316, paragraph 3), common territory and economic connectivity (ibid., p. 316, paragraph 5), common culture (ibid., pp. 316, 317), in which the national character is expressed and thanks to which the national character is reproduced in the continuity of generations (although the textbook leaves the question of national character and national psychology in silence).

In the work of I.V. Stalin “Marxism and the National Question”, due to various objective and subjective reasons, topics were not considered an adequate understanding of which is necessary for the harmonization of national relationships in multinational societies:

What is culture in general and national culture specifically;

Formation of national cultures;

The interaction of nations, the emergence and development options of diasporas and their impact on the life of the indigenous population in the areas where diasporas have penetrated;

Implementation of the full function of management in the life of peoples, as the totality of the national population in the area of formation of its culture and diasporas outside this area;

The separation of diasporas from the region of formation of ethnic cultures and the replacement of the population that once gave rise to diasporas with ethnically different populations belonging to other nations and diasporas;

The formation of a universal human culture, which will integrate into itself all of humanity, multinational in its historical past;

Problems of the biological basis of national cultures, the genetic core of the nation and its originality, which distinguishes peoples in a statistical sense from each other based on purely biological characteristics;

Nation and Civilization;

Egregorial processes in the life of nations, diasporas and in national interaction.

Along with this, it should be noted that the definition of a nation as a social, historically conditioned phenomenon, given by I.V. Stalin, distinguishes a nation from a people as a social organism that passes throughout history through various forms of organizing the life of a culturally unique (national) society in one or another regional civilization. This difference between the phenomena “nation” and “people” is also visible in the text of the work, in particular, when in the above fragment I.V. Stalin writes about the Georgians as a people who, in a certain period of their history, feudal fragmentation did not allow to unite into a nation in in the sense as this term was defined by I.V. Stalin. But I.V. Stalin does not give a definition of how a nation differs from a tribe or people, as a result of which nation, people, ethnicity, even in the scientific lexicon, are perceived as synonyms - almost complete equivalents, not to mention the everyday understanding of these words in wide sections of society .

The lack of adequate coverage of the above-mentioned problems by the sociological science of the USSR is one of the reasons why the process of formation of a new historical community, called the “Soviet people,” was interrupted, and national conflicts played a significant role in the deliberate destruction of the USSR by foreign policy forces. And this is one of the threats to the territorial integrity of post-Soviet Russia.

Nations, diasporas, individuals, multinational culture - multinational society

Stalin's definition of the term “nation”

The definition that has become almost generally accepted in the science of the USSR and the post-Soviet Russian Federation nation as a social phenomenon gave by I.V. Stalin in his work “Marxism and the National Question”. Let us present in full section I of the named work, entitled “Nation”, and not just the formulation of Stalin’s definition of this term, since the formulation represents the result - captured in the text-dialectical procedure of cognition: asking questions and finding answers to them in real life , and everyone needs to master dialectics in order to become free.

“What is a nation?

A nation is, first of all, a community, a certain community of people.

So, a nation is not racial or tribal, but historically established community of people.

So, a nation is not an accidental or ephemeral conglomerate, but stable community of people.

But not every stable community creates a nation. Austria and Russia are also stable communities, however, no one calls them nations. How does a national community differ from a state community? Incidentally, the fact that a national community is unthinkable without a common language, while a common language is not necessary for a state. The Czech nation in Austria and the Polish nation in Russia would be impossible without a common language for each of them, while the integrity of Russia and Austria is not hindered by the existence of a number of languages within them. We are, of course, talking about colloquial languages, and not about official clerical ones.

So - community of language as one of the characteristic features of the nation.

But why, for example, do the British and North Americans not form one nation, despite their common language?

So, community of territory, as one of the characteristic features of the nation.

Take the Georgians, for example. Georgians of pre-reform times lived on a common territory and spoke the same language, however, they did not, strictly speaking, constitute one nation, for they, divided into a number of principalities separated from each other, could not live a common economic life, for centuries they lived among themselves wars and ruined each other, pitting the Persians and Turks against each other. The ephemeral and random unification of the principalities, which sometimes some lucky king managed to carry out, at best captured only the superficial administrative sphere, quickly breaking down due to the whims of the princes and the indifference of the peasants. Yes, it could not have been otherwise given the economic fragmentation of Georgia... Georgia, as a nation, appeared only in the second half of the 19th century, when the fall of serfdom and the growth of the country’s economic life, the development of communications and the emergence of capitalism established a division of labor between the regions of Georgia and completely undermined the economic isolation principalities and tied them into one.

The same must be said about other nations that went through the stage of feudalism and developed capitalism.

So, community of economic life, economic connectivity, as one of the characteristic features of the nation.

Needless to say, “national character” is not something given once and for all, but changes along with living conditions, but since it exists at every given moment, it leaves its stamp on the physiognomy of the nation.

So, community of mentality, affecting the community of culture, as one of the characteristic features of the nation.

Thus, we have exhausted all the signs of a nation.

The period of counter-revolution in Russia brought not only “thunder and lightning,” but also disappointment in the movement and disbelief in the general forces. They believed in a “bright future” - and people fought together, regardless of nationality: common issues come first! Doubt crept into the soul, and people began to disperse to their national apartments: let everyone rely only on themselves! “National problem” first of all!

At the same time, a serious disruption of economic life was taking place in the country. The year 1905 was not in vain: the remnants of the serfdom in the village received another blow. A series of harvests after the famines and the industrial boom that followed propelled capitalism forward. Differentiation in the countryside and the growth of cities, the development of trade and communications took a major step forward. This is especially true in the suburbs. But this could not help but speed up the process of economic consolidation of the nationalities of Russia. The latter had to set in motion...

The “constitutional regime” established during this time acted in the same direction of awakening nationalities. The growth of newspapers and literature in general, some freedom of the press and cultural institutions, the growth of popular theaters, etc., undoubtedly contributed to the strengthening of “national feelings.” The Duma, with its election campaign and political groups, provided new opportunities for the revitalization of nations, a new broad arena for the mobilization of the latter.

And the wave of militant nationalism that rose from above, a whole series of repressions on the part of the “those in power” taking revenge on the outskirts for their “love of freedom”, caused a response wave of nationalism from below, sometimes turning into crude chauvinism. The strengthening of Zionism among Jews, growing chauvinism in Poland, pan-Islamism among Tatars, strengthening of nationalism among Armenians, Georgians, Ukrainians, the general bias of the average person towards anti-Semitism - all these are well-known facts.

The wave of nationalism was advancing more and more, threatening to overwhelm the working masses. And the more the liberation movement declined, the more magnificent the flowers of nationalism bloomed.

At this difficult moment, Social Democracy had a high mission - to fight back against nationalism, to protect the masses from the general “craze”. For Social Democracy, and only it, could do this by contrasting nationalism with the proven weapon of internationalism, the unity and indivisibility of the class struggle. And the stronger the wave of nationalism approached, the louder the voice of Social Democracy should have been heard for the brotherhood and unity of the proletarians of all nationalities in Russia. At the same time, special resilience was required from the outlying Social Democrats who were directly confronted with the nationalist movement.

But not all Social Democrats were up to the task, and above all, the Social Democrats on the outskirts. The Bund, which had previously emphasized general objectives, now began to highlight its own special, purely nationalistic goals: it came to the point that it declared “celebration of the Sabbath” and “recognition of jargon” as the fighting point of its election campaign. The Bund was followed by the Caucasus: one part of the Caucasian Social Democrats, who previously, together with the rest of the Caucasian Social-Democrats, denied. “cultural-national autonomy”, now puts it forward as another demand. We are not even talking about the liquidators' conference, which diplomatically sanctioned nationalist vacillations.

But it follows from this that the views of Russian Social-Democracy on the national question are not yet for everyone the Social-Democrats. are clear.

A serious and comprehensive discussion of the national question is obviously necessary. We need the united and tireless work of consistent Social Democrats against the nationalist fog, no matter where it comes from.

What's happened nation?

A nation is, first of all, a community, a certain community of people.

This community is neither racial nor tribal. The present Italian nation was formed from the Romans, Germans, Etruscans, Greeks, Arabs, etc. The French nation was formed from the Gauls, Romans, Britons, Germans, etc. The same must be said about the English* Germans and others formed in the nation from people of different races and tribes.

So, a nation is not racial or tribal, but a historically established community of people.

So, a nation is not a random or ephemeral conglomerate, but a stable community of people.

But not every stable community creates a nation. Austria and Russia are also stable communities, however, no one calls them nations. How does a national community differ from a state community? Incidentally, the fact that a national community is unthinkable without a common language, while a common language is not necessary for a state. The Czech nation in Austria and the Polish nation in Russia would be impossible without a common language for each of them, while the integrity of Russia and Austria is not hindered by the existence of a number of languages within them. We are, of course, talking about vernacular languages, and not about official clerical ones.

So - community of language

This does not mean, of course, that different nations always and everywhere speak different languages, or that all speakers of the same language necessarily constitute one nation. A common language for every nation, but not necessarily different languages for different nations! There is no nation that speaks different languages at once, but this does not mean that there cannot be two nations speaking the same language! The English and North Americans speak the same language, and yet they do not constitute one nation. The same must be said about the Norwegians and Danes, the English and the Irish,

But why, for example, do the British and North Americans not form one nation, despite their common language?

So, community of territory as one of the characteristic features of the nation.

Joseph Stalin: “A nation is...”

1913
“A nation is a historically stable community of language, territory, economic life and mental makeup, manifested in a community of culture... It must be emphasized that none of these characteristics, taken separately, is sufficient to define a nation. Moreover, the absence of at least one of these signs is enough for a nation to cease to be a nation... Only the presence of all the signs taken together gives us a nation.” Stalin I.V. Marxism and the national-colonial question. - M., 1934, p.6.

1934
“A nation is a historically established stable community of people that arose on the basis of a common language, territory, economic life and mental makeup, manifested in a common culture... Only the presence of all the characteristics taken together gives us a nation. Stalin I.V.” Great Soviet Encyclopedia, 1st ed., vol. 31, M., 1934.

1946
“A nation is a historically established stable community of people that arose on the basis of a common language, territory, economic life and mental makeup, manifested in a community of culture.” Only the unity of all four features constitutes the concept of a nation; “the absence of at least one of these features is enough for a nation ceased to be a nation... A nation represents a combination of all characteristics taken together." Stalin I. Marxism and the National Question. - Soch., vol. 2, M., 1946, pp. 296-297.

1949
“According to the Marxist theory of the nation, which has received general recognition in all communist parties as the only correct one, “a nation is a historically established stable community of people that arose on the basis of the commonality of four main characteristics, namely: on the basis of a common language, a common territory, a common economic life and a community mental make-up, manifested in the commonality of specific features of national culture.” Stalin I. The National Question and Leninism (March 1929) - Soch., vol. 11, M., 1949, p. 333.

1954
“A NATION (from Latin natio - tribe, people) is a historically established stable community of people, which is characterized by the following features: a common language, a common territory, a common economic life and a common mental makeup, manifested in a common culture. If there is no combination of all these four characteristics, there is no nation. This scientific definition of the Nation was formulated by I.V. Stalin, who creatively developed the views of Marxism-Leninism on the national question.” Great Soviet Encyclopedia, 2nd ed. t. 29, M., 1954, p. 307.

“Father of Nations” and his definition of a nation.
(On the history of philosophical discussions of the 60-80s of the twentieth century).

In history, the apparent has always played a more important role than the real, and the unreal always prevails over the real. G. Lebon. Psychology of crowds.

Yes, few other philosophical concepts in the USSR were as lucky as the concept of nation.
Not one of the most pressing issues for the life of the Soviet people was discussed as much as the definition of a nation, which at the dawn of the century - in 1913 - a man at the age of Christ with the strange nickname Koba published in an illegal magazine, published in a meager circulation, in a small work, first called, like the works of his predecessors Stepan Shaumyan and Otto Bauer, “The National Question and Social Democracy”, and then renamed by the author - first to “The National Question and Marxism”, and then to “Marxism and the National Question”.
Although the author’s intellectual background by that time amounted to three and a half courses at theological seminary, the history of the creation of Stalin’s definition and its scientific analysis could well become the subject of a special study in itself.

Without much difficulty it can be proven that the formula of the nation given by the future leader of the party, which called itself Marxist, had nothing to do with Marxism.

Moreover, its scientific validity is extremely doubtful. After all, none of the features listed by Stalin are either necessary or sufficient for the existence of a nation.

For each of them, there will definitely be a nation in history that refutes the presence of this particular feature.
Well, for a nation to have all four characteristics at the same time, an exceptional combination of circumstances is required.

One can even assume that none of the existing and possible definitions can come close to the concept of a nation, since this concept is an empty set.

As a matter of fact, this is exactly what more than a hundred academicians and doctors of various sciences discussed for a decade and a half, that is, from 1964 to 1982.
Dozens of publications in many magazines and newspapers were devoted to this topic.

However, although they say that truth comes from debate, this was clearly not the case.
Although the definition of a leader, to which the entire Stalinist theory of the nation was reduced, was the same element of the communist faith, like many other myths created in those years, it had to be professed, despite the absurdity of the phrase once written by this “father of many nations” (Gen. 17:5).

The formulation created by Stalin in the USSR was called the “classical example of definition” for decades. Vinogradov S.N. and Kuzmin A.F. Logic, textbook for high school. Ed. 7th. M., 1953, p. 35.
The authors of a school textbook on logic argued it this way: “This definition contains all the necessary characteristics of a nation.” The closest genus in this definition is “a community of people,” and all other characteristics that distinguish a nation from a collective, public organizations, class, etc., are specific differences. All these properties express the fundamental properties of the nation.”

Anyone who would dare to doubt the above...
However, since the beginning of the 1930s, it was impossible to find such eccentrics in the USSR.

In those years, the leader’s great contribution to philosophy was supposed to be written like this:
“Comrade Stalin created the Marxist theory of the nation, comprehensively developed the program and theory of the party on the national question, and discovered the most appropriate forms of unifying the national Soviet republics into a single union state.” Kammari M.D. The USSR is a great community of socialist nations. - M. 1950, p. 14.

And the work “Marxism and the National Question,” according to the author’s modest remark, became “the largest speech of Bolshevism on the national question in the international arena before the war. This was the theory and programmatic declaration of Bolshevism on the national question." Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin. Short biography. - M., 1948, p.54.

True, the leader of the Bolsheviks Vladimir Lenin, having read the “programmatic declaration of Bolshevism” written by the “wonderful Georgian”, soon gave birth to “Critical Notes on the National Question” and rubbed into dust all Stalin’s arguments about the unity of the nation, but... after the death of the old critic, few could dare to engage in malice.
From now on the General Secretary laid out the general course.

In general, as the Father of Nations himself would have summed it up: “One thing remains: to admit that the Russian Marxist theory of the nation is the only correct theory.” Stalin I.V. Soch., vol. 11, p. 334.

Only 3 years after his death, at a closed meeting of the 20th Congress, on February 25, 1956, N.S. Khrushchev dared to speak out against the tyrant.

Everything secret, which was previously spoken about only in whispers, everything that was in terrible rumors and guesses, was generalized in Khrushchev’s report on the scale of the USSR and called criminal.
This secret report was read everywhere at party and Komsomol meetings.
The party and the country finally heard the truth about the murder of millions of innocent people, about torture and concentration camps, about crimes against the ideals of communism and humanity.

And on October 17-31, 1961, the XXII Congress of the CPSU was held in Moscow, where the personality cult of Stalin, despite the resistance of his associates, was again condemned by Khrushchev. Stalin's actions were already publicly, from the highest rostrum in the country, called a monstrous crime.
Nikita Khrushchev ordered not only to remove the great criminal from the Mausoleum, but also to erase all traces of his activities in the life of society, to erase the name of Stalin from the map of the country, from the history of the state and the theory of communism.

But Stalin's contribution to the “field of social sciences” consisted in a definition of the nation, which for almost half a century was considered scientific and consistent with all Marxist canons.
Therefore, scientists were obliged to urgently give a new scientific definition of the nation, at the same time in the spirit of Leninist historical mathematics.

Academician-secretary of the Historical Department of the USSR Academy of Sciences, editor-in-chief of the “Soviet Historical Encyclopedia” and editor of the journal “World History”, Evgeniy Zhukov, was entrusted with providing the theoretical basis for a special party order, which he did by publishing an editorial in “Questions of History.”

Zhukov's arguments boiled down to this:
“Nation is a historical category. The list of four characteristics of a nation given at one time by Stalin, in our opinion, cannot be applied to the current socialist nations of the Soviet Union without significant reservations.
In this case, such features as common territory and economic community have almost lost their significance.
The commonality of mental makeup, manifested in the commonality of culture, has also undergone serious modification.
Among the modern nations of the Soviet Union, only the commonality of the national language is fully preserved, which, undoubtedly, will exist for a very long time.
Thus, of the four signs required by Stalin, only one has constant significance, and the rest gradually fade away. But nations continue to exist.
This means that the time has come to reconsider the formula that if there is no totality of all the named characteristics, then there is no nation. In new historical conditions it is no longer applicable.” Zhukov E.M. XXII Congress of the CPSU and the tasks of Soviet historians. - Questions of history. 1961, no. 12.

Indeed, if the signs disappear, but the nations remain, it means that for this reason alone the previous definition should be considered at least inaccurate.

However, if, according to I. Stalin, essential characteristics arise before the nation (“a nation is a community formed on the basis of a commonality of characteristics”, and according to I. Arsky, the very concept of a nation arose before the birth of nations), then according to Zhukov, the phenomenon can exist and after the disappearance of its own specific distinctive features. Arsky I.V. The question of the formation of nationalities in Western Europe. - Scientific notes of Leningrad State University, East series. science, v.12. L, 1941.

Thus, the logical absurdity associated with the concept of a nation continued to intensify, and Stalin's brainchild remained untouchable.

In December 1962, Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee B.N. Ponomarev at the All-Union Conference of Historians again noted “Stalin’s services to the party”:
“Historians, for their part, cannot deny certain positive actions of Stalin in historical science, in particular in the development of certain problems of the origin and essence of the nation, in defending in the first years after Lenin’s death the correct views on certain questions of the history of Bolshevism against Trotskyist attacks.” Ponomarev B.N. The tasks of historical science in the training of scientific and pedagogical personnel in the field of history. - M., 1962, p.16.
Only two years later these words about Stalin’s merits in developing the theory of the nation were deleted from Ponomarev’s report. See All-Union Conference of Historians. - M., 1964, p. 21, 28.

But more than a decade has passed since the death of the Great Fighter against Trotskyism.
Therefore, emboldened academician and vice-president of the USSR Academy of Sciences P.N. Fedoseev, during the Stalin years - editor-in-chief of the magazines “Bolshevik” and “Party Life”, showed courageous adherence to principles: “It is necessary to completely eliminate the consequences of Stalin’s personality cult in the field of social sciences.” Questions of History, 1964, No. 3, p.4.

However, the first shot, according to Stalin's definition, was fired not from the philosophical, but from the ethnographic side.

In 1964, ethnographer Sergei Tokarev stated that although peoples (ethnic communities) may differ in such characteristics as “language, territory, common origin, cultural characteristics, religion, etc.,” none of the listed characteristics are mandatory (essential) for determining an ethnic community ) is not.
In his opinion, “a common language cannot be a distinctive feature: the same language is often spoken by several different nations. Common territory is also not a sign - nations without territory have been known for a long time. As for the commonality of economic life, there are no clear economic boundaries between nations. And the idea of a common mental makeup does not bring anything but fog into the definition of a nation.”

And then S.A. Tokarev proposed a definition of an ethnic community: “An ethnic community is a community of people that is based on one or more of the following types of social ties: community of origin, language, territory, nationality, economic ties, cultural way of life, religion (if the latter is preserved).” Tokarev S.A. Problems of types of ethnic communities (towards methodological problems of ethnography). - Questions of Philosophy, 1964, No. 11.

The very idea that a nation could be defined on only one basis was, at that time, a desperate audacity.

Then the Avar Ahed Agayev struck a blow at the Stalinist stronghold in his work on the theory of nationality: “The scientific definition of a nation, formulated in 1913 by I. Stalin, needs serious adjustments. In the version in which it exists in literature to this day, this definition is more suitable for characterizing the ethnic community of people in general, and not one of the specific historical forms of this community. All four characteristics are inherent in a clan, a nationality, and a nation, and not just the latter.” Agaev A.G. On the question of the theory of nationality. - Makhachkala, 1965, p. 37.

Agayev's remark was to the point.

Although then it turned out that the totality of these characteristics is nothing more than a multi-place generic characteristic of an ethnic community, and a “stable community” is a specific one, as follows from his arguments expressed later.
“The concept of ethnic community refers to all ethnic units. What are the specific specific forms of manifestation of this ethnic community in a nation? Stalin answered this question by introducing into the concept of “nation” the attribute “stable community of people.” This was already enough to distinguish it in the system of types of ethnic communities.” Agaev A.G. The nation, its essence and self-awareness. - Questions of History, 1967, No. 7, p. 88.

However, Khrushchev left, Brezhnev came.
Philosophers decided to wait and wait with innovations in order to understand which way the wind was blowing.

And they waited - at the XXIII Congress of the CPSU, delegate Ion Bodiul, the future first secretary of the Communist Party of the Communist Party of Moldova, spoke from a high rostrum and reproached social scientists: “It cannot be considered normal that in the educational literature published recently, contradictory definitions of the nation are given, and in the textbook for universities “Fundamentals of Marxist Philosophy” the section “Marxist-Leninist Doctrine of Nations” is completely omitted. Confusion is allowed in the teaching of philosophy in universities and technical schools.” True, 3.4.1966.

I had to roll up my sleeves, damn it, and begin a scientific search. And so began the famous philosophical discussion about the concept of a nation, which was conducted by the largest specialists of the USSR on the pages of the journal “Questions of History” in 1966-1968.

It was a very strange discussion.

Like in a song about a ballroom dancing school,
"two steps to the left,
two steps to the right,
step forward,
vice versa".

On the one hand, the discussion participants demonstrated their excellent knowledge of the classics of Marxism, carefully selecting from the various works of K. Marx and F. Engels those scraps of quotes that supported their attempts at analysis.
In the speeches of most of the debaters, there was a sober understanding of the inconsistency of Stalin’s formula, which was subjected to the harshest criticism; various considerations were expressed that are still relevant today.
But as soon as it came to the need to give an independent definition, all the fervor seemed to evaporate, and although several dozen new definition options were proposed, almost all variations on a given theme retained the same approach: “a nation is a community that”...

This paradox Yu.I. Semenov explained the natural dogmatism of the discussion participants: “Stalin’s approach to this issue has become so self-evident that even many scientists who take part in the ongoing discussion and who consider it necessary to revise this I.V. Stalin’s definition of the nation, they essentially see no other way to solve the problem.” Semenov Yu.I. From the history of theoretical development by V.I. Lenin's national question. - Peoples of Asia and Africa, 1966, No. 4, p. 124.

S.I. also shared her doubts. Yakubovskaya (Institute of History, USSR Academy of Sciences). “It seems that any scientific general definition does not apply to all cases of life. The dialectics of historical development excludes this. The definition given by I.V. Stalin, being scientific, is correct in general terms, but at the same time it allows for a number of deviations. For example, according to this definition, the characteristics of a nation are a common language and a common territory. But it is common knowledge that the Belgian nation is bilingual; Americans and British are different nations, although they speak the same language; Arabs are a nation based in various territories. The task of the discussion should, in my opinion, not be to revise the definition given by J.V. Stalin, but to fight to ensure that it is not treated dogmatically. After all, the trouble is not that the position was wrong, but that this position, which is generally correct, was treated dogmatically, applied to all cases of life, trying to fit the definition of any nation to four signs. This gave rise to a certain constraint in the development of problems of the theory of the nation.”

And M.N. Rosenko found the following answer to this question:
“We believe that the scientific concept of any social phenomenon is enduring. It exists as long as the phenomenon exists. If it (in this case, the nation) changed radically in its content, then we would no longer be talking about it, but about another social phenomenon. If nations exist for centuries, then no matter how social conditions change, they do not cease to be nations. It is possible to improve and develop the concept of “nation” in relation to a certain stage of social development, but we cannot talk about a radical change in the concept itself.” Rosenko M.N. The modern era and some issues of the theory of nations. - Questions of History, 1968, No. 7, pp. 85-101.

Thus, in the understanding of the participants in the discussion, the matter came down only to the need to adapt the existing definition to the new, socialist, stage of development of the concept.
Therefore, many of the proposed “new” definitions were most often modifications of the old formula.

Those who opened the discussion were P.M. Rogachev and M.A. Sverdlin proposed the following definition as a seed for discussion:
“A nation is a historically established community of people, characterized by a stable commonality of economic life (in the presence of a working class), territory (within one state), language (especially literary), self-awareness of ethnicity, as well as some features of psychology, traditions of life, culture and liberation struggle." (Text in parentheses was shortened before publication.) Rogachev P.M., Sverdlin M.A. On the concept of “nation”. - Questions of History, 1966, No. 1, pp. 33-48.

N.P. Ananchenko put it intricately: “A nation as a comprehensive concrete historical community of people, replacing a nationality and preceding an international society, which appears and develops in connection with the spread of capitalist relations, the creation of large-scale machine production, the expansion of territorial borders within the pre-nation of related nationalities or tribes or other neighboring ethnic communities, concentration of the population speaking predominantly one language, enshrined in literature, the creation of national statehood, the increasing role of socio-political relations, etc.” Ananchenko N.P. From nations to an international community of people. - Questions of History, 1968, No. 3, pp. 82-96.

Throughout the entire dispute, the key question was a simple one: can a nation be considered an ethnic successor to a nationality, or does this continuity not exist in relation to pre-capitalist communities, and a nation, based not on kinship, but on economic community, is in fact a social negation of previous development?

In fact, in those years there was an ideological choice between ethnic nationalism and civil nationalism.
It is characteristic that the majority of social scientists living in national republics, dismissing the priority of the economic criterion, recognized the nation as an ethnic phenomenon.
The same motive is seen in the repeated demands to put in the first place in the definition of a nation not economics, but language, “the most striking feature that allows one to distinguish one nation from others.”

"Two steps to the right"...

Starting with the article by M.S. Dzhunusov, who offered several definitions to choose from, the discussion persistently echoes the idea of a nation not as a historically established community, but precisely as an ethnic community: “A nation is the highest form of an ethnic community of people, formed on the basis of the community of both bourgeois and socialist social relations . From the point of view of its social function, a nation is a form of social development inherent in capitalist and socialist society, representing an integral socio-ethnic organism.” Dzhunusov M.S. A nation as a socio-ethnic community. - Questions of History, 1966, No. 4, pp. 16-30.

Although many colleagues objected with restraint (for example, M.N. Rosenko, who recalled that “ethnicity presupposes a common origin, way of life and culture,” and “nations, with rare exceptions, cannot be characterized by a common origin.” Rosenko M.N. Ibid. ), but national social scientists defended the exact opposite thesis.

One of the oldest nationality experts in the USSR, Professor I.P. Tzameryan (his articles on nation and nationality were published in the Bolshevik magazine back in 1951) first stated that he did not see the need to change anything in the definition.
“The existing definition is “fundamentally scientific, Marxist. There are no grounds, in our opinion, for a radical revision of this definition; only some clarifications are required.”
Then he attacked the article “Types of Ethnic Communities” by S.A. Tokarev, who “leads readers to the idea that we have neither a scientific theory of a nation nor a definition of the concept of a nation,” but then he himself made a significant revision of the generic feature of the Stalinist formula: “A nation is the historically highest form of ethnic community of people of the era of capitalism and socialism, characterized by a commonality of economic life, territory, language and national character, manifested in the specific features of its culture.” Tzameryan I.P. Topical issues of the Marxist-Leninist theory of nations. - Questions of History, 1967, No. 6.

A.G. also turned out to be an ardent supporter of the view of the nation as an ethnic entity. Agayev.
“The formula of a historically established community of people essentially breaks the ethnic connection of the nation with those ethnic formations that formed the basis of the nation, giving it its territory, language, character, and ethnic characteristics. In the interests of limiting the concept of a nation, it is advisable to characterize it as a historical form of an ethnic community of people, a higher form of an ethnic community of people, or an ethnic community of people typical of capitalism and socialism. Agayev’s definition included a nation as a special case of an ethnic community, characterized by 4 characteristics: “Territory and language, economy and culture - these are the four forms in which an ethnic community is formed, polished, concentrated and modified... A nation is an ethnic community of capitalist and socialist formations, awakening to independent national life and sovereignty.” Agaev A.G. The nation, its essence and self-awareness. - Questions of History, 1967, No. 7, pp. 87-104.

ON THE. Tavakelyan presented a rare example of pseudo-philosophical idle talk: “A nation is a complex, highly developed, homogeneous socio-ethnic stable dynamic community of people, closely linked to each other by deep ties of language, territory, economic life, self-awareness of ethnicity and national character, which is manifested in the era of capitalism and socialism. in all spheres of public life, predominantly and more perceptibly in various types and forms of material and spiritual culture, in everyday life and traditions, in morals and customs.” Tavakelyan N.A. - Questions of History, 1967, No. 2, p. 118.

The same echo of gradually smoldering nationalism, but attacking from the other side and criticizing Stalin for... underestimating the social specifics of the nation, can be considered the attempts to recognize statehood as the leading feature of the nation.

So, M.O. Mnatsakanyan tried to get rid of the Stalinist “mental makeup” and replace it with a sign of the presence of statehood: “A nation is a historically established community of people who have a common language, a common territory, common economic ties and a common state structure.” Mnatsakanyan M.O Nation and national statehood. - Questions of History, 1966, No. 9, pp. 27-36.
He also pointed out that the sign of a common national language, as the sum of its various forms, is not correct; it is more correct to talk about the commonality of a literary language.

"Two steps to the left"...

At the same time, a number of speakers rejected the traditional generic sign.
Thus, they began to talk not about the nation as a community, but about the nation as a group of people.
In the same article M.S. Dzhunusov said: “A nation is a large group of people, distinguished by a stable common language, ethnic territory, national identity and specific national cultural features, developing during the formation of both capitalist and socialist economic relations.” Dzhunusov M.S. A nation as a socio-ethnic community. - Questions of History, 1966, No. 4, p. 20.

A.I. also spoke about the nation as a group. Goryacheva “A nation is a group of people connected by a common economic life, territory, language, mental makeup.” Goryacheva A.I. Is mental makeup a sign of a nation? - Questions of History, 1967, No. 8, pp. 91-104.
However, having made a revision of the generic characteristic, she left untouched, like other “freethinkers,” all 4 Stalinist characteristics, and expressed disagreement “with those definitions that highlight the characteristics characteristic of nations in one or another period of their development, because these will already specific rather than general definitions.”

In other words, in the opinion of these “Stalin fighters”, the definition of a capitalist and socialist nation must contain the same features.

However, among the proposed definitions there were some oddities.

So, according to S.I. Novikov, one of the distinctive features of a nation should be the presence of its own currency, as well as its own system of weights and measures: “A nation is a large socio-ethnic group, bound by the unity of written and spoken language, enshrined in literature, by the political unity of the territory with the population speaking in one language, the presence of a unified system of money, weights and measures and customs borders.” Questions of History, 1968, No. 6, p. 99.

A.V. Santsevich advanced a revolutionary thesis: “A nation is a historically established community of people in economic, political and cultural life on a common territory with an active role of the working class in the revolutionary struggle and socialist transformations, a community of historical traditions.” Santsevich A.V. Questions of History, 1966, No. 12, p. 116.

Some have tried to view the nation as a form of social relations.
For example, M.S. Rosenko offered a clever definition:
“A nation is a form of material and spiritual relations between people under capitalism and socialism, which has relative independence in its development, but is largely (if not to a decisive) extent determined by the essence of the socio-economic formation. A nation is a historically determined form of social connections between people, leading humanity to a non-national unity.” Rosenko M.N. The modern era and some issues of the theory of nations. - Questions of History, 1968, No. 7, pp. 85-101.

S.T. Kaltakhchyan questioned the very need for discussion.
Demonstrating a brilliant mastery of the art of sophistry and declaring that “in their essence, the nations of one social system are very different from the nations of another system” and that there are no rules without exceptions, he criticized the formal-logical approach as such.
“Unfortunately, the identification of common features is often carried out formally logically, by comparing various tables, comparing examples of the phenomenon being studied, selecting cases that contradict the generalization. (I personally do not know of a single attempt to carry out a formal logical analysis of the definitions of the concept of a nation. - S.Sh.).
In a similar way, it is always possible to identify and combine certain common features of a particular phenomenon, but the essence of the phenomenon is not limited to this. And the point is not only that exceptions are possible and always occur, but also that anatomizing a phenomenon, destroying living connections and not clarifying the basis of the vital functions of a given phenomenon, does not allow one to get to its true essence.” Kaltakhchyan S.T. Questions of History, 1966, No. 6, pp. 24-44.
Appealing to the authority of Lenin, who objected to the eclectic pursuit of a complete list of signs, Kaltakhchyan reduced everything to the fact that it was necessary to find out one main sign. This feature, in his opinion, is again supported by a reference to Lenin’s old work (“the concept of “nation” is built here on the artificial abstraction of the contradictions between the classes that form this nation.” Lenin V.I. PSS, vol. 2, p. 221) , is the presence of a class division in a nation. The whole national question comes down not to the existence of nations, but to the contradiction between labor and capital.

A special place in the discussion was occupied by the topic of ethnic communities in third world countries, in which, according to B.V. Andrianova, E.A. Simonia, P.I. Puchkov, the processes of national consolidation do not fit into theory.
For example, in Mali and Indonesia, the creation of a nation occurs in the absence of a single national language; the leading factor in the emergence of nations from multilingual tribes is the state.
Is it possible in this case to talk about nations as such?

Having analyzed all four characteristics of a nation proposed by Stalin, the participants in the discussion convincingly showed that they cannot be considered distinctive characteristics, putting forward strong arguments against each individually and all together.

"Ladies, don't blow your nose on the curtains,
This is indecent, they tell you!”

For example, T.Yu. Burmistrova reasonably noted that in the Stalinist definition, “the characteristics are called the “base” on which a nation arises, and the concept of “national community” remains undisclosed.” Burmistrova T.Yu. Some questions of the theory of the nation. - Questions of History, 1966, No. 12, p. 102.

Often in the statements of the discussion participants the idea arose about the subjectivity of these so-called essential features.

A.G. drew attention to a very important detail. Agayev:
“Upon closer examination, it turns out that one ethnic community may differ primarily in terms of language, another - in territoriality, a third - in religion, etc. As soon as this basic feature weakens or disappears altogether, the entire ethnic community collapses. She dissolves into the surrounding ethnic environment.” Agaev A.G. The nation, its essence and self-awareness. - Questions of History, 1967, No. 7.
By the way, Ahed Gadzhimuradovich wrote back in 1965 about “the real existence of separate ethnic communities, including nationalities and nations, without a common territory, a common language, etc.” Agaev A.G. Nationality as a social community. - Questions of Philosophy, 1965, No. 11.
“In our opinion,” he noted, “the concept of a nation must meet at least three requirements.
Firstly, it must reflect the specific difference of a nation as an ethnic community in the general system of historical forms of community of people, such as state, racial, class, international, etc.
Secondly, to imagine the nation as the highest and final stage of an ethnic community.
And, thirdly, to identify the specifics of the nation among other types of ethnic communities.” Agaev A.G. The nation, its essence and self-awareness. - Questions of History, 1967, No. 7.

Is common territory an essential feature, and if so, for which class constituting a nation? - asked V. Zaichenko and K. Sabirov. “The ruling classes have the entire territory of the state at their disposal. For the lower ones, the limits of such a territory are limited to several hundred meters or several kilometers, beyond which their activities do not extend.” Zaichenko V.M. Sabirov K. Community of mental makeup is one of the essential characteristics of a nation. - Questions of History, 1968, No. 5, pp. 75-81.

"This is a school,
ballroom dancing school,
ballroom dance school
they tell you"...

A curious attempt to completely discard the definition of a nation (of course, with reference to the authority of Lenin) was made by Yu.I. Semenov.
In his opinion, one should study not nations, but national movements, as Vladimir Ilyich did, while creating definitions is unnecessary scholasticism.
“No definition of a nation, reduced to a simple listing of any of its characteristics, can be successful... We know what linguistic, territorial, economic, cultural communities of people, taken separately, are. What do they represent taken together? When they are superimposed on each other, do they together form something single, does a qualitatively new phenomenon arise that cannot be reduced to the sum of its components? If the answer is negative, it makes no sense to talk about the emergence of a new community of people - a national one; in the case of a positive one, the same question arises again: what is the essence of this phenomenon, what type of phenomena does it belong to, what is its place among social phenomena.” Semenov Yu.I. From the history of theoretical development by V.I. Lenin's national question. - Peoples of Asia and Africa, 1966, No. 4, p. 122.
Stalin's definitions are eclectic, he said, without expressing the essence of nations, they do not make it possible to separate this phenomenon from the rest, to draw a qualitative line between this and all the others.

Having reported that “concise definitions are always imperfect in that they cannot cover the comprehensive connections of a phenomenon in its full development,” V.I. Kozlov noted that a nation should be spoken of not as a group of people, but as a large group of people.
Although it was obvious that small nations cannot be called the word nation and clearly there is some kind of pattern between the quantitative growth of the nation and economic development, the emergence of cities, the emergence of national movements and, accordingly, the nation’s claims to create its own statehood, no one could formulate this pattern had tried.

Kozlov explained:
“The average size of a tribe is several hundred or thousand people. Nations are hundreds of thousands, millions of people. Only such dimensions can ensure an internal division of labor corresponding to a developed mode of production. Of particular importance in this is the creation of a national intelligentsia. To proceed from specific material - this call will find sympathy among all researchers who are faced with the difficulty, and sometimes the impossibility, of applying a rigid definition of a nation based on 4 characteristics, the content of which is still not fully disclosed, to the actually existing peoples of the world. Ethnographers wrote about a thousand articles about different peoples of the world for the Great Soviet Encyclopedia. But they are not able to determine which of these peoples is a nation and which is a nationality.”

It is difficult to even name the criteria by which one can identify a person’s belonging to a particular nation.
They say that at one time Ben-Gurion, instead of answering the question asked him “Who is a Jew?”, shrugged his shoulders and answered: “A Jew is ... a Jew!”
In any case, the principle, elevated to the status of law, according to which the son of a Jewish woman should be considered a Jew, often fails. The annals of the Faculty of Philology of Moscow State University include the romantic story of a student who managed to become a mother three times during her studies in the 60s. Her first child was the son of a Chinese revolutionary who died during the Cultural Revolution. She gave birth to her second from a Cuban who arrived from Liberty Island, and her third from a French communist. Since she herself was a Jew, all her half-born sons - a black child, a Chinese child and a child from a French father - should have been considered Jews...

IN AND. Kozlov also reasonably rejected the commonality of economic life as a specific feature of a nation. “Analysis of the concept of economic community shows that this community is characteristic not so much of a nation as of a state, and its scope is determined not by ethnic, but by political boundaries. The factor of statehood has a significant influence on the formation of a linguistic and cultural community and a decisive influence on the formation of an economic community, which is considered the main feature of a nation... In practice, when we are dealing with the presence of state entities or national political movements in which the main classes of a given people are involved and who set the goal of territorial autonomy, this usually serves as a sign that we are dealing with an emerging or already formed nation.” Kozlov V.I. On the development of the theoretical foundations of the national question. - Peoples of Asia and Africa, 1967, No. 4.

In total, during the discussion, about 50 articles were published on many aspects of the concept of nation.
23 historians, 16 philosophers, 5 ethnographers, 3 lawyers, 2 linguists and one economist took part in it.
Similar discussions in the same years took place in the journals “Questions of Philosophy”, “State and Law”, “Peoples of Africa and Asia”, “Friendship of Peoples” (Literary Hero and His National Character - 1966-1967) and “Literary Gazette” (National originality of literature and art), as well as on the pages of the Polish magazine (Nation and State, 1966, No. 3), and a number of Hungarian publications.
In 1969, an All-Union Scientific and Theoretical Conference on the same topic was even held in Frunze.

Then the stupid argument was stopped for a long time.
The country was already creeping into years of stagnation.
Denying Stalin's role in the history of the USSR was considered a voluntaristic mistake.

But only more than a year and a half after the publication of the last material of the discussion, an article appeared in Voprosy istorii, where the results of the discussion were summed up and all national i’s were dotted.

Then, without taking into account the authority of Academician E.M. Zhukov, slashed out: “Socialist nations have the same characteristics as bourgeois ones. None of them disappears during the transition from capitalism to socialism, but the content of these features changes radically. Consequently, the existing Marxist definition of a nation includes the main, defining characteristics of all types of nations. However, this definition does not and cannot reflect the development of one or another type of nation, much less individual nations.”

What about ballroom dancing?

"Zhenya, Zhenya, don't turn around,
this is not a propeller
and you are not an airplane...

Now it was necessary to distribute earrings to all the sisters, which the author did with virtuosity indicating considerable experience.
“During the discussion, some participants expressed the opinion that since nations develop, they do not have stable, stable characteristics, that mandatory characteristics turn a nation into something metaphysically unchangeable. However, these views did not receive support. Since a nation really exists, its scientific definition should include the most important, stable features that reveal the essence of the nation. If we assume that such signs do not exist, it means that a nation is something amorphous, indefinite, constantly changing its being and appearance. This is what the majority (!) thinks and one cannot but agree with this.”

Also, with reference to the opinion of the majority, which is always right, the author recognized it necessary, in addition to the two already known types of nation - bourgeois and socialist, to “identify a new type to designate nations that arise in countries liberated from colonial oppression.”

The author categorically refused to include “self-awareness” among the characteristics of a nation.
“Self-awareness of ethnicity,” just like “national self-awareness,” cannot serve as one of the main characteristics of a nation, since it is a subjective reflection in a person’s mind of the objective fact of the existence of a nation.” Questions of History, 1970, No. 8, p. 95.

Whether the protocol of voting results was drawn up, whether this scientific question was resolved by a simple or qualified majority, the author of the article did not say, but moved on to the most important thing:
“The well-known definition of a nation, formulated by I.V. Stalin, is a generalization of everything that was said by K. Marx, F. Engels and V.I. Lenin on the question of the essence and main characteristics of a nation. It is known that the work of I.V. Stalin, in which this definition was given, was positively assessed by Lenin. The above definition of a nation, as rightly noted during the discussion, is a scientific, Marxist definition; it represents part of the Marxist theory of the nation.” Questions of History, 1970, No. 8, pp. 90-94.

This was the end of all theoretical debates about the concept of a nation in the USSR.

"Cavaliers, don't hold back the ladies,
below the waist, they tell you!”

From now on, scientific research and journalistic materials about national relations in the USSR sounded like a song about a gullible marquise. And how could it be otherwise, because “the national question in the form in which it was inherited from the past has been completely and finally resolved. Relations of genuine equality and brotherhood, Leninist friendship of peoples, have been firmly established in the country.” Ponomarev B.N. Report at the All-Union Scientific and Practical Conference. - In the book. To educate convinced patriots-internationalists. Proceedings of the conference “Development of national relations in conditions of mature socialism. Experience and problems of communist international education" in Riga. - M., 1982, p.13.

...However, one day the veil of silence was finally broken.

At the end of 1972, an article “Against anti-historicism” appeared in the Literary Gazette, placed on a double page and signed by Doctor of Historical Sciences A.N. Yakovleva. It was dedicated to the national question in the USSR, or more precisely, to the growth of Russophile sentiments in the country.
Its author at that time was the head of a department of the CPSU Central Committee, and pointed out the dangerous intensification of nationalist speeches in literature and journalism in recent years, clearly dividing the concepts of “Russian” and “Soviet.”

Yakovlev wrote that “the revival of Russian nationalism awakens the nationalism of other peoples that make up the USSR.”
It is impossible to play with nationalism in the USSR; in a socialist multinational country, ideologists are obliged to understand that the rejection of the class historical approach, regardless of which side it is proclaimed, inevitably leads to a symmetrical rejection on the other side.

“When the past is deliberately idealized, and even with unclear social positions, an absurd dispute arises about whose king is better...”

Russians idealize Russian commanders and kings - in response, Georgians begin to write about the bright personality of Queen Tamar, Ukrainians - about the fabulous Kiev prince Bogdan Gatilo, under whose name the leader of the Huns Atilla was hiding, Kazakhs - about the movement of Kenesary Kasymov, Uzbeks - about Timur, Moldovans - about their cultural figures of the last century, etc.
“Attempts are being made to embellish and whitewash some representatives of bourgeois nationalism, which was revealed in a number of publications about Ukrainian bourgeois nationalists, Georgian Mensheviks, social-federalists, and Armenian Dashnaks.”

The party cried out: Emergency!

"Ladies, ladies, help Sasha,
Help Sasha, they tell you!
He made a puddle in the corridor...

Article by Comrade Yakovleva about Russian nationalism was given the honor of being spat upon at a Politburo meeting.
The speaker, head of the cultural department of the Central Committee Vasily Shauro, by the way, a native of Belarus, was deeply outraged by the immature, fundamentally incorrect speech of his colleague, discrediting the great Russian people, pouring grist into someone else’s mill, etc., in general, approached the printed word in a principled manner .
To learn respect for the Russian people, Yakovlev was sent to Canada, where he remained as ambassador for more than 10 years, until Gorbachev took him from there to first appoint him as an ideologist, and then responsible for foreign policy and the eminence grise of perestroika.

But by creating the illusion of universal well-being at the request of the nomenklatura bureaucracy and theoretically justifying the existence of the administrative-command system, the creators of the fictitious idyll demonstrated their devotion to the principles of Stalinist national policy, which they renamed Leninist.
Habitual verbal formulas reliably closed long-gaping gaps in theoretical constructions and satisfied customers - why fuss, trying to find a definition of a phenomenon that will no longer exist in the bright future? All nations will eventually dissolve into a single people.

However, in connection with the doctrine of the emergence of a single Soviet people, other political and economic oddities arose.

Everyone knew that Russian, Turkmen, Georgian, Estonian and other peoples are part of the Soviet people on equal rights, but live and thrive on their own, many have their own statehood, culture and literature.
At the same time, a citizen of a national republic usually had more rights than residents of Russia.
Let's say that much more money was spent on his education and upbringing from the all-Soviet budget than on the same goals for a person from a Central Russian village.
Many republics were considered subsidized, that is, they received funds for their economic, cultural, medical and other purposes directly from the federal budget, that is, not earned by them themselves.

It turned out that the Soviet people are some kind of amazing structure, a federation of ethnic groups, something like a huge nesting doll, which includes many smaller nesting dolls.
Some of these peoples had their own national republics, regions and districts, others simply lived in the USSR, not bothering themselves with paradoxes and not being upset that they were part of the single Soviet people directly, without an intermediary state.
A resident of a national autonomy, part of a national republic, had exactly the same Soviet citizenship as a resident of Moscow.
The only thing he could not, by definition, was become the General Secretary of the CPSU.

However, social scientists later made a number of attempts to define a nation.

Among the innovators was, for example, Doctor of Sciences M.I. Kulichenko, who proposed this option: “A nation is a historically formed stable historical community, the basis of whose existence is the social ties inherent in a certain formation, primarily the unity of economic life and, in varying degrees of maturity, political cohesion, formed in inextricable unity with ethnic ties, acting in the form commonality of the national territory, literary language, national traditions and customs, national culture in general (class-contradictory under capitalism), and the national ties of people are also reflected in a significant way and in class refraction in the public consciousness (national consciousness) and in social psychology (national psychology).” . Kulichenko M.I. National relations in the USSR and trends in their development. - M., 1972, p.29.

But, if a nation is a historical product of the development of society, then socio-historical development, being a decisive factor in “the emergence and deepening, and in some circumstances, the softening and erasing of mental differences between individual ethnic communities” (Methodological problems of social psychology. - M ., 1975, p.215) contributes to the constant revaluation of existing values. This process goes on constantly, and under relatively identical initial conditions, different peoples come to some similarities in their own ways. Humanity, once arose, “turned into a society in which the social environment from the very beginning began to influence people to the extent that people, an individual, must fulfill the duties assigned to them, thereby the socialization of the individual represents constant pressure on a person, natural relationship, changing its essence as a result.” (Ibid.).

Therefore, what is common and special in national cultures must be sought not in ethnic communities, but, first of all, in the historical experience of people, which determines all the socio-psychological processes that take shape during the historical development of peoples.

Among foreign Marxists, the most interesting definition was proposed by the German philosopher Alfred Kosing:
“A nation is a structural form and form of development of human society that naturally arises with the formation of the socio-economic formation of capitalism, as a result of the process of economic development, as well as the processes of socio-political and ideological development and historical class battles based on it... The nation appears and becomes historically active as a collection of large groups of people, and while classes exist - as a collection of classes. The nation, as a naturally occurring structural form and form of development of society, is characterized by the following general distinctive features: the historical nature of its emergence and formation, its economic foundations that determine the essence of the nation, language as the most important means of communication, and the territory on which the unification of national regions and the formation of a national states." Kozing A. Nation in history and modernity. - M., 1978, p. 119.

M.I. Kulichenko, highlighting the political attribute as characteristic of the definition, contrasts the social, class side of the nation with the ethnic one, connecting language, territory, traditions and culture with the ethnic one. At the same time, public consciousness in his understanding has not an ethnic, but a national coloring.

A. Kosing, having abandoned the understanding of the nation as a community and considering it a large collection of people, and in class societies - a collection of classes, focuses on the structural features of the nation as a form of development of society, while decisively omitting all references to the psychological and cultural, as well as ethnic component.

However, the Politburo of the CPSU Central Committee decided to correct some of the most obvious absurdities in the old formula and leave everything as it is.
In general, it turned out like this (for some reason they decided to throw out the mention of sustainability): “A nation is a historical community of people that takes shape during the formation of a common territory, economic ties, literary language, and some features of culture and character.” Philosophical Encyclopedic Dictionary - M., 1983, p.417.

“Where the brooch is -
there's pyro...

In the “Soviet Encyclopedic Dictionary” (1985), the definition from the “Philosophical Encyclopedic Dictionary” was copied word for word:
“A nation is a historical community of people that takes shape during the formation of a common territory, economic ties, literary language, and certain features of culture and character.” The difference is that it is added: “in the USSR a historically new social and international community has emerged - the Soviet people. The community of socialist states is growing stronger.” Soviet encyclopedic dictionary. - Moscow, 1985.

Since it was not indecent to refer to Stalin, it was decided to attribute his definitions to the classics, and to cover up with quotes from Marx and Lenin what was invented by the Father of Nations.
His “theory of nation” was renamed Leninist; Stalin’s national policy, carried out in the USSR until the early 70s, also turned out to be Leninist.
Defending the theory of the luminary of all sciences, Soviet social scientists erected strong fortifications around its provisions, trying to support their efforts with references to the classics, most often distorting their views, and often, in the desire to find Stalinist approaches in the works of Marx or Lenin, they did not disdain the ordinary linden.

Here is a typical example.
S.T. Kaltakhchyan in his work “Marxist-Leninist theory of nation and modernity” with reference to “Lenin’s collection” (vol. XXX, p. 53) writes: “V.I. Lenin considered the determinants of a nation: “Language and territory. The main thing (Economic sign). Historical character." He thus highlighted those determinants of a nation, without which it cannot exist.” Kaltakhchyan S.T. History of the Marxist-Leninist theory of the nation and modernity. - M., 1983, p.68.
From here the conclusion naturally followed: “V.I. Lenin comprehensively developed and developed the materialist, historical and economic theory of the nation.”

But if you pick up the 30th volume of the “Lenin Collection” and open it to the indicated page, you will find out that the quote given by Kaltakhchyan looks a little different: “Kautsky. Language and territory. The main thing (Economic sign). Historical character."
And this text is... Lenin’s summary of Kautsky’s views on the nation, whose historical and economic theory Lenin, by the way, criticized.
Having removed from the selected quotation the indication of the direct author of this point of view, Kaltakhchyan simply made a substitution: he attributed Kautsky’s views to Lenin. And he did this because it was from Kautsky that Stalin copied all these signs of a nation - language, territory, economic characteristics.

That’s what they wrote, like Doctor of Historical Sciences M.I. Kulichenko, not disdaining lies: “K. Marx, F. Engels and V.I. Lenin substantiated in his works the position that a nation is a stable community of people in the era of capitalism and the emergence of communism.” Kulichenko M.I. The flourishing and rapprochement of nations in the USSR. - M., 1981, p.45.

Or as Candidate of Philosophy P.A. Korchagin: “Considering the approach of K. Marx and F. Engels to the problem of understanding the nation, we can draw the following conclusion. A nation is a socio-ethnic community historically formed in the era of capitalism, characterized by a common economic life, language, territory, and a large number of people who exhibit common features and characteristics in their social psychology.” Korchagin P.A. K. Marx and F. Engels about nations and national relations in the works of 1840. - Scientific Communism, 1980, No. 4, p. 104.

What can I say?
"Step forward, on the contrary"...

However, there was another micro-discussion in the USSR about the concept of a nation in the journal “Scientific Communism” in 1980.
She was summoned, firstly, by those who appeared at the suggestion of M.S. Dzhunusov’s statements about the ethnosocial nature of the nation, about its social and ethnic sides, and secondly, the freshly baked theory of Yu.V. Bromley about ethnic groups, and the specific reason is the statements of the same S.T. Kaltakhchyan that nationality is an ethnic characteristic of a nation.

It turned out that the old guard was vigilantly watching the carried away youth.

Having thoroughly prepared the attack, loyal Stalinist Ivan Tsameryan dealt a powerful blow to the revisionists by publishing a very convincing article in the genre of political denunciation in Scientific Communism. Tzameryan I.P. Some current issues in the theory of nations and national relations. - Scientific communism. 1979, no. 2, pp. 27-43.

He stated that “the mechanical interpretation of the nation as a combination of two autonomous parts - ethnic and social” by individual authors (namely Y.V. Bromley with his ethnicos and ethnosocial organisms) fundamentally contradicts Marxism.

“All kinds of views that interpret the nation as a community of two autonomous sides (or parts) - ethnic and social, can serve as a convenient form of justifying the eternity of the nation,” the old demagogue denounced the revisionists. - “According to these authors, nationality characterizes the ethnic side of a nation and nationality, that is, their ethnic characteristics. We know that nationalities existed long before the nation existed. Consequently, nationality as the ethnic side of the nation arises long before the emergence of the nation, and is something almost given from time to time.” Moreover, contrary to the well-known Leninist position that in social and class terms the nation of bourgeois society does not represent one nation, but consists of two nations, some (here M.S. Dzhunusov was clearly meant) declare that “a nation, having a different socio-political and moral character, in ethnic terms - common territory, language, national specifics, cultural characteristics, way of life, customs, tastes, traditions and psychology - represents one nation.” Dzhunusov M.S. Two trends of socialism in national relations. - Tashkent. 1975, p.33.

Thus, the ethnic turned out to be more important than the social, which finally drove Ivan Petrovich into righteous anger.
“There are no ethnic characteristics that do not have a social character. A nation, in the totality of all its characteristics, features and characteristics, is a social phenomenon. A nation is a social or socio-historical community of people,” wrote Tsameryan, as if forgetting that relatively recently, in the discussion of 1966-1968, he himself called a nation “the highest form of ethnic community.”

Bromley and Kaltakhchyan had to write a refutation, but, in essence, Tsameryan had nothing to object to. (Bromley Yu.V. Kaltakhchyan S.T. Current problems of the Marxist-Leninist theory of nation and national relations and the struggle of ideas. - Scientific Communism. 1980, No. 1).
According to Stalin, in the USSR the nation was considered a purely social phenomenon, without any autonomous ethnic parts.

“Fima, Sonya, stop talking,
What kind of balabolka, they tell you!”

But in the future, attempts to encroach on the legacy of the mustachioed leader were met with hostility by those who worked for a long time in the field of the theory of the nation - this became the specificity of their world.

In addition to the above, there were discussions “Nationalism and mass character” in the Literaturnaya Gazeta in 1982; “On the definition of the concept of “ethnic group”” - in the journal Soviet Ethnography 1986-1987; discussion about the problems of typology and historical types of ethnic communities in the yearbook “Races and Peoples”: No. 18 - M., 1988, pp. 5-65; No. 19 - M., 1989. See also Articles from the early 1990s. in the journal Ethnographic Review.

With what metal in his voice, 10 years later, at a round table in the editorial office of “Questions of Philosophy,” Suren Kaltakhchyan himself rebuffed the arrogant perestroikas: “The whole world knows the outstanding results of the Leninist national policy. This is especially worth thinking about for those who like to see everything as compromised, who, instead of correcting the distortions and deviations from the Leninist theory of the nation and national relations, strive to devalue what has been done in the development of this theory and try to propose starting everything from scratch.” Philosophical problems of the theory and practice of national relations under socialism. Round table materials. - Questions of philosophy. 1988, no. 9, p. 33.

How hot it will collapse - already in 2000! - Viktor Kozlov on the apostate Vladimir Tishkov, who dared to declare that a nation is “an essentially empty word that has become emotionally influential”, that all the theoretical constructions of domestic philosophers and ethnographers about nations and ethnic groups are parascientific chimeras created by the imagination of ideologists! Kozlov V.I. Ethnos. Nation. Nationalism. - M., 2000, pp. 19-20.

"It's unethical
unhygienic
and unsympathetic
they tell you "...

Many years have passed since Stalin's death. The USSR - along with the communist doctrine - is also a thing of the past, but the leader’s creation is still published in encyclopedias and dictionaries as a classic, although without attribution.

Barnaul resident Alexander Melnikov is absolutely right when he bitterly writes that “the Stalinist understanding of the nation, loudly proclaimed from thousands of stands, replicated in millions of copies, canonized during his lifetime, lives in textbooks and the works of social scientists even after his death.” Melnikov A.N. Reflections on Nations. Experience of restructuring national thinking. Barnaul. 1989, p.65.

Neither the country created by the Secretary General nor the camps he built are on the map; the communist dream is a thing of the past, but the leader’s theory of the nation has overcome all obstacles.
How does the definition given by Muscovite Valentina Torukalo in her Ph.D. thesis differ from Stalin’s: “A nation is a social community of real living, communication, language, way of life, labor, thinking, feeling, culture, etc. It is also clear that nations arise at a certain stage of social development.” Torukalo V.N. Nation and national relations: origins, theory, modernity. - M., 1997, p.23.

Slyly linking the emergence of nations with a “certain stage of social development” and calling a nation a “community”, although not historically stable, but merely social, replacing the commonality of economic ties with the commonality of life and work, the commonality of the territory with the commonality of real residence, deciphering the commonality of mental makeup as a community communication, thinking and feeling, of course, without forgetting about the commonality of culture, etc., - Valentina Ivanovna turned the old song into a new way. Before us is the same, but cunningly disguised, definition of a leader.

In recent years, leaders of the Orthodox Church have been increasingly taking up the godly task of determining the nation and people, of course, emphasizing with all their might their own Orthodox significance for the Russian nation and proving that every nation seeks “religious unity - otherwise it will not happen.”

“Russian identity and the future of the Orthodox world in the era of globalization,” this is how priest Sergiy Karamyshev titled the report he delivered on October 6, 2011 at St. Petersburg State University at a historical and political science conference, in keeping with the spirit of the times.
To begin with, the shepherd, like many of his predecessors, dissociated himself from the bad legacy, attributing Stalin’s words to another author, although the “churched nationalist” clearly did not fit the shelves with the works of the classic of scientific communism.

“We are not close to Marx’s definition of a nation as a community formed from individual nationalities only under the “capitalist” mode of production,” said the bearer of the spirit of God. - This understanding of the nation contradicts the Holy Scripture, which speaks of “peoples” without regard to any “capitalism” or “feudalism.” We offer a genetic definition of the concept “nation”. It has the advantage of being based on Holy Scripture...

Although it is difficult to substantiate the Lord’s words with genetics, such trifles do not bother Father Sergius. He theorizes out of ignorance, as God put on his soul.

“This is the definition we propose,” exclaims the theorist from Christ.
Nation (people) - 1) naturally, organically formed in accordance with the divine economy of our salvation in time and continuing to exist in eternity, a community of people united by 2) origin (common history), 3) religion, 4) language, 5) state legal norms, 6) culture and 7) territory.
The set of points from 2 to 6 conveys to the representatives of the nation a unique worldview (mentality).
Of the listed characteristics, two, in our opinion, are not obligatory: biological origin and territory.
Once formed, a nation can relatively painlessly absorb people who are alien by blood, assimilating them - in the process of assimilation, they acquire other characteristics that are already obligatory for the nation. Once formed, a nation, or, usually, parts of it, can continue to exist without being deprived of territory.”
And further...
“It seems extremely necessary to introduce into the current political and legal field a DEFINITION OF THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE, confirmed by scientific developments. As a working definition for the first time, we could offer our own, based on the general definition of the nation: the Russian people - naturally, organically formed in accordance with the divine economy of our salvation in time, namely, in the X-XI centuries from the Nativity of Christ and continuing to exist in eternity, a community of people united by origin and common history, the Orthodox faith, Russian and (used for prayer) Church Slavonic language, adherence to a monarchical form of government, Russian Orthodox culture and territory.”

Here, however, the holy father, clearly realizing that by hinting at the national territory, he blurted out something not too ecclesiastical, makes an awkward curtsey:
“The latter corresponds to the borders of the Russian Empire by 1904, including also part of the territory of the former Austrian Empire, where Orthodox Rusyns lived. This does not mean that the Russians are making territorial claims to a number of modern states. This simply means the territory of our ethnocultural space, in which we can act without conflicting with the existing legislation of these states.”
So, historical community, language, territory, mentality...

"Step forward, on the contrary"...

The Holy Father only has to add economics, and everything will turn out exactly like Comrade Stalin.

Let’s open the “Concise Philosophical Dictionary”, published in 1997: “A nation is a historically stable community of people, formed on the basis of a common language, territory, economic life, as well as common national forms of material and spiritual culture.” Brief philosophical dictionary. Ed. Alekseeva A.P. - M., Progress. 1997, p.202.

Let's take a look at the thick volume of the “Historical-Etymological Dictionary of the Modern Russian Language”, published in 1999, authored by P.Ya. Chernykh: “A nation,” he writes, is a historically established form of community of people, characterized by a common language, territory, economic life and mental makeup, manifested in a common culture.” Chernykh P.Ya. Historical and etymological dictionary of the modern Russian language. In 2 volumes - 3rd edition, volume 1. - M., Russian language. 1999.

How luxuriously published is the New Illustrated Encyclopedia, the twelfth volume of which with the word “Nation” was published at the beginning of the millennium.
What's there?
“A nation (from Latin natio tribe, people) is a historical community of people based on a common territory, historical, economic and political ties, literary language and other cultural features. New illustrated encyclopedia. - M., Great Russian Encyclopedia. 2001, vol. 12, p. 169.

So the Stalinist legacy wanders from the dictionary to the encyclopedia, from the textbook to the reference book, usually without reference to the author.

Sometimes, when compiling publications, they get out of an absurd situation by pointing out that there is a different point of view on the nation, or simply list several variants of definitions that supposedly exist in science, but they are silent about which one is more correct.

Thus, in the 2000 edition of the “Russian Encyclopedic Dictionary” we will find a hybrid definition containing as many as three different decodings of the poor concept, but in the first place, of course, is the one given by Joseph Vissarionovich: “Nation - (from Lat. natio - tribe, people) - a historical community of people based on a common territory, historical, economic and political ties, literary language and other cultural features. Often seen as a form of ethnic community. In modern practice, the more common concept of a nation is the aggregate of all citizens of a certain state, regardless of their ethnicity.” Russian encyclopedic dictionary in 2 volumes, volume 2, - M., Publishing house Big Russian Encyclopedia, 2000, art. 1030.

In modern literature, one can sometimes find attempts to defend the ethnic understanding of the nation that existed in the USSR, and to define the nation as the highest historical type of ethnic group that arises on the basis of the development of bourgeois relations: “Nation (from Latin - tribe, people) is a historical type of ethnic group that arises in the era of the formation and development of capitalism. Nations are formed, as a rule, on the basis of nationality; in this case, 2 or more nationalities, usually related, participate in the consolidation of nations. Ethnicity turns into a more integral social system - a nation. The nation state plays a prominent role in this process. A nation can be considered as a special historical type of socio-political organization of an ethnic group.” Avksentyev A.V. Avksentyev V.A. Brief ethnosociological dictionary-reference book. - Stavropol. 1994., p.50.

In "Political Dictionary" edited by A.A. Migolatyev, published in 1994, a nation is also interpreted as an ethnic community: “A nation is a socio-ethnic community historically formed in a certain territory, which is characterized by a stable unity of economic life, language, stable characteristics of culture and psychology.” Political Science Dictionary in 2 parts, ed. Migolatyeva A.A. Part 1. - M., Luch. 1994, p.440.

According to the same dictionary, “an ethnos, an ethnic community is a stable set of people (tribe, nationality, nation, people) historically formed in a certain territory, possessing common features and stable features of language, psychological make-up, as well as an awareness of their interests and goals, their unity , differences from other similar formations in self-awareness and historical memory.” Political Dictionary in 2 hours, ed. Migolatyeva A.A. Part 2. - M., Luch. 1994, p.508.

What arguments are made in defense of this concept?

“In the Russian language, the interpretation of the concept of a nation as a historical type of ethnic group developed mainly under the influence of the Marxist-Leninist theory of the nation and in this sense has firmly entered the Russian language. In recent years, some Russian scientists have declared the concept of “nation” to be meaningless, far-fetched and meeting only the needs of the ideology of the 18th-19th centuries. This point of view, however, seems controversial and unconvincing. There are many discrepancies in scientific terminology in all languages and even in different scientific disciplines in the same language. This, of course, complicates scientific communication, but is not a reason to consider the interpretation of a particular term in any language or scientific discipline to be meaningless. If for ethnology and ethnography the differences between historical types of ethnic groups as historical ways of organizing ethnic life are not fundamental, then for sociology, political science and other social science disciplines these differences are significant and the concept of a nation in these disciplines is filled with specific content in these disciplines.” Avksentyev A.V. Avksentyev V.A. Ibid., p.51.

Thus, the main one of the listed arguments is habit, in other words, the reluctance to look at things not as they were taught, but objectively.

Much has already been said about what “content” the concept of a nation was “filled” with in Soviet social science disciplines.
In fact, all categories of the so-called theory of nations - nation, nationality, people, nationality, ethnos, ethnic community - were not scientific terms, but ideological polysemantic constructs, their meanings overlapped each other, so it is impossible to use them as tools of cognition.

It’s sad, gentlemen and comrades, to follow the torment of the same V.A. Tishkov, trying to explain to his contemporaries how confused everything was in that heap of concepts and words that was proudly called the Stalinist theory of the nation.
Here he is trying in the encyclopedia “Peoples and Religions of the World” to give modern definitions of a nation, people, ethnic group:
“Nation (from Latin natio - people) is a term denoting the totality of citizens of one state, a political nation. Previously, there was an understanding of the nation as an ethnic group, that is, a cultural or ethno-nation, that is, the idea of it as a historically stable socio-economic and cultural community of people. The concept of an ethnic nation has roots in Austro-Marxism and Eastern European social democracy. In the USSR, ethnic communities (peoples) were called socialist nations, and the actual political nation was called the Soviet people (p. 892). A people - in the ethnic sense - is the same as an ethnic group (p.891). For the existence of an ethnic group, the myth of common origin is important, as well as the presence of ethnic identity, name, and culture. Ethnic groups are characterized by the presence of a language, a certain territory and economy. Currently, there are 2-3 thousand ethnic groups (p.901).” Peoples and religions of the world. Encyclopedia. M., 1999. 928 p.

Clever Tishkov - alas! - is right in everything, but the reader experiences a slight brain short-circuit.
If we briefly summarize what is said in the encyclopedia, we get the following: what were previously called nations are in fact peoples; what was previously called the people is the nation; Moreover, although in the USSR a nation was considered an ethnic group, in reality it is a people.
What a nation or people actually are does not add clarity to such explanations.
But, trying to find the objective signs that characterize a nation, we continue to move through the same methodological labyrinth into which the insidious thought of the Father and Teacher of all nations led us: a nation is a community that...

"Two steps to the left,
two steps to the right,
step forward,
vice versa".

“Considerations of logic and historical methodology require, first of all, to define a nation in all its breadth, i.e. to identify features that are always, to one degree or another, inherent in any nation as a specific form of community.” Rogachev P.M. Sverdlin M.A. About the concept of nation. - Questions of History, 1966, No. 1, p. 34.

In a word, Stalin is still more alive than anyone else alive.

Review of “The Father of Nations and His Definition” (Sergey Shramko).

Before turning to the consideration of problems that social science was obliged to illuminate after the publication of the cited work of I.V. Stalin, but never illuminated for almost 100 years, let us turn to Stalin’s definition of a nation in order to clarify some of the silences hidden in it. This is necessary so that the ambiguity of their understanding ceases to be an obstacle to the harmonization of national relations in the country and in the world.

First of all, the question of community of economic life, economic coherence of the nation.

J.V. Stalin gave the definition of a nation in that historical period of development of global civilization, when all historically established nations by that time were characterized by the quality of economic self-sufficiency in the sense that the range of products they consumed was dominated by products produced by the nation itself. The volume of interethnic product exchange was insignificant in relation to the volume of the gross national product produced by the nation itself, and interethnic product exchange played any significant role in shaping the quality of life only of the national “elites” (the ruling and richest layer of national crowd-“elite” societies) , and not the vast majority of the people who make up the nation. In other words, there was not only territorial and linguistic, but organizational and technological (economic) isolation of nations from each other.

Due to the fact that the nation at that time was self-sufficient in terms of production and consumption of products and interethnic product exchange did not have any noticeable impact on the quality of life of the vast majority of its representatives, behind the words of Stalin’s definition of the commonality of economic life, the economic coherence of the nation lies the fact that the nation, at the expense of its own human resources, supported the entire range of professions necessary to produce its gross national product at the level of organizational and technological development it had achieved.

Nowadays, the overwhelming majority of nations that existed in the historical period when I.V. Stalin defined this phenomenon have lost the quality of economic self-sufficiency in the above sense: a fair share of the product they produce is intended for export, and their own production and consumption is based on there is a fair share of imports of those types of products that are not produced in the national economy either at all or are not produced in the required quantities; At the same time, national economies are involved in a number of projects carried out jointly by several nations, the fruits of which are shared by their participants (examples of such projects are the production of European Airbus airliners, European Space Agency programs, the International Space Station, etc.).

The above applies to the production and consumption of both intermediate and investment products consumed in technological processes, and the final product - products intended for consumption outside the sphere of commodity production - in households, by the state and public organizations. Those. The quality of life of the vast majority of the population, at least in developed countries, is now determined by the participation of their economies in the global economy of mankind, both in terms of production and in terms of consumption of intermediate, investment and final products.

As a consequence, nations have ceased to support the full range of occupations needed to produce products in accordance with their spectrum of consumption.

The economic isolation of nations is a thing of the past. Due to this circumstance, the essence of the phenomenon of the common economic life of the nation, its economic coherence has changed. This does not mean that:

· nations, in the sense as this term was defined by I.V. Stalin, ceased to exist and bourgeois liberalism is right, according to the ideas of which “national identity” is a private matter of every individual, which does not have any significance for the organization of the life of society in the state under provided that all adult individuals are brought up in the spirit of the notorious “tolerance” and “political correctness” and the only problem is how to instill this “tolerance” and “political correctness” in every individual in a “multicultural society”;

· or the Stalinist definition can be given to oblivion, as having not stood the test of time, and in the national policy of the state - rely on the definitions of the nation by O. Bauer, R. Springer, T. Herzl, on the “ethnos” of L.N. Gumilyov, on some then other definitions or, abandoning definitions and disputes essentially solvency each of them, to build national policies on the basis of vague feelings of difference and originality of both people and cultures.

In fact, the global economic changes that took place in the 20th century mean that Stalin’s definition of a nation was initially not entirely accurate, and this is a consequence of the fact that it expresses a Marxist worldview, which is characterized by:

· in life to see only matter in various “forms of its movement”, but not to see the objectivity of information and the algorithms of its transformation in natural and social processes (and, accordingly, not to have a terminological apparatus to adequately describe this component of life);

· distinguish between “mental labor” and “physical labor”, but do not distinguish managerial work And directly productive labor, subject to some control external to it(and, accordingly, do not have an adequate management theory - general enough in the sense of the universality of its application);

· interpret all social phenomena on the basis of a statement about the determining role of the class struggle regarding the implementation in society of the right of ownership of the means of production and the product produced in public labor association(i.e. the class struggle is the locomotive of history, and everything else in the life of society is its expression and consequences; violence is the “midwife of history”, helping to give birth to something new in the life of society, when the previously dominant old one resists its birth) .

In addition, please note: Stalin's definition of a nation refers to a process - to the sustainable existence of a nation in the continuity of generations, but not to the period of formation of the nation as a historically stable community of people, and not to the period of degradation of the nation under the influence of various reasons, which can end with the disappearance of the nation, its division into several related nations or nationalities that have not formed into a nation, or the revival of the nation in some new quality.

The stable existence of a nation in the continuity of generations means that it - as a single whole - is in some way self-governing. Self-government of society (its management) is multidimensional in nature, and only one of its aspects is the economic life of an established nation, which can proceed either in a mode of more or less pronounced economic isolation from other nations (as was the case at the time of writing by I.V. Stalin work “Marxism and the National Question”), or in the absence of economic isolation from other nations (as is the case today in most cases). Wherein:

Self-government of human society in its development implies that satisfying the physiological and everyday needs of people is not the meaning of their existence (this limits the range of interests of only the lumpen), but a means of translating the meaning of life (ideals) common to a group of people into real life.

And this semantic community, if it exists, is expressed in the self-government of the nation as a single social organism, regardless of the intensity of communication between representatives of the nation living at opposite ends of the territory it occupies, and regardless of the exchange of products between remote regions.

· If this the meaning of life that goes beyond the satisfaction of physiological and everyday needs, there is, that is, a nation - even if people living at different ends of the territory it occupies only know about each other’s existence and do not have any economic or other visible ties with each other.

· If this meaning does not exist, then in the presence of all other signs of a nation, there is a collection of individuals speaking the same language, having (still) a common territory, the same customs and other elements of culture, but there is no nation. In this case, there is a pseudo-national lumpen who is doomed either to find this kind of meaning in life, or disappear into historical oblivion, becoming “ethnographic raw material” for the formation of other nations or becoming extinct in the process of degradation. During periods of social crises, the proportion of lumpen people in the population increases, and this poses a great danger to society and its prospects.

The presence of this kind of meaning of life (ideals), in the presence of other signs of a nation, preserves the nation even in modern conditions, when not only the economic isolation of nations from each other is a thing of the past, but the general cultural isolation of a nation from each other is gradually becoming a thing of the past in the process of forming a single culture humanity: “The measure of a people is not what it is, but what<он> considers it beautiful and true, about which<он>sighs"(F.M. Dostoevsky).

Those. the community of economic life of a nation, its economic coherence is only one of the faces commonality for an established nation its sphere of government, in which a certain meaning is realized in the lives of the many people who make up the nation, and is objectively common to all of them, even if they cannot express it; it is enough that they feel its presence in life, and one way or another, make their contribution to its implementation (i.e., so that, informationally and algorithmically, they are actively involved in its implementation).

The sphere of management differs from other spheres of society in that professional management work is localized in it in relation to all other spheres of activity of society (although the boundaries of the spheres of activity are to one degree or another determined subjectively, they still exist because they are based on the objectivity of social employment statistics population by one or another type of activity). That is:

One of the signs of a nation is not the commonality of economic life (as I.V. Stalin realized), but the commonality for a historically formed nation of the meaning of life, which goes beyond the satisfaction of the physiological and everyday needs of the people who make up the nation, which is expressed in the unity of the sphere of government for the nation carried out on a professional basis, and in particular - generates the economic connectivity of the nation.

This professional management work can cover both some particulars in the life of a national society, and the management of affairs of public importance in general locally and throughout society. Given the presence of the remaining characteristics of a nation given in the Stalinist definition, and the understanding that the commonality of economic life is only one of the expressions of the commonality for the nation of the sphere of governance, isolation and development in management area, which includes the management on a professional basis of affairs of general public importance locally and throughout the entire national society, leads to the emergence of statehood.

Statehood this is a management subculture on a professional basis affairs of general public importance locally and throughout society.

Those. statehood is only one component of the sphere of management, but not the sphere of management as a whole, since the sphere of management also includes management of product exchange (i.e. trade), management of collective production and other activities outside the state apparatus and its bodies.

State this is statehood in the indicated sense, plus the territory and water area over which the jurisdiction of this statehood extends, plus the population living in the territory subject to the statehood.

The formation of statehood on a homogeneous national basis leads to a widespread identification of the nation and its national state, which is characteristic of Western sociology, formed on the historical experience of Europe.

The influence of this sociology on political life in the Russian Federation is expressed in the stupid transfer of its terminology to Russian reality by “scientists” and politicians, which was also manifested at the State Council on December 27, 2010, from which we began this work by citing materials. As a result of such stupid imitation of “advanced countries” in the MULTI-national Russian Federation, “politicians” call Russia a “nation”, want someone to express a “national idea”, and when someone expresses a certain “national idea”, then his accused of nationalism, xenophobia, separatism; “politicians” want to get their hands on a “national security strategy”, “national development strategy”, but do not think about the need for Russia strategies for the safe development of a multinational society; Russians are becoming in their opinion a “multinational Russian nation”, and the official science of the Russian Federation “teaches” this and other nonsense, neglecting the norms of expressing meaning through the Russian language and thereby dumbing down both itself and those who rely on the opinions of such “scientists”.

But despite this nonsense, statehood can also develop on a multinational basis, serving the lives of many nations that either have not developed their national statehood, or those whose national statehood has to one degree or another limited sovereignty, since a number of problems in the life of such a national society are solved common to several nations statehood, multinational in the composition of the people working in it, whose power extends to regions of formation and dominance of several national cultures.

The statehood of Russia is a multinational statehood, common to all peoples living in it. And in this capacity it has been developing for several centuries: at least, starting from the capture of Kazan by Ivan the Terrible and the entry of Tatarstan into Russia. It is clear that identifying such a multinational state with a nation-state, which is the type of state that predominates in Europe, is stupidity or malicious intent. Moreover, it is stupidity or malicious intent to try to manage public life in such a state on the basis of social patterns identified in the life of nation-states.

And in relation to such statehood, on the territory subject to it there are no “national minorities” oppressed by the statehood of a certain “titular nation” or the statehood of a corporation of “titular nations”, since access to work in it is determined not by origin from representatives of this or that people, but by business qualities and the political intentions of the contenders.

According to this understanding of statehood and the state, a historically established stable nation may have a common sphere of governance, which includes those of its representatives who manage collective activities in the sphere of production, trade, etc., but not have its own statehood.

The original language and cultural in general a community that has developed in any territory, in the presence in the regions of this territory of several separate spheres of management carried out on a professional basis, is:

· or the process of formation of a nation from several nationalities, each of which has its own somewhat specific sphere of government(in the case of erasing the boundaries separating regions in the sphere of public self-government on the basis of the meaning of life that unites people, going beyond the satisfaction of their physiological and everyday needs, and a linguistic community that ensures mutual understanding without translators);

· or a process of national disunity leading to:

Ø to the formation of several related nations;

Ø either to the assimilation of failed nations or separated nationalities by other established nations;

Ø or to ethnic cleansing on territory developed for their own needs by some established nations.

In all other respects, Stalin’s definition of the social phenomenon “nation” satisfies the needs of understanding national relationships given that, that there is an adequate vision of those phenomena that stand behind the words “culture” and “national character” (or “mental makeup”) included in it. Taking into account the above, we can give the following definition of the social phenomenon “nation”:

Nation is a historically established stable community of people that arose on the basis of a commonality: 1) language, 2) territory, 3) the meaning of life, expressed in the unity and integrity of the sphere of public self-government, carried out on a professional basis, 4) mental makeup (national character), manifested 5 ) in a culture that unites people and reproduces on its basis in the continuity of generations. Only the presence of all the signs taken together gives us a nation.

A people is more than a nation.

People this is a nation living in an area of dominance of its national culture (or culturally similar nationalities that have not formed into a nation), plus national diasporas, i.e. carriers of the corresponding national culture living in areas of dominance of other national cultures. At the same time, diasporas may lose their linguistic community with the population of the area of dominance of their national culture, while maintaining cultural identity with it in other aspects.

But history knows communities broader than national ones. If the same meaning of life is the ideal of different peoples with linguistic and cultural uniqueness, and they somehow work to ensure that these ideals are brought to life, then there arises a community of peoples of a supranational order. This is a civilizational community. It informally unites many peoples, even if their ideals have not yet become a reality in life. Let's repeat it again: “The measure of a people is not what it is, but what it considers beautiful and true.”(F.M. Dostoevsky), i.e. the essence of a people is its ideals.

With this view, the observable history of mankind is the history of regional civilizations, each of which is characterized by certain life ideals that distinguish it from other regional civilizations. The West (Europe beyond the borders of Russia, Belarus, Ukraine; North America, Australia) is a set of nation-states belonging to one of the regional civilizations of the planet. Russia-Rus is another regional civilization of many peoples, living in a state common to them all. According to the 2002 census, about 85% of Russians called themselves Russian, and the Russian language in this regional civilization is one of its system-forming factors.

The latter has been reflected in the language itself since ancient times. The word “Russian” in ancient texts is in most cases a definition of the land (Russian land), and not of the people living on this land. It began to be used as an ethnonym only in the last few centuries. And grammatically it is an adjective, which distinguishes it from other ethnonyms, which are all, without exception, nouns in the Russian language. Those. the word “Russian” characterizes not a national community, but a civilizational one. And therefore it is organically applicable to the Slavs, and to the Tatars, and to the Georgians, and to the Kalmyks, and to representatives of other peoples of our regional civilization, as well as to many representatives of other regional civilizations who came to Rus'. We distinguish our nationalities while we remain within Russia, but as soon as we go abroad, then for foreigners we are all Russian; even Ukrainians and Belarusians living in separate states after the collapse of the USSR have not ceased to be part of the Russian civilizational multinational community and are perceived outside the territory of the USSR as Russians.

Accordingly, in terms of development indicators of supranational public institutions, civilization-West lags behind civilization-Russia by 400 years, since the creation of the European Union, which marked the beginning of the formation of a common supranational statehood with a unified credit and financial system and legislation, with a common system of educational and other standards, etc. , this is a repetition of what began in Russia back in the time of Ivan the Terrible.

And due to this objective-historical civilizational difference, philosophy (and above all, political philosophy), born on the ideals and life experience of Western nation-states, is inevitably doomed to mistakes when they try to apply the recipes it generates to identifying and resolving problems in Rus'. An example of this is the attempt to build socialism on the ideological basis of “mraxism.” An example of this is the liberal reforms in post-Soviet Russia.

And from the difference in the meaning of life between the regional civilizations of the West and Russia, stem the well-known words of F.I. Tyutchev - a poet-philosopher, diplomat - who received an education of a pan-European nature (i.e. Western), and expressed the Russian spirit with feelings and unconscious levels of the psyche, which is characterized by ideas that are not always expressible in the terminology of Western science: “You can’t understand Russia with your mind, / You can’t measure it with a common arshin, / It’s special to become-/ You can only believe in Russia.” For the same reason, the overwhelming majority of assessments of Russia and its prospects by the West (as well as the East) are nonsense, since they proceed from other civilizational ideals, elevated to the rank of an uncontested absolute.

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