Conservatism in Russia was based on theories that proved the inviolability of autocracy and serfdom. The idea of ​​the need for autocracy as a unique form of political power inherent in Russia since ancient times has its roots in the period of strengthening of the Russian state. It developed and improved during the 18th–19th centuries, adapting to new socio-political conditions. This idea acquired a special resonance for Russia after absolutism was ended in Western Europe. At the beginning of the 19th century N.M. Karamzin wrote about the need to preserve the wise autocracy, which, in his opinion, “founded and resurrected Russia.” The speech of the Decembrists intensified conservative social thought.

For the ideological justification of autocracy, Minister of Public Education Count S.S. Uvarov created a theory official nationality. It was based on three principles: autocracy, Orthodoxy, nationality. This theory reflected enlightenment ideas about unity, the voluntary union of the sovereign and the people, and the absence of social antagonisms in Russian society. The uniqueness of Russia lay in the recognition of autocracy as the only possible form of government in it. This idea became the basis for conservatives until the collapse of the autocracy in 1917. Serfdom was seen as a benefit for the people and the state. Conservatives believed that landowners provide fatherly care for the peasants, and also help the government maintain order and tranquility in the village. According to conservatives, it was necessary to preserve and strengthen the class system, in which the nobility played a leading role as the main support of the autocracy. Orthodoxy was understood as the deep religiosity and commitment to orthodox Christianity inherent in Russians. From these postulates, the conclusion was drawn about the impossibility and unnecessaryness of fundamental social changes in Russia, about the need to strengthen the autocracy and serfdom.

28. Liberal direction of socio-political development in the 19th century

The theory of official nationality caused sharp criticism from the liberal-minded part of society. The most famous was the speech of P. Ya. Chaadaev, who wrote “Philosophical Letters” criticizing autocracy, serfdom and the entire official ideology.

At the turn of the 30s and 40s. In the 19th century, two currents emerged among liberals in opposition to the government: Slavophilism and Westernism. The ideologists of the Slavophiles were writers, philosophers and publicists: K.S. and I.S. Aksakovs, I.V. and P.V. Kireev, A.S. Khomyakov, Yu.F. Samarin and others. The ideologists of Westerners are historians, lawyers, writers and publicists: T.N. Granovsky, K.D. Kavelin, S.M. Soloviev, V.P. Botkin, P.V. Annenkov, I.I. Pa-naev, V.F. Korsh and others. Representatives of these movements were united by the desire to see Russia prosperous and powerful among all European powers. To do this, they considered it necessary to change its socio-political system, establish a constitutional monarchy, soften and even abolish serfdom, provide peasants with small plots of land, introduce freedom of speech and conscience. Fearing revolutionary upheavals, they believed that the government itself should carry out the necessary reforms. At the same time, there were significant differences in the views of Slavophiles and Westerners.

Slavophiles exaggerated the peculiarity of the historical path of development of Russia and its national identity. The capitalist system that had established itself in Western Europe seemed to them vicious, bringing impoverishment of the people and a decline in morals. Idealizing the history of pre-Petrine Rus', they insisted on returning to those orders when Zemsky Sobors conveyed the opinion of the people to the authorities, when patriarchal relations supposedly existed between landowners and peasants. At the same time, the Slavophiles recognized the need to develop industry, crafts and trade. One of the fundamental ideas of the Slavophiles was that the only true and deeply moral religion is Orthodoxy. In their opinion, the Russian people have a special spirit of collectivism, in contrast to Western Europe, where individualism reigns. The struggle of the Slavophiles against sycophancy before the West, their study of the history of the people and people's life had a great positive significance for the development of Russian culture.

Westerners proceeded from the fact that Russia should develop in line with European civilization. They sharply criticized the Slavophiles for contrasting Russia and the West, explaining its difference by historical backwardness. Denying the special role of the peasant community, Westerners believed that the government imposed it on the people for the convenience of administration and tax collection. They advocated broad education of the people, believing that this was the only sure way to successfully modernize the socio-political system of Russia. Their criticism of serfdom and calls for changes in domestic policy also contributed to the development of socio-political thought.

Slavophiles and Westerners laid the foundation in the 30s–50s. XIX century the basis of the liberal-reformist trend in the social movement.

It is possible to talk about the presence of a certain holistic conservative economic doctrine in the period under review only with a certain degree of convention; it appears only in the second half of the 19th century. In addition, early Russian conservatives did not consider the problems of economic development to be the main ones - in comparison with socio-political problems, they were clearly not a priority in their views, which, generally speaking, is a characteristic feature of most directions of Russian conservative thought. The views of the early conservatives were determined not by the original abstract principles drawn from the works of E. Burke or J. de Maistre, but by the need to respond to the specific political and economic situation of the first half of the 19th century. During the reigns of Alexander I and Nicholas I, both the authorities and social thought, including conservative ones, proceeded from the generally accepted idea at that time of Russia as an exclusively agricultural country1351. Accordingly, in the economic views of Russian conservatives, the solution to the agrarian question and the attitude towards serfdom occupied a central place, which was explained by the extreme severity of these problems1352. A significant feature of the economic development of Russia in the first half of the 19th century, in addition to the agrarian nature of the economy, was the extreme narrowness of the consumer market caused by the predominance of the peasant and landowners. subsistence farming providing themselves with almost everything they need. The economy was also characterized by chronic scarcity of financial resources and material resources, despite the fact that the empire was constantly leading heavy wars , requiring enormous costs. Naturally, under these conditions, such phenomena as the periodic occurrence of “gaps” in the budget, unstable tax collection, the strict need for foreign borrowing, the issuance of rapidly depreciating paper money and the transition to silver circulation were inevitable1353. All these “challenges of the time” required unambiguous, clear answers from the country’s social forces. Conservatives have also attempted this kind of response. As already mentioned, slavery, according to de Maistre, naturally follows from the depravity of human nature itself. The man is too angry to be free. If man must be liberated, it must be done by Christianity. It was Christianity that began “to work ceaselessly to abolish slavery, while no other religion, no legislator, no philosopher dared not only to undertake something, but even to dream about it”1354. In other words, any social reform must be preceded by a transformation of consciousness. Before de Maistre, the idea that the psychological liberation of the slave should precede political and social liberation was defended by J.-J. Russo1355. The peculiarity of de Maistre’s views on the problem of liberation from serfdom of Russian peasants was that this militant Catholic rated Russian Orthodoxy extremely low: “The Russians do not have a strong and reliable religion that could sufficiently serve as a moral bridle for the evil nature of man.” 1356. But if religion is not rooted in the masses, then the role of slavery as a factor of stability sharply increases: “Slavery exists in Russia because it is necessary, and because the emperor cannot rule without slavery”1357. Therefore, in Russia, the liberation of the peasants cannot, from his point of view, not be accompanied by a particularly strong risk: “as soon as thirty-six million people are given freedom, a general fire will immediately break out and devour Russia”1358. If we are to begin the liberation of Russia from slavery, then we must begin not with the peasants, but with the nobles: “The glory and safety of the empire lies to a much lesser extent in the liberation of that part of the nation that is still in slavery than in the improvement of its free part and the first turn of the nobility”1359. De Maistre believed that the liberation of the peasants under no circumstances should take place immediately, at once, “let it be indefinitely long, until there is not a single serf left”1360. “Everything must be accomplished without noise and disaster, for everything great is accomplished this way. Then let the sovereign promote this natural movement (this is his right and duty), but God forbid us from him himself bringing this movement to life.”1361 It seems that some of de Maistre’s recommendations were of fundamental importance for understanding the views of Russian conservatives on the problem of serfdom. The length and slowness of the process of liberation is what united all conservatives who allowed the abolition of serfdom among the peasants. Among the Russian conservatives, G. R. Derzhavin was one of the first to formulate his position on the peasant issue. He negatively assessed such a liberal measure of Alexander I as the publication of the law on free cultivators in 1803, since he believed that from the liberation of the peasants “in the current state of public education, no state benefit will come, but on the contrary, the harm of the mob will turn freedom into willfulness and cause a lot of troubles"1362. Derzhavin argued that “although according to ancient laws there is no right of owners to slavery of peasants, but political types , having strengthened the peasants on the land, thereby introducing slavery into custom. This custom, approved by time, has become so sacred that great caution is required to touch it without harmful consequences.”1363 Derzhavin also believed that the decree did not introduce anything new into the legislation, since it was not prohibited to release peasants before: “According to the manifesto of 1775, all owners are allowed to release their people and peasants, and according to the decree of the reigning sovereign in 1801, it is possible to supply the released people with lands, therefore, there is no need for a new law. Rumyantsev (the initiator of the adoption of the decree “On free cultivators.” - A.M.) can release at least all his people and peasants according to those decrees (however, he did not do this either then or later), but by a special decree, issue imaginary liberty and freedom is dangerous for simple, still rather unenlightened people, and only such an institution will make a lot of noise, and will be of no benefit to either the peasants or the nobles”1364. In addition, Derzhavin believed that the landowners would demand too much as a ransom, and therefore the peasants would not be able to pay the entire amount at once (“the slave will promise everything that is demanded of him for his freedom, and the landowner, deprived of the peasants and with them his income, or, better to say, his existence, will want to have such capital for this freedom, not only but also to improve his well-being” 1365), and as a result, litigation will be fought over defaults in payments. In this case, the peasants will find themselves in a deliberately losing position, since “justice in the Russian Empire is mostly in the hands of the nobility,” and therefore, “a nobleman, judging the case of his fellow man, will condemn himself; Nothing will come of that other one, like prepared lawlessness; The peasants will be accused and, according to this decree, converted to their former state of serfdom and grave slavery, because the landowner will take revenge for the troubles and losses caused to him." 1366. Among other things, the peasants, having received freedom, will cease to bear duties, and the interests of state: “the peasants, having sold the land they took from the landowners, can move to other lands in the most remote countries of the empire, where it is soon impossible to find them, or, out of their own willfulness and laziness, scatter wherever their eyes look, so as not to recruit and not pay any duties , in which they have their only freedom”1367. The state cannot find a better police force than the landowners, since they are the best police chiefs in their villages: “The lower zemstvo courts or rural police throughout the empire of residential and empty places cannot keep them from disorder without the landowners, who are the best guardians or police chiefs for the deanery and organization of the villagers in their villages" 1368. Landowners are interested, from Derzhavin’s point of view, in the prosperity of their peasants, therefore it is they who should take care of the development of peasant farms: “The improvement of peasant character and condition should also be the responsibility of the owners. They know their subjects' qualities, inclinations, behavior, disorderly economy, property, shortcomings and all sorts of needs. They can correct the evil in them, support the good with prudent instruction, diligent supervision, active assistance in need and due punishment”1369. Derzhavin's position displeased the emperor, who invited him to an audience, during which Derzhavin expressed to him all the above arguments. For criticizing the decree, he received a reprimand from the emperor. Meanwhile, Derzhavin did not so much defend serfdom as an inviolable principle, but considered the issue of emancipating the peasants untimely. In one of the versions of his will, written by him already in retirement, Derzhavin expressed the desire that all his serfs and peasants, on the basis of the decree of 1803, be converted into free cultivators. However, this clause was not included in the final version of the will; he only bequeathed the release of several servants after his death1370. F.V. Rostopchin also critically perceived the decree on free cultivators. In March 1803, he wrote to P. D. Tsitsianov: “Where did they get the idea that a peasant who was able to pay money for himself and buy a plot of land would belong to arable farming? Doesn’t anyone know that all rich men are only trying to get out of their primitive state in order to become merchants? And what village can pay the due price for itself? And who will sell the plots from the dacha separately?”1371. N. M. Karamzin in his journal journalism of the early 19th century. developed a patriarchal utopia, according to which the landowner was the patron father of the peasants, caring for their morality and well-being. This kind of relationship is the key to the prosperity and prosperity of the peasants, but if the peasants gain freedom, then their ruin occurs1372. Karamzin most fully expressed his views on the peasant question in the article “Letter from a Villager.” It described the following situation. After service and travel, the young man became the master of the estate and decided to be the benefactor of his peasants: “he gave them all the land, was content with the most moderate rent, did not want to have in the village either a manager or a clerk, who are often worse than the worst gentlemen, and with sincere pleasure love for humanity wrote to the peasants: “Good farmers! Choose your own leader for order, live peacefully, be hardworking and consider me your faithful intercessor in any oppression.” As a result, upon arrival, the utopian discovered “poverty, very poorly cultivated fields, empty granaries, rotting huts!”1373. The secret of the former prosperity turned out to be that the narrator’s late father “looked after not only his own, but also the peasants’ fields: he wanted both of them to be well cultivated - and in our village the bread was born better than in many others; The master grew rich, and the farmers did not become poor. The will that I gave to them turned into the greatest evil: that is, into the will to be lazy and indulge in the vile vice of drunkenness.” The peasants rented out the land they received for free and took 5 rubles per tithe, although the same land could bring up to 30 - 40 rubles if they cultivated it themselves1374. Karamzin concludes that the peasants are “lazy by nature, by skill, and by ignorance of the benefits of hard work.” Moreover, liberty is not a panacea for poverty. “We have many free peasants, but do they cultivate the land better than the masters? For the most part, it's the opposite. For some time now, arable farming in all provinces has been in a better state: why? From the efforts of the landowners: the fruits of their economy, their care, endow the markets of the capitals with abundance”1375. Karamzin’s main recipe for peasant prosperity is comprehensive care, strict paternalism and detailed, if not petty, regulation on the part of the landowner: “I renewed the master’s arable land, became the most diligent economist, began to go into all the details, provided the poor with everything necessary for the economy, declared war on the lazy , but the war is not bloody; together with them, in the fields, he met and saw off the sun; I wanted them to work just as diligently for themselves, to plow and sow on time; demanded strict accountability from them even on non-working days; rebuilt the village in the most convenient way; introduced, as much as possible, neatness and cleanliness in their huts, not so much pleasing to the eye as necessary for the preservation of life and health”1376. Karamzin concluded: “For the true well-being of our farmers, I only wish that they have good masters and a means of enlightenment, which alone, alone will make all good things possible”1377. What did Karamzin mean by enlightenment? Elementary literacy and religious education: “This winter, on my own initiative, I started a school for peasant children, with the intention of teaching them not only literacy, but also the rules of rural morality, and in my spare time I composed a catechism, the simplest and most unpretentious, in which they explain the villager's positions necessary for his happiness. The clever priest of our village was my critic, adviser and assistant in this matter.”1378 Karamzin attached exceptional importance to the spread of faith for peasants: “My peasants respect and love the priest as a father, and under him they became much more devout. For my part, I help this happy disposition of theirs by my diligent example and appear in church every Sunday. A person with an educated mind has a thousand motives to be kind.”1379. In the article “On the new formation of public education in Russia” (1803), Karamzin repeats the idea of ​​the need not only to teach peasants to read and write, but also to teach the “primary foundation of morality” set out in the “moral catechism” for parish schools. “What is most responsible for success is that our wise government combines the rank of spiritual shepherds, respected by the people, with the position of rural teachers”1380. For Karamzin, the prosperous peasant was the positive hero of peasant life, i.e. a hardworking peasant who carefully cultivates the land. In Karamzin’s discourse, hard work, according to the observation of R. B. Kazakov, “helps the peasant, that is, the “slave” in terms of his social status, to stand on a par with representatives of other classes, enjoying the same trust and bearing the same responsibility for what he has done”1381. Karamzin considered drunkenness to be the most serious evil preventing peasants from achieving prosperity: “Could they all have gotten rich if the disastrous passion for wine had not ruined many, a passion that in Russia, especially around Moscow, does at least as much evil , as in North America between savage peoples"1382. The richest of the Moscow region peasants are the Old Believers: “they don’t drink!”1383. Karamzin saw a way out of poverty and ignorance for the serfs in enlightenment, together with other classes. Back in 1793, he dreamed of a certain idyll that was hardly feasible even at a much later time: “Enlightened farmer! To be enlightened is to be sensible, not a scientist, not a polyglot, not a pedant. I will set as an example many Swiss, English and German villagers who plow the land and collect libraries; they plow the land and read Homer and live so purely, so well that the muses and graces are not ashamed to visit them.”1384 R. B. Kazakov recreates the scheme of Karamzin’s reasoning as follows: “a prosperous (that is, a hard-working and sober peasant) prospers under the good care of his master, but liberation from this dependence will only lead to a decline in morals and - ultimately - to a decline in the well-being of the peasants and nobles, and therefore the state itself”1385. At the beginning of the 19th century. Among the landowners of Central Russia, a fashion arose for “English farmers”, for agricultural equipment and technologies that were modern at that time. However, the fashion for the experiment quickly passed, and soon the landowners “returned to the old but proven path - to intensifying the exploitation of the peasants”1386. Understanding the results of this “experiment” gave a serious impetus to Russian conservative thought. In the course of “self-criticism”, F.V. Rostopchin (in 1803-1806 he was also carried away by the experience of English agriculture) published a rather voluminous brochure “The Plow and the Plow”, which outlined ideas about the methods of farming in Russia and the possibility of using them in Russian conditions of Western European agricultural culture. Rostopchin severely condemned some landowners for their desire to introduce fashionable innovations on their estates: what “has been done in other lands for centuries and out of need, we want to introduce in our country in a year, in the midst of abundance, out of a penchant for news, and in imitation of foreign ones, due to the many changes in clothes, in structure, in upbringing, even in the way of thinking”1387. The “Russian English” believed that the experiment was supposed to lead to commodity abundance and enrichment for both themselves and the peasants, through “fertilization of fields, maintenance of large livestock breeding, excellent seeds, vast fields turned into vegetable gardens”1388. However, the reality turned out to be different. The landowners who became involved in the experiment encountered a number of unforeseen difficulties. These were, first of all, the prohibitively high costs of establishing a new type of economy1389. According to Rostopchin’s calculations, the profitability of even model farms was extremely low: “they barely get two percent per hundred for this fashionable change from Plow to Plow”1390. English grain quickly lost its properties in Russian climatic conditions: “The superiority of foreign seeds is a temptation from intense heat, short summer and early ripening; after two sowings they become grain no larger than ours”1391. Rostopchin believed that “the largest farm is nothing more than a large vegetable garden”1392. The size of land plots in Russia is extremely large in comparison with the areas of English farms, which also gives rise to certain difficulties with their cultivation: “In England, the division of land, called a farm, is very large, when it is 50 acres, and many are even 10. How is everything possible? Is there enough time to process, sow, harvest and transport? Lovers of English agriculture always forget one thing, that for us and Sokha it operates from the end of April to the end of August”1393. The “personnel issue” was also of no small importance, which in practice turned out to be another insurmountable obstacle to the successful development of the experiment: “With English agriculture, you must certainly have an Englishman to supervise. No matter how difficult it is to find capable people who know their business, who are not flighty, active and not greedy for money; but considering this to be possible, any institution of this kind will not come into operation unless the Master himself begins to live in that place for at least seven months a year, in order to protect foreigners from ridicule, from intrigues, from tricks, and sometimes from beatings. But with all this, no benefit can be expected for the first two years, because the caretakers, not knowing the language, are not able to interpret or give orders decently; and when they begin to speak Russian well, the workers will get used to the new arable land, the fields will begin to come into order: then, having started the Anglinsky arable land, he will completely become from the Master the steward of his farmer’s Anglinsky and will certainly have to decide either to please him, or later to see the destruction of an entire establishment with the loss of time and a significant amount of money”1394. In a word, the invitation of foreign specialists gave rise, from Rostopchin’s point of view, to a lot of insoluble problems. F. V. Rostopchin very clearly formulated a number of characteristics that distinguished the Russian serf and state peasant from the Western European farmer: “A farmer in England is nothing more than the owner of a certain part of the land, which he hires, cultivates, and thereby supports himself and the whole family. Consequently, a farmer is not a peasant, but a temporary owner of a plot of land. The Russian peasant has his own state-owned land, and the landowner has a certain one, with which they pay duties and get their own maintenance, cultivating everything with their family”1395. The position of the serf peasant, from Rostopchin’s point of view, a whole series lasting virtues. Thus, he argued that “Russia does not yet know what real hunger is; and by this name sometimes refers to crop failure in some provinces, where in a lean year the villagers need food for seven months, but do not die of hunger; for the Government and landowners are always quick to help the suffering”1396, and assured that the serf peasant is almost perfectly protected from all sorts of adversities thanks to the constant care of the landowners and communal mutual assistance. If poverty existed in Russia, it was solely due to the depravity of human nature: “in England there are many people without food, but in every peasant house we have cattle, poultry, vegetables and bread, in which from the eldest in the family to the small child everyone has equal participation. If a man becomes impoverished in a government-owned village, then they help him in peace. The landowner is so confident in the help of the lord that many are lazy because of this to work for themselves, and more often, having drunk their bread, they go to the master’s courtyard to ask for it. In this case, and in all those where the peasant has a need for help, he always finds it, and the landowners seem to become fathers for them, most of them by humanity, some by wealth; but it also follows from this that our people do not die of hunger.”1397 F.V. Rostopchin even considered it necessary to give arguments in defense of black huts and black bread as the original attributes of Russian peasant life: “Foreign paper smearers have been screaming in horror for 200 years with one voice that our people live in black huts and eat black bread; and no one has yet noticed how much it is necessary to heat a hut in winter, that smoke cleanses the air, destroying fumes; that our soldiers were on campaigns where they had white wheat bread, sometimes they came to ask the bosses for black rye”1398. Rostopchin's main argument against the introduction of Western European innovations was that they were, in fact, rejected by the entire system of serfdom. Thus, the current structure is extremely low prices for agricultural products and its widespread surplus in a peasant country in themselves excluded the widespread introduction of farming, made it an unnecessary and expensive landowner's pastime: “The annual grain harvest of Russia - A.M. is sufficient not only for its own food, but also for the maintenance of other lands in almost half of Russia, rye, oats, barley and hay are not at all worthwhile. Rye is sown for their own food, oats for their horses, hay is cut as much as is needed for livestock, barley for birds, pigs and for beer that is bad for the holiday.”1399. Under these conditions, even if it made sense to start farming, then exclusively near the capitals, for the convenience of supplying them with vegetables, and even then with significant reservations: “two or three similar English establishments will lower the price of vegetables to such an extent that there will be no profit for the owner”1400. At a distance further from the capitals, such farms will not only be unprofitable, but also ruinous for landowners and extremely burdensome for serfs, sharply increasing the level of their exploitation: “What to do with woodpeckers (clover - A.M.), where there is plenty hay with vegetables that no one will buy, and with a large harvest, which there is no time to harvest and nowhere to sell? Why look for excess when there is great abundance? What is the need to sow bread for the birds, for the mice, and for it to rot in the field? Which one increases in costs when there are no prices for bread and meat? Is it possible, without showing the peasant obvious benefits, to suddenly decide to change his way of life and work? When his land yields 10 times in many places without fertilizer, and he earns his annual allowance in 24 days: why turn the already difficult peasant work into Egyptian work? What is the need to transform the Russian plowman into English ones and make a new addition to Ovid’s transformations?”1401. F.V. Rostopchin, being quite an effective owner for his time, noted that the introduction of only some Western European agricultural implements, for example a thresher and a plow, could be definitely positive in Russian conditions1402. In general, according to Rostopchin, Western European innovations were more harmful than useful, and were a frivolous fashion of Russian landowners, which he placed “among the amusements characteristic of wealth and luxury, because it is no more useful than horn music.” , the Anglinsky Garden, racehorses, colonnades with pediments, hound hunting and the fortress theater"1403. It must be assumed that such assessments were, to one degree or another, convincing for the consciousness of a significant part of conservative-minded landowners right up to 1861. The factors that determined them: the relative cheapness of agricultural products in a peasant country, the prevalence of subsistence farming, the narrowness of the domestic market - remained very much the same. for a long time. In fact, Rostopchin was one of the first to talk about Russian identity from the point of view of economic development, insisting that Russian agriculture should develop taking into account geoclimatic and historical features Russia. In 1811, conservatives received a significant reason to clarify and publicly express their ideas on the peasant issue. This year, the work of the Polish count V. Stroynovsky “On the conditions of landowners and peasants” was published, which was published in Russian. In it, he proposed to carry out personal landless emancipation of peasants on the basis of voluntary agreements by mutual consent of both parties, while respecting the interests of the state, landowners and peasants1404. This was the first public address to the problem of serfdom. The book caused a sharp reaction, especially since the year of its publication was pre-war, Stroinowski was a Pole, and the Poles were allies of Napoleon. The response to Stroinovsky’s book in the conservative camp was Rostopchin’s “Remarks” on this work. Having largely repeated, and in some ways expanded, his thoughts on the “prosperity” of Russian serfs under the “fatherly” rule of the landowners, expressed in “The Plow and the Plow,” Rostopchin introduced into his new work a philosophical argument aimed at defending serfdom, built on the “principle of unfreedom.” The main target of Rostopchin’s criticism was “liberty” or “freedom,” which he defined as “a flattering, but not natural state for a person, for our life is an incessant dependence on everything”1405. Liberty leads to self-will, disobedience and rebellion against authority. Freedom “is a word that captivates our feelings with the promise of independence, and is as dangerous for a person and for society as beautiful fruits that contain cruel poison”1406. F.V. Rostopchin argued that serfdom in Russia developed historically, that the Russian tsars were forced to eliminate peasant freedom, i.e. the right to pass from one owner to another, since “freedom turned into willfulness, caused the destruction of the property of the landowners and the ruin of the peasants themselves, and its harm was a truth proven by experiments”1407. The serf peasant, according to Rostopchin, “has everything, uses property, leaves it to his children and disposes of the estate according to his own will.” To the question about the possibility of landowner arbitrariness in relation to the personality and property of the peasant, Rostopchin answered as follows: “These transformations are prevented by philanthropy, reason and law; for to ruin the peasant is the surest way to ruin oneself.” In addition, Rostopchin pointed to Catherine’s legislation, according to which governors received the right to “take away power from inhuman landowners, transferring their estate to the board of the Noble Guardianship”1408. The number of cruel landowners in Russia is therefore extremely small. The thesis about the effectiveness of free labor, which constitutes main idea Stroinovsky’s work was “refuted” by Rostopchin in a very unique way. He argued that “agriculture cannot flourish in Russia due to the freedom of the peasants, because the Russian peasant does not like arable farming and neglects his condition, not seeing any benefit in it.” Even free state peasants, according to Rostopchin, “barely have bread to eat due to laziness and bad order in cultivating the fields, depleting them recklessly.” Therefore, free labor in Russia is ineffective. As a result, Rostopchin actually came to an apology for serf forced labor: “The peasant must be forced to cultivate the land and prepare clean and good bread”1409. According to Rostopchin, the landless emancipation of peasants will have numerous negative consequences. Peasants will want to engage in crafts and will begin to leave their farms and families. Widowed and poor peasants will remain unmarried, deprived of the care of the landowners. All establishments, factories and factories will stop due to lack of labor and not being able to pay the wages requested by workers. The wineries, which are almost all owned by landowners, will go bankrupt, which will deprive the treasury of significant income. Poll tax collections will also be disrupted. Household people who do not know how to do anything will be doomed to starvation. Courts consisting of landowners, in the event of conflicts between peasants and landowners, will decide cases in favor of the landowners. At the same time, Rostopchin quite accurately predicted the social consequences of peasant liberation, arguing that the peasants would soon fall into a new slavery: “They will have rich men who will quietly become new landowners and will force the poor to work, lending them money and reprimanding them instead of interest.” , work, which will completely enslave them”1410. A landmark work of Russian conservative thought of this period, in which the peasant question was developed, was the note “On Ancient and New Russia” by N. M. Karamzin. The significance of this work was especially emphasized in his study of the agrarian question in Russia by S. A. Kozlov: “Nicholas I tried to put into practice the main provisions of the system recommended in the note “On Ancient and New Russia” by his home mentor N. M. Karamzin”1411 . The note expressed Karamzin's views on the peasant issue in the most concentrated form. N.M. Karamzin proceeded from the fact that the abolition of serfdom at the time of writing the note was impossible. This position was supported by arguments of a legal, economic and moral nature, which Karamzin almost literally borrowed from Rostopchin. Serfdom, which historically arose in Rus', represented, in his opinion, the “Gordian knot”, for only “free farmers, strengthened by Godunov for their masters, can, in fairness, demand the former freedom,” but to find out which of them came from serfs, and who from the free was impossible. In terms of historical evidence, Karamzin’s similar argumentation, naturally, was more detailed than Rostopchin’s, but the logic, in essence, was the same: the peasants cannot be freed immediately, since due to various historical circumstances they are the property of their owners. In his reasoning, Karamzin proceeded only from the possibility of a landless option for the liberation of peasants: land - “about which there can be no dispute - is the property of the nobility”1412. Like almost all Russian conservatives of that time, Karamzin focused exclusively on calculating the negative consequences of the abolition of serfdom. And in this case, Karamzin’s argumentation repeated Rostopchin’s. Thus, he argued that freedom would bring a significant increase in exploitation to the peasants, since “selfish owners will want to take from them everything possible for their physical strength.” Due to the resulting freedom of movement, tax revenues to the state budget will be reduced: “If the peasant is here today and there tomorrow, will the treasury suffer a loss in collecting per capita money and other taxes?” “Will not many fields remain uncultivated, many granaries empty?” The abolition of the patrimonial power of the landowners will lead to the fact that “the peasants will begin to quarrel among themselves and sue in the city, they will begin to get drunk and commit crimes”1413. N.M. Karamzin, it seems, generally doubts the advisability of giving peasants freedom: the emperor “wants to make farmers happier with freedom; but what if this freedom is harmful to the state? And will the farmers be happier, freed from the power of the master, but sacrificed to their own vices, tax farmers and unscrupulous judges?”1414. The position of personally free state peasants may be even worse than serfs: “There is no doubt that the peasants of a prudent landowner, who is content with a moderate rent or tithe of arable land for tax, are happier than the state-owned, having in him a vigilant guardian and intercessor”1415. Karamzin is also skeptical about the already existing decree on free cultivators: “I don’t condemn Alexander’s law, which gives villages the right to buy off their masters with their consent, but how many are so rich, how many will want to give their last for freedom? The peasants of the philanthropic owners are satisfied with their lot; poor peasants are poor: both hinder the success of this law”1416. In general, the peasantry, according to Karamzin, is not morally ready for liberation: “For the firmness of the existence of the state, it is safer to enslave people than not to give them freedom in time, for which it is necessary to prepare a person through moral correction, and the system of our wine farming and the terrible successes of drunkenness serve to a saving preparation for this”1417. The idea of ​​“moral correction” certainly distinguished Karamzin’s phraseology from Rostopchin’s, and, it seems, it was this idea that was subsequently developed by A. S. Sturdza and S. S. Uvarov in their ideas about solving the peasant question. From Karamzin’s point of view, Russian peasants “prosper” under the rule of “virtuous” landowners: “There is no doubt that the peasants of a prudent landowner, who is content with a moderate rent or tithe of arable land for taxes, are happier than the state-owned, having in him a vigilant guardian and intercessor”1418. Karamzin agreed with the position of Rostopchin, who believed that the problem of suppressing the arbitrariness of landowners had already been largely solved in Russia under Catherine the Great: “Isn’t it better to take measures at hand to curb the cruel masters?”1419. In addition, the nobility, having patrimonial power, performs police functions, and the state has no one to replace it: “Now the nobles, scattered throughout the state, assist the monarch in maintaining silence and improvement: having taken away this guardian power from them, he, like Atlas, will take Russia for ramen. Will it hold? The fall is scary"1420. Karamzin’s entire system of argumentation indicates that he assumed the possibility of prosperity for peasants in a serfdom, subject to certain conditions: hard work, aversion to drunkenness, education, help from landowners1421. Karamzin’s position clearly indicates that he was not against the practice of buying and selling people. “We heard about monster nobles who traded people inhumanly: having bought a village, they chose peasants fit to be soldiers and sold them separately. Let us suppose that such animals existed in our times: it would be necessary to prohibit this trade by a formidable decree and say that the estate of the nobles, so unworthy, would be handed over to guardianship. Governors could oversee implementation. Instead, the sale and purchase of recruits is prohibited. Until then, the best farmers willingly worked for 10-20 years to save 700 or 800 rubles to buy a recruit and thereby preserve the integrity of their family; Now the strongest motivation for beneficial industriousness, industry, and a sober life has been taken away from them. What use is wealth to a parent when it does not save his dear son? How will the small estate owner, who has no recruiting line, now intimidate the dissolute peasants? With a stick? Exhausting work? Isn’t it more useful for them to be afraid of the cane in the company?”1422. Karamzin's position remained unchanged at a later time. In a letter dated October 30, 1818 to P. A. Vyazemsky, an ardent supporter of the liberation of the peasants, Karamzin wrote: “I want to know how you intend to make your peasants free in 10 years, teach me: I am ready to follow a good example if the sheep will be safe and the wolves will be fed"1423. A categorical opponent of the liberation of the peasants was the right-wing freemason I. A. Pozdeev. If the peasants are freed, then they will no longer want to engage in the hardest “sweat work,” which will lead to the destruction of all classes, general corruption and weakening of the state, he believed1424. According to his deep conviction, “the peasants are prosperous when they have the rule, by the sweat of their brow, to prepare their bread for themselves and others, I say: for others, being forced, but without coercion, who would want to voluntarily move stones? For farming is just as difficult, and the easiest thing is to trade, to be clever, to fight, to plunder under the guise of truth and the benefit of the people. And if we were to allow everyone to expect that he can reach all sorts of government ranks and states, then this would infuse into them the desire to be dissatisfied with their state and want to move to another; then such permissibility will begin to torment the minds and desires of people, who should each remain in their own sphere and improve in it, for our whole life is very small; then it is enough to distinguish yourself in your field, to be venerable, respected, loved, and to leave good examples of honest morals and deeds for your descendants”1425. A. S. Shishkova is traditionally considered, and rightly so, to be a staunch supporter of the inviolability of serfdom. In the draft manifesto he compiled dated August 30, 1814, he wrote about the serfs’ expectations of freedom: “Peasants, our faithful people, receive their reward from God”1426. A. S. Shishkov was sincerely convinced that serf relations are a reasonable and optimal form of social relations in which landowners act as father-benefactors for their children - peasants. In the draft manifesto, he stated on behalf of the autocrat: “We are confident that our concern for their (landowner peasants - A.M.) welfare will be prevented by the care of their masters. The connection that has existed between them for a long time, based on mutual benefit, characteristic of Russian morality and virtue, previously and now marked by many experiences of their mutual zeal for each other and common love for the fatherland, does not leave us with no small doubt that, on the one hand, landowners take paternal care for them, like their children, and on the other hand, they, like zealous household members, by fulfilling their filial duties and obligations, will bring themselves to that happy state in which good-natured and prosperous families flourish.”1427 It was this part of the text that forced Alexander I to categorically declare: “I cannot sign what is contrary to my conscience, and with which I disagree quite a bit.” The liberal autocrat was outraged by the phrase that characterized the relationship between serfs and landowners as based “on mutual benefit.” In his later notes, Shishkov wrote that he proceeded in his reasoning from the fact that “every connection between people, some of whom command and others obey, is on this basis moral and beneficial; that faith and laws themselves prescribe this rule, and that landowners who do not observe it are deprived of the power to govern their subordinates”1428. It is characteristic that Shishkov explained the emperor’s negative reaction to this passage by the pernicious French influence: “This unfortunate sovereign’s prejudice against serfdom in Russia, against the nobility and against the entire previous structure and order was instilled in him by the Frenchman Laharpe, who was with him, and other young people around him , pupils of the French, who turned their eyes and hearts away from clothes, from language, from morals and, in a word, from everything Russian”1429. In October 1820, Shishkov sharply opposed the draft law on suppressing the sale of household servants and peasants separately and without land, presented by the commission for drafting laws1430. In his objections to this bill, Shishkov stated that “the right given over people in Russia is neither unlimited nor violent, but protected by laws requiring that the landowner combine his benefit with the benefit of his subordinates, and together with the state good, observing between they, like a father between children, provide well-being, order and structure, otherwise the laws accept complaints against him, take away power from him and punish him himself”1431. In other words, if landowners allow any abuses against peasants, then they need to be punished for these abuses, but not question the very principle of serfdom. The weakening of the landowner's power over the peasants can lead to the most dire consequences: “The people are a river flowing peacefully on its banks; but increase the water in it, it will overflow its limits, and nothing will restrain its ferocity. The prosperity of the people lies in restraint and obedience. Divine Scripture says: “Obey the authorities; the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.”1432 It is the inviolability of serfdom, according to Shishkov, that is the key to the stability and security of the Russian Empire, in contrast to the countries of Western Europe shaken by revolutions and wars: “At a time when we hear and see that almost all the European powers around us are rushing and worrying, our blessed fatherland has always remained and will remain peaceful. The unanimous thunder against the rebellious enemy, the far-reaching victories and the inner silence amid the disorders of Europe, do not they show that it is more prosperous, more prosperous than all other peoples? Isn’t this a sign of good nature and purity of morals that has not yet been infected by anything? What good are changes in laws, changes in customs, changes in ways of thinking? We clearly see the grace of God above us. The Hand of the Most High protects us. What better could we wish for?”1433. Therefore, any public discussion of the possibility of abolishing serfdom can and does lead to harmful consequences: “in many places, peasants refused to obey their landlords, and then military detachments were sent to pacify them. From here it happened that, on the one hand, they were encouraged by rumors and various suggestions to rebel against their masters, and on the other hand, they were curbed by force of arms, punishments and exile to Siberia. Thus, new thought, standing up for humanity, burdened it with disasters and stained it with blood!”1434. The only project for the liberation of peasants created by a representative of the conservative camp was famous project A. A. Arakcheev 1818. According to this project, “measures to abolish the serfdom of people in Russia could only consist in the acquisition and purchase of landowner peasants and courtyard people for the treasury, with the voluntary consent of the landowners”1435. For this, Arakcheev proposed establishing a permanent commission that would make the purchase either “at voluntarily agreed prices with the landowners, if they wished to sell their estates in their entirety, without separating excess lands and various lands in their favor,” or “for special rules established for the acquisition of peasants with only a certain amount of land and land belonging to the estates being sold”1436. The value of estates should be determined by the amount of quitrent received from the peasants, “which was supposed to represent capital yielding 5 percent; so, for example, a quitrent estate giving 1000 rubles. income, should have been valued at 20 thousand rubles, etc.”1437. The commission was to receive 5 million rubles annually. Arakcheev assumed that these funds could be obtained from farm-outs; in addition, “in the event of unforeseen difficulties on the part of the Ministry of Finance, it was planned to issue annually 10,000 State Treasury notes, worth 500 rubles. every. These tickets, from the time they were issued by the Commission to the seller of the estate, were supposed to bring him 5% and meanwhile circulate like cash”1438. In this way, landowners could free themselves from debt and receive capital. General principles The projects were simple, but well thought out and practical, and this was not accidental, since Arakcheev was one of the most effective landowners in Russia1439. In addition, this kind of project shows that, under certain conditions, conservatives could well put forward projects that are difficult to interpret as protecting the self-interested class interests of the nobility. In the conservative discourse of that time, one could often find a kind of apology for agriculture and the associated way of life and, conversely, record peculiar traditionalist phobias regarding industrial development. For example, at one time A.S. Sturdza rejected the development of manufactories for moral reasons and fears for the political stability of the country. In the 30s XIX century he developed a whole theory of the superiority of the rural way of life over the urban one. In his opinion, industry, trade and cities did not have, unlike agriculture, “a constant, salutary influence on the fate, character and moral development of mankind”1440. On the contrary, “agricultural citizenship” dominated over “artificial existence provided by trade alone”1441. States based on agriculture were, from his point of view, more durable and stronger than others, since in agriculture “the identity of peoples is established,” and trade and industry “can occupy in public life not the first, but the second, subordinate and, therefore, conditional only place"1442. To a great extent dependent on climate and weather, the farmer is closer to God, he feels the “right hand of the Most High” above him, learns humility, “the fear of God, obedience, infantile faith and filial trust”1443. The farmer is a natural patriot: “In peoples doomed to arable land, love for the fatherland is ineradicable”1444. Russia, from Sturdza’s point of view, was one of those countries that, being predominantly agricultural, “accepted on the stage of the world the crown of moral primacy, not subject to the rapid withering and decline that befalls the Commercial States”1445. Sturdza believed that industry and trade are necessary where agriculture cannot feed the population, only in this case “the supreme power, considering the circumstances of the time and place, should resort to the establishment of manufactories, to strengthening navigation or to a correct, maturely thought-out system of temporary migrations.” 1446. Views of this kind are similar to the ideas of the physiocrats, but this is only external resemblance . For physiocrats, farming is merely a market-oriented activity. For Sturdza and other conservatives, the very existence of the village way of life had a self-sufficient meaning and organically fit into the system of a conservative way of thinking and lifestyle. The anti-capitalist motives of the superiority of the peasant, agricultural, rural way of life over the commercial and industrial, urban, up to the denial of the latter, generally speaking, quite characteristic of Russian conservatism, were first formulated in such a clear and vivid form by Sturdza. If we summarize the ideas of the early conservatives on the peasant issue, we can very roughly identify several positions. Most conservatives categorically opposed the abolition of serfdom, citing the fact that serfdom was an organically developed part of autocratic statehood and the way of life of the people over a long period of time. It is, in essence, a form of patriarchal family, where landowners play the role of kind and caring parents, and peasants, accordingly, play the role of obedient and grateful children. The landowners are not interested in the ruin of the peasants; on the contrary, the condition for the prosperity of the landowners is the well-being of his peasants. In general, Russian conservatives have succeeded not in their positive programs, but in their explanations of why the peasants cannot be liberated at the present time, as well as in their assessments of the negative consequences of liberation if it does happen. Conservatives had more complex ideas on the peasant question, who, when developing their views, went through the well-known school of liberal thinking (N.M. Karamzin). As a rule, they did not deny that serfdom was a socio-economic and moral evil, which in the future was supposed to gradually disappear from Russian life. However, in the then situation, they proposed to refrain from any serious changes, since the abolition of serfdom was supposed to lead to the impoverishment of both the peasantry and the nobility and, ultimately, to a social revolution. From their point of view, a large-scale program of educating the peasantry was necessary, which would be a necessary condition for preparing the abolition of serfdom. The prospect of liberating an “unenlightened” people, deprived of the basics of legal consciousness and respect for other people’s property, frightened conservatives. It was necessary to prepare him for emancipation through the creation of an appropriate educational system that would make serfs, first of all, law-abiding and enlightened citizens. However, it was precisely this part of the Conservative program, the implementation of which could help mitigate social contradictions and reduce the “costs” of the Great Reform, that was not implemented by the government until the start of large-scale reforms. In general, it can be stated that the views of Russian conservatives on the peasant question were often more moderate and primitive than those of government circles, which, under Nicholas I, set a course for preparing the abolition of serfdom through private measures (meaning the reform of the state village, the decree on “obligated "peasants, etc.).

In politics, as in all public life, not to move forward means to be thrown back.

Lenin Vladimir Ilyich

The theory of official nationality arose during the reign of Nicholas 1; this theory was based on the principles of the Orthodox faith, autocracy and nationality. This ideology was first voiced in 1833 by Count Uvarov, who served as Minister of Public Education in the Russian Empire.

The main content of the theory

The government of Nicholas 1 sought to create in Russia an ideology that meets the needs of the state. The implementation of this idea was entrusted to S.S. Uvarov, who on November 19, 1833 sent a special report to the emperor entitled “On some general principles that can serve as a guide in strengthening the Ministry.”

In this report, he noted that in Russia there are only three unshakable concepts:

• Autocracy. Uvarov sincerely believed that the Russian people do not share such concepts as “tsar” and “country”. For people, this is all one, guaranteeing happiness, strength and glory.
• Orthodoxy. The people in Russia are religious, and respect the clergy on an equal basis with state authorities. Religion can solve issues that cannot be solved by autocracy.
• Nationality. The foundation of Russia lies in the unity of all nationalities.

The general essence of the new concept was that the Russian people are already developed, and the state is one of the leading ones in the world. Therefore, no fundamental changes need to be made. The only thing that was required was to develop patriotism, strengthen autocracy and the position of the church. Subsequently, supporters of this program used the slogan “Autocracy. Orthodoxy. Nationality."

It should be noted that the principles that were set out in the theory of official nationality were not new. Back in 1872 A.N. Pypin came to exactly the same conclusions in his literary works.

Disadvantages of the new ideology

Uvarov's theory was logical and many politicians supported it. But there were also a lot of critics who, for the most part, highlighted two shortcomings of the theory:

• She refuted any creation. In fact, the document stated the fact of what is important for the Russian people and what unites them. There were no proposals for development, since everything was perfect as is. But society needed constructive development.
• Concentration only on on the positive side. Any nationality has both advantages and disadvantages. The official blog theory focused only on the positive, refusing to accept the negative. In Russia there were many problems that needed to be solved; the ideology of the official nationality denied such a need.

Reaction of contemporaries

Naturally, the shortcomings of the new ideology were obvious to all thinking people, but only a few decided to voice their position out loud, fearing negative reaction states. One of the few who decided to express their position was Pyotr Yakovlevich Chaadaev. In 1836, the Telescope magazine published a “Philosophical Letter,” in which the author noted that Russia was actually isolating itself from Europe.

The state created in the country an atmosphere of self-confident nationalism, which was based not on the real state of affairs, but on the stagnation of society. The author emphasizes that in Russia it is necessary to actively develop ideological movements and the spiritual life of society. The reaction of the government of the Empire was paradoxical - Chaadaev was declared crazy and put under house arrest. This was the official position of the state and personally of Emperor Nicholas 1, under whom the theory of the official nationality was for many years became the main ideological document in the country. This theory was propagated by everyone who had at least some connection with the state.

Literature

• History of Russia 19th century. P.N. Zyryanov. Moscow, 1999 "Enlightenment"
• Uvarov's reports to Emperor Nicholas 1.
• Official nationality. R. Wortman. Moscow, 1999.

The defeat of the Decembrists and the strengthening of the government's police and repressive policies did not lead to a decline in the social movement. On the contrary, it became even more animated. Various St. Petersburg and Moscow salons (home meetings of like-minded people), circles of officers and officials, higher educational institutions (primarily Moscow University), and literary magazines: “Moskvityanin”, “Vestnik Evropy” became centers for the development of social thought. “Domestic Notes”, “Contemporary”, etc. In the social movement of the second quarter of the 19th century. The demarcation of three ideological directions began: radical, liberal and conservative. Unlike the previous period, the activity of conservatives who defended the existing system in Russia intensified.

Conservatism in Russia was based on theories that proved the inviolability of autocracy and serfdom. The idea of ​​the need for autocracy as a unique form of political power inherent in Russia since ancient times has its roots in the period of strengthening of the Russian state. It developed and improved during the 18th-19th centuries. adapting to new socio-political conditions. This idea acquired a special resonance for Russia after absolutism was ended in Western Europe. At the beginning of the 19th century. N. M. Karamzin wrote about the need to preserve the wise autocracy, which, in his opinion, “founded and resurrected Russia.” The speech of the Decembrists intensified conservative social thought.

For the ideological justification of autocracy, the Minister of Public Education, Count S.S. Uvarov, created the theory of official nationality. It was based on three principles: autocracy, Orthodoxy, nationality. This theory reflected enlightenment ideas about unity, the voluntary union of the sovereign and the people, and the absence of social antagonisms in Russian society. The uniqueness of Russia lay in the recognition of autocracy as the only possible form of government in it. This idea became the basis for conservatives until the collapse of the autocracy in 1917. Serfdom was seen as a benefit for the people and the state. Conservatives believed that landowners provide fatherly care for the peasants, and also help the government maintain order and tranquility in the village. According to conservatives, it was necessary to preserve and strengthen the class system, in which the nobility played a leading role as main support autocracy. Orthodoxy was understood as the deep religiosity and commitment to orthodox Christianity inherent in the Russian people. From these postulates, the conclusion was drawn about the impossibility and unnecessaryness of fundamental social changes in Russia, about the need to strengthen the autocracy and serfdom.

The theory of official nationality and other ideas of conservatives were developed by journalists F.V. Bulgarin and N.I. Grech, professors at Moscow University M.P. Pogodin and S.P. Shevyrev. The theory of official nationality was not only propagated through the press, but was also widely introduced into the education system.

Liberal direction

The theory of official nationality caused sharp criticism from the liberal-minded part of society. The most famous was the speech of P. Ya. Chaadaev, who wrote “Philosophical Letters” criticizing autocracy, serfdom and the entire official ideology. In his first letter, published in the Telescope magazine in 1836, P. Ya. Chaadaev denied the possibility of social progress in Russia and saw nothing bright either in the past or in the present of the Russian people. In his opinion, Russia, cut off from Western Europe, ossified in its moral, religious, Orthodox dogmas, was in dead stagnation. He saw the salvation of Russia, its progress, in the use of European experience, in the unification of the countries of Christian civilization into a new community that would ensure the spiritual freedom of all peoples.

The government brutally dealt with the author and publisher of the letter. P. Ya. Chaadaev was declared crazy and placed under police supervision. The Telescope magazine was closed. Its editor, N.I. Nadezhdin, was expelled from Moscow with a ban on engaging in publishing and teaching activities. However, the ideas expressed by P. Ya. Chaadaev caused a great public outcry and had a significant impact on the further development of social thought.

At the turn of the 30-40s of the 19th century. Among the liberals opposing the government, there were two ideological trends- Slavophilism and Westernism. The ideologists of the Slavophiles were writers, philosophers and publicists: K. S. and I. S. Aksakov, I. V. and P. V. Kireevsky, A. S. Khomyakov, Yu. F. Samarin and others. The ideologists of the Westerners were historians, lawyers, writers and publicists: T. N. Granovsky, K. D. Kavelin, S. M. Solovyov, V. P. Botkin, P. V. Annenkov, I. I. Panaev, V. F. Korsh and other representatives These movements were united by the desire to see Russia prosperous and powerful among all European powers. To do this, they considered it necessary to change its socio-political system, establish a constitutional monarchy, soften and even abolish serfdom, provide peasants with small plots of land, and introduce freedom of speech and conscience. Fearing revolutionary upheavals, they believed that the government itself should carry out the necessary reforms. At the same time, there were significant differences in the views of Slavophiles and Westerners.

Slavophiles exaggerated the peculiarity of the historical path of development of Russia and its national identity. The capitalist system that had established itself in Western Europe seemed to them vicious, bringing impoverishment of the people and a decline in morals. Idealizing the history of pre-Petrine Rus', they insisted on returning to those orders when Zemsky Sobors conveyed the opinion of the people to the authorities, when patriarchal relations supposedly existed between landowners and peasants. At the same time, the Slavophiles recognized the need to develop industry, crafts and trade. One of the fundamental ideas of the Slavophiles was that the only true and deeply moral religion is Orthodoxy. In their opinion, the Russian people have a special spirit of collectivism, in contrast to Western Europe, where individualism reigns. The struggle of the Slavophiles against sycophancy before the West, their study of the history of the people and people's life had a great positive significance for the development of Russian culture.

Westerners proceeded from the fact that Russia should develop in line with European civilization. They sharply criticized the Slavophiles for contrasting Russia and the West, explaining its difference by historical backwardness. Denying the special role of the peasant community, Westerners believed that the government imposed it on the people for the convenience of administration and tax collection. They advocated broad education of the people, believing that this was the only true path for the success of modernization of social political system Russia. Their criticism of serfdom and calls for changes in domestic policy also contributed to the development of socio-political thought.

Slavophiles and Westerners laid the foundation in the 30-50s of the 19th century. the basis of the liberal-reformist direction in the social movement.

Radical direction

In the second half of the 20s - the first half of the 30s, circles that united no more than 20-30 members became a characteristic organizational form of the anti-government movement. They appeared in Moscow and in the provinces, where police surveillance and espionage were not as established as in St. Petersburg. Their participants shared the ideology of the Decembrists and condemned the reprisal against them. At the same time, they tried to overcome the mistakes of their predecessors, distributed freedom-loving poems, and criticized government policies. The works of the Decembrist poets became widely known. All of Russia was reading the famous message to Siberia by A.S. Pushkin and the Decembrists’ response to him.

Moscow University became the center for the formation of anti-serfdom and anti-autocratic ideology (the circles of the brothers P. M. and V. Kritsky, N. P. Sungurov, etc.). These circles operated for a short time and did not grow into organizations capable of having a serious impact on changing the political situation in Russia. Their members were only discussing domestic policy, made naive plans for reforming the country. However, the government brutally dealt with the circle participants. Student A. Polezhaev was expelled from the university for his freedom-loving poem “Sashka” and given up as a soldier. By personal order of the emperor, some of the members of the circle of the Cretan brothers were imprisoned in the Shlisselburg fortress and the casemate of the Solovetsky Monastery, some were evicted from Moscow and placed under police supervision. The court sentenced some members of the Sungurov Society to exile to hard labor, others to conscription as soldiers.

Secret organizations of the first half of the 30s of the XIX century. were mainly educational in nature. Groups formed around N.V. Stankevich, V.G. Belinsky, A.I. Herzen and N.P. Ogarev, whose members studied domestic and foreign political works and promoted the latest Western philosophy.

The second half of the 1930s was characterized by a decline in the social movement due to the destruction of secret circles and the closure of a number of leading magazines. Many public figures were carried away by the philosophical postulate of G.V.F. Hegel “everything rational is real, everything real is rational” and on this basis tried to come to terms with the “vile”, according to V.G. Belinsky, Russian reality.

In the 40s of the XIX century. a new upsurge has emerged in a radical direction. He was associated with the activities of V. G. Belinsky, A. I. Herzen, N. P. Ogarev, M. V. Butashevich-Petrashevsky and others.

Literary critic V. G. Belinsky, revealing the ideological content of the works under review, instilled in readers hatred of tyranny and serfdom, and love for the people. The ideal of a political system for him was a society in which “there will be no rich, no poor, no kings, no subjects, but there will be brothers, there will be people.” V. G. Belinsky was close to some of the ideas of the Westerners, but he also saw the negative sides of European capitalism. His “Letter to Gogol” became widely known, in which he condemned the writer for mysticism and refusal of social struggle. V. G. Belinsky wrote: “Russia does not need sermons, but the awakening of a sense of human dignity. Civilization, enlightenment, humanity should become the property of the Russian people.” The “Letter,” which was distributed in hundreds of lists, was of great importance for the education of a new generation public figures radical direction.

Petrashevtsy

The revival of the social movement in the 40s was expressed in the creation of new circles. After the name of the leader of one of them - M.V. Butashsvich-Pstrashevsky - its participants were called Petrashevites. The circle included officials, officers, teachers, writers, publicists and translators (F. M. Dostoevsky, M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin, A. N. Maikov, A. N. Pleshcheev, etc.).

M. V. Pegrashevky, together with his friends, created the first collective library, which consisted mainly of works on the humanities. Not only St. Petersburg residents, but also residents of provincial cities could use the books. To discuss problems related to the domestic and foreign policy of Russia, as well as literature, history and philosophy, members of the circle organized their meetings - known in St. Petersburg as “Fridays”. To widely promote their views, the Petrashevites in 1845-1846. took part in the publication of the “Pocket Dictionary of Foreign Words That Are Part of the Russian Language.” In it they outlined the essence of European socialist teachings, especially Charles Fourier, which had a great influence on the formation of their worldview.

Petrashevites strongly condemned autocracy and serfdom. In the republic they saw the ideal of a political system and outlined a program of broad democratic reforms. In 1848, M. V. Petrashevsky created the “Project for the Liberation of Peasants,” proposing direct, free and unconditional liberation of them with the plot of land that they cultivated. The radical part of the Petrashevites came to the conclusion that there was an urgent need for an uprising, the driving force of which was to be the peasants and mining workers of the Urals.

The circle of M. V. Petrashevsky was discovered by the government in April 1849. More than 120 people were involved in the investigation. The commission qualified their activities as a “conspiracy of ideas.” Despite this. members of the circle were severely punished. A military court sentenced 21 people to death, but at the last minute the execution was commuted to indefinite hard labor. (The re-enactment of the execution is very expressively described by F. M. Dostoevsky in the novel “The Idiot.”)

The activities of M. V. Petrashevsky’s circle marked the beginning of the spread of Western European socialist ideas in Russia.

A. I. Herzen and the theory of communal socialism. The creation of a domestic version of socialist theory is associated with the name of A. I. Herzen. He and his friend N.P. Ogarev, while still boys, swore an oath to fight for a better future for the people. For participating in a student circle and singing songs with “vile and malicious” expressions addressed to the Tsar, they were arrested and sent into exile. In the 30s and 40s, A. I. Herzen studied literary activity. His works contained the idea of ​​​​the struggle for personal freedom, protest against violence and tyranny. The police closely monitored his work. Realizing that it was impossible to enjoy freedom of speech in Russia, A. I. Herzen went abroad in 1847. In London he founded the Free Russian Printing House (1853). published 8 books in the collection “Polar Star”, on the title of which he placed a miniature of the profiles of 5 executed Decembrists, organized, together with N.P. Ogarev, the publication of the first uncensored newspaper “The Bell” (1857-1867). Subsequent generations of revolutionaries saw the great merit of A. I. Herzen in creating a free Russian press abroad.

In his youth, A. I. Herzen shared many of the ideas of Westerners and recognized the unity of the historical development of Russia and Western Europe. However, close acquaintance with the European order, disappointment in the results of the revolutions of 1848-1849. convinced him that the historical experience of the West is not suitable for the Russian people. In this regard, he began to search for a fundamentally new, fair social system and created the theory of communal socialism. A. I. Herzen saw the ideal of social development in socialism, in which there would be no private property and exploitation. In his opinion, the Russian peasant is devoid of private property instincts and is accustomed to public ownership of land and its periodic redistribution. In the peasant community, A. I. Herzen saw a ready-made cell of the socialist system. Therefore, he concluded that the Russian peasant is quite ready for socialism and that in Russia there is no social basis for the development of capitalism. The question of the ways of transition to socialism was resolved by A. I. Herzen in a contradictory manner. In some works he wrote about the possibility of a popular revolution, in others he condemned violent methods of changing the political system. The theory of communal socialism, developed by A. I. Herzen, largely served as the ideological basis for the activities of the radicals of the 60s and revolutionary populists of the 70s of the 19th century.

In general, the second quarter of the 19th century. was a time of “external slavery” and “internal liberation.” Some remained silent, frightened by government repression. Others insisted on maintaining autocracy and serfdom. Still others were actively looking for ways to renew the country and improve its socio-political system. The main ideas and trends that emerged in the socio-political movement of the first half of the 19th century continued to develop with minor changes in the second half.

The concept of conservatism in Russia, dynamic conservatism, ideology of conservatism

History of conservatism, ideas of conservatism, conservatism in the countries of the world, principles of conservatism, philosophy of conservatism,

Section 1. The concept and essence of conservatism.

Section 2. Conservatism in Russia in the 19th century.

Chapter3. Ideas of conservatism in the works of F.M. Dostoevsky.

Chapter4. The originality of the conservative ideas of K.N. Leontyev.

Section 5. Conservatism at the present stage of development.

Section 6.Conservatism in countries of the world

Conservatism- is an ideological commitment to traditional values ​​and orders, social or religious doctrines. In politics - a direction that defends the value of state and social order, rejection of “radical” reforms and extremism. In foreign policy, the emphasis is on strengthening security, the use of military force, and supporting traditional allies; in foreign economic relations, there is protectionism.

Conservatism- this is a direction in politics that defends the existing state and social order, as opposed to liberalism, which requires the necessary improvements and reforms

Conservatism– this is a commitment to everything outdated, outdated, inert; hostility and opposition to progress, everything new, advanced

Conservatism is an ideological orientation and political movement that advocates the preservation of traditional values ​​and practices.

Conservatism- this is the principle of prudence - a generally accepted accounting principle that implies a certain degree of caution in forming judgments necessary in making calculations in conditions

Conservatism- is a set of heterogeneous ideological, political and cultural movements based on the idea of ​​tradition and continuity in social and cultural life. Over the course of history, conservatism acquired various shapes, but in general it is characterized by a commitment to existing and established social systems and norms, rejection of revolutions and radical reforms, and advocacy of the evolutionary, original development of society and the state. In conditions of social change, conservatism manifests itself in a cautious attitude towards the destruction of old orders, restoration of lost positions, and recognition of the value of the ideals of the past.

The concept and essence of conservatism

In conservatism, the main value is the preservation of the traditions of society, its institutions, beliefs and even “prejudices”

As an ideology, it was formed as a reaction to the “horrors of the French Revolution” (pamphlets of Edmund Burke (1729-1797)). Opposes liberalism, which requires economic freedoms, and socialism, which requires social equality. The list of founders of conservatism, in addition to Burke, includes the Frenchman, Jesuit Joseph de Maistre (1753-1821) and the Austrian Chancellor Clemens Metternich (1773-1859)

It should be distinguished from retrograde as a desire to go back and hostility to innovation and from traditionalism. Modern conservatism (neoconservatism) sometimes turns out to be even more flexible and mobile than other political movements. Examples are Reagan's reforms in the USA, Thatcher's reforms in the UK.

The ideology of conservatism is considered as one of the most important structural components of modern political ideologies. However, there are great difficulties in determining its main content. The term “conservatism” itself comes from the Latin “conserve” - I preserve, I protect. However, its ideological and political significance is difficult to identify, due to a number of circumstances. Firstly, in the process of development there was an inversion of the historical meanings of liberalism and conservatism.

Thus, many fundamental provisions classical liberalism- the requirement of market freedom and limitation of government intervention - are today considered conservative. At the same time, the idea of ​​a strong centralized regulatory power of the state, previously put forward by conservatives of the traditionalist type, has now become an essential component of liberal consciousness. Secondly, there is internal heterogeneity, heterogeneity of the political ideology of conservatism, which includes various directions united by a common function - the justification and stabilization of established social structures.

The bearers of the ideology of conservatism are social groups, strata and classes interested in preserving traditional social orders or in their restoration. There are two ideological layers in the structure of conservatism. One is focused on maintaining the stability of the social structure in its unchanged form, the other - on eliminating opposing political forces and trends and restoring and reproducing the former.

In this context, conservatism also acts as a political ideology to justify the existing order.

Various directions and forms of conservatism exhibit common characteristic features. These include: recognition of the existence of a universal moral and religious order and the imperfection of human nature; belief in the inherent inequality of people and in the limited capabilities of the human mind; a belief in the need for a rigid social and class hierarchy and a preference for established social structures and institutions. The political ideology of conservatism, in a sense, is secondary in nature, since it is derived from other ideological forms, which at a certain stage exhaust the functions they perform.

Conservatism in Russia in the 19th century

Considering the formation and development of conservatism in Ukraine, it should be noted that, being an integral part of the Russian Empire during the period under review, in our opinion, it cannot be considered independently, in isolation from Russia. Therefore, we will consider conservatism in Russia, noting some features of its development in Ukraine.

The second half of the 18th century was very significant in the socio-economic life of Russia. It is then that capitalist relations begin to take shape, trends in economic development appear that will lead to sharp contradictions with the existing socio-political system.

In search of new means of political influence on society, the Russian nobility turns to the idea of ​​“Enlightenment absolutism.” It was especially vigorously enforced during the reign of Catherine II. In 1767, the “Commission on the drafting of a new Code” was formed. It included elected deputies from nobles, cities, government agencies, Cossacks, and some categories of personally free peasants. Catherine carefully prepared the convening of the commission. She writes an extensive “Instruction” for deputies. The goal of the state is declared to be the “common good”, which must be ensured by the wise rule of the monarch. However, the “Nakaz” does not eliminate the class system and does not ensure legal equality of citizens, freedom of conscience and freedom of contract.

In the second half of the 18th century, an independent current of political thought was formed in Russia, which insisted on preserving the feudal-serf system unchanged, opposing educational ideas and at the same time criticizing, on the right, individual manifestations of the policies of the autocratic state. The most prominent representative of this trend is Prince Mikhail Shcherbatov (1730 -1790). Turning to history, politics, economics, and ethics, M. Shcherbatov acts as a defender of serfdom, painting an idyllic picture of the relationship between landowners and peasants. Defending serfdom, he argued that landowners cede most of the land to the peasants for food, supervising them as their children. The abolition of serfdom, Mikhail believed, Shcherbatov would lead to the ruin of the nobility.

In Russia, the conservative type of thinking (for the 19th century) is clearly revealed in the worldview of the Slavophiles. Here conservative thought takes a romantic form. A prominent representative of this style is K.N. Leontyev. However, in its pure form, conservatism in Russian social, philosophical and political thought is quite rare (in V.A. Zhukovsky, the ideologists of the official “nationality” M.P. Pogodin and S.P. Sheverev, K.P. Pobedonostov, in the conservative tradition spiritual-academic philosophy). In most cases, this type of thinking was combined with the liberal type. Conservatism as a type of thinking presupposes the rejection of any forms of extremism.

In this sense, conservative thought is opposed to both the extreme right, ultra-reactionary ideology (for example, the latter - the views of M.N. Katkov after 1863) and the radical left, which in the middle and end of the 19th century gained popularity in the intellectual environment (revolutionary democrats, populists, Socialist Revolutionaries , anarchists). Of particular interest are the relations between conservatism and liberalism in Russia. Usually these concepts are opposed to each other, but they do not seem to be mutually repulsive; certain connections and compromises are found between them.

The conservative liberal Chicherin, in his work “Questions of Politics,” noted that the conservative trend, to which he belongs and which he considers the strongest bulwark of state order, prohibits any useless, and even more so harmful, disruption. It is equally separated from the narrow reaction that tries to stop the natural course of things, and from the forward striving that breaks away from the ground in the pursuit of theoretical goals. He is equally disgusted by the persistent effort to retain what has lost its vitality and the encroachment on what still contains internal strength and can serve as a useful element of the social order. His task is to closely monitor the course of life and make only those changes that are caused by urgent needs. The fate of both conservatism and liberalism in Russia was tragic. The conservative type of thinking in Russian social thought found itself sandwiched between two forms of extremism - left and right. The scales tipped first one way and then the other, never stopping in the middle.

The very concept of “conservatism” is quite ambiguous. Many scientists and researchers characterize this direction in different ways, attach their own special meaning, and endow it with various functions. "Philosophical Encyclopedic Dictionary" /M., 1989/ defines conservatism as "an ideological and political doctrine that opposes progressive trends in social development." The bearers of the ideology of conservatism are various social classes and strata interested in preserving the existing order. The characteristic features of conservatism are hostility and opposition to progress, adherence to the traditional and outdated, /conservatism translated from Latin - I preserve/.

The so-called “situational” understanding of conservatism as a system of ideas used to justify and stabilize any social structure, regardless of its meaning and place in the socio-historical process. Conservatism reveals similar ideological attitudes: recognition of the existence of a universal moral and religious order, the imperfection of human nature, the belief in the natural inequality of people, the limited capabilities of the human mind, the need for a class hierarchy, etc.

Conservatism also denotes a philosophical and political concept in which its bearers oppose both any radical, left-wing movements, as well as extreme right-wing forces trying to stop the progressive development of society. One of the most important functions of conservatism is social, which has the following characteristics:

Saving and careful attitude to the national mentality, moral traditions and norms of humanity;

The inadmissibility of human intervention in the course of historical development, the forcible breaking of the usual way of life;

Interpretation of society as an objective reality, which has its own structure and its own development.

In modern scientific literature one can also find another function of conservatism, which can be called a certain type or style of thinking.

The theory of conservatism and its main provisions were considered in the works of E. Burke /XVIII century/. He and his many followers were convinced that social experience is passed on from generation to generation, a person cannot consciously predict it and therefore is not able to control it.

In Russia throughout the nineteenth century. the ideas of conservatism became widespread and went a long way from Slavophilism to religious and ethical quest. In philosophical and literary critical works of this period, historical events related to the victory over Napoleon /1812/, the Decembrist uprising /1825/, the abolition of serfdom /1861/, and the implementation of bourgeois-liberal reforms /60-70s were examined and interpreted. /. the development of capitalist relations and the revolutionary democratic movement.

In the first half of the nineteenth century. The tsarist government tried to develop its own ideology, on the basis of which to raise a young generation loyal to the autocracy. Uvarov became the main ideologist of the autocracy. In the past, a freethinker who was friends with many Decembrists, he put forward the so-called “theory of official nationality” / “autocracy, Orthodoxy, nationality”/. Its meaning was to contrast the revolutionary spirit of the nobility and intellectuals with the passivity of the masses, which had been observed since the end of the 18th century. Liberation ideas were presented as a superficial phenomenon, widespread only among the “spoiled” part of educated society. The passivity of the peasantry, its patriarchal piety, and its persistent faith in the Tsar were portrayed as “primordial” and “original” traits folk character. Uvarov argued that Russia “is strong with unparalleled unanimity - here the tsar loves the Fatherland in the person of the people and rules it like a father, guided by the laws, and the people do not know how to separate the Fatherland from the tsar and see in it their happiness, strength and glory.”

The most prominent representatives of official science, for example, historian M.P. Pogodin, were supporters of the “theory of official nationality” and in their works praised the original Russia and the existing order. This theory became the cornerstone of the ideology of autocracy for many decades.

In the 40-50s. XIX century ideological debates were conducted mainly about the future paths of development of Russia. Slavophiles advocated the originality of Russia, which they saw in the peasant community, in Orthodoxy and in the conciliarity of the Russian people. Among them, I.V. stood out for their significant philosophical potential. Kireyevsky. K.S. Aksakov, Yu.F. Samarin and especially A.S. Khomyakov. They sought to refute the German type of philosophizing and develop a special Russian philosophy on the basis of native Russian ideological traditions.

Speaking with a justification for the original, i.e. not the bourgeois path of historical development of Russia, the Slavophiles put forward the original doctrine of conciliarity, the unification of people on the basis of the highest spiritual and religious values ​​- love and freedom. They saw the main features of Russia in the peasant community and the Orthodox faith. Thanks to Orthodoxy and communalism, the Slavophiles argued, in Russia all classes and estates would live peacefully with each other.

They assessed the reforms of Peter I critically. It was believed that they diverted Russia from the natural path of development, although they did not change its internal structure and did not destroy the possibility of returning to the previous path, which corresponds to the spiritual make-up of the Slavic peoples.

The Slavophiles even put forward the slogan “Power to the Tsar, opinion to the people.” Based on it, they opposed all innovations in the field of public administration, especially against a Western-style constitution. The spiritual basis of Slavophilism was Orthodox Christianity, from the standpoint of which they criticized materialism and the classical /dialectical/ idealism of Hegel and Kant.

Many researchers associate the beginning of independent philosophical thought in Russia with Slavophilism. Particularly interesting in this regard are the views of the founders of this movement, A.S. Khomyakov /1804-1860/ and I.V. Kireyevsky /1806-1856/.

For the philosophical teaching of the Slavophiles, the concept of conciliarity, which was first introduced by A.S., is fundamental. Khomyakov. By conciliarity he means a special kind of human community, which is characterized by freedom, love, and faith. Alexey Stepanovich considered Orthodoxy to be the true Christian religion: in Catholicism there is unity, but there is no freedom; in Protestantism, on the contrary, freedom is not supported by unity.

Conciliarity, unity, freedom, love - these are the key and most fruitful philosophical ideas of Khomyakov.

I.V. Kireyevsky defines conciliarity as genuine sociality, non-violent in nature. Sobornost, according to his teaching, is only a quality of Russian socio-cultural life, a prototype of the Kingdom of God on earth.

In modern scientific literature, monographs, and collective research in recent years, special emphasis is placed on the study of the social ideals of the Slavophiles. Both Kireevsky and Khomyakov saw the community as an ideal model of social structure, which they considered the only thing surviving in Russian history social institution, in which the morality of both the individual and society as a whole is preserved.

In the theory of Slavophilism, the most harmonious and logically substantiated concept of the social structure of society belongs to K.S. Aksakov, son famous writer S.T. Aksakova. He formulated the concept of “land and state,” in which he proved the peculiarity of the historical path of the Russian people. In 1855 Aksakov, in his note “The Internal State of Russia,” outlined his own views on the ideal social structure. He was convinced that following them would help avoid various kinds of social riots, protests, even revolutions that were breaking out in Europe at that time.

K.S. Aksakov believed that the only acceptable form of government for Russia, corresponding to the entire course of Russian history, is the monarchy. Other forms of government, including democracy, allow public participation in resolving political issues, which is contrary to the character of the Russian people.

In Russia, the people do not consider the sovereign as an earthly god: they obey, but do not idolize their king. State power without the intervention of the people can only be an unlimited monarchy. And the non-interference of the state in the freedom of spirit of the people, the people - in the actions of the state, is the basis of the life of society and the state.

All followers of the theory of Slavophilism believed that in Russia under no circumstances should institutions of power similar to Western ones be introduced, because Russia has its own political models.

The ideologists of Slavophilism advocated the revival of the pre-Petrine estate-representative system, monarchical and patriarchal mores. In their works, Slavophiles often idealized the features of the Russian national character, way of life, and beliefs. They tried to deduce the future of Russia from the past, and not from the present, so there is a lot of utopianism in their views.

The philosophy of the Slavophiles was built on the basis of the Russian understanding of Christianity, nurtured by the national characteristics of Russian spiritual life. They did not develop their own philosophical system as such, but they managed to establish a general spirit of philosophical thinking in Russia. The early Slavophiles put forward a number of fundamentally new ideas, but they did not have a coherent philosophical system. Even the late Slavophiles, in particular N.Ya., failed to achieve success in this matter already in the 70s and 80s of the 19th century. Danilevsky. He became famous for his book "Russia and Europe". Following the German historian Rückert, but earlier the author of the famous book “The Decline of Europe” by Spengler and other works that became widely known in Europe. Danilevsky developed the concept of cultural-historical types: there is no universal civilization, but there are certain types of civilizations, there are 10 of them in total, among which the Slavic historical-cultural type stands out for its future. The later Slavophiles were conservatives and abandoned the utopianism of their predecessors.

Under the influence of Slavophilism, pochvennichestvo, a socio-literary movement in the 1960s, developed. A.A. Grigoriev and F.N. Dostoevsky was close to the idea of ​​the priority of art - taking into account its organic power - over science. “Soil” for Dostoevsky is a family unity with the Russian people. To be with the people means to have Christ in you, constant efforts for your moral renewal. For Dostoevsky, in the foreground is the comprehension of the final truth of man, the origins of a truly positive personality. That is why Dostoevsky is an existential thinker, a guiding star of the “existentialists of the twentieth century, but unlike them he is not a professional philosopher, but professional writer. Perhaps this is why in Dostoevsky’s work one can hardly discern any clearly formulated philosophical theory.

Speaking from the standpoint of pochvennichestvo A.A. Grigoriev /1822-1864/ generally recognized the decisive significance of patriarchy and religious principles in Russian life, but spoke very critically of the romantic worldview of classical Slavophilism: “Slavophilism believed blindly, fanatically in the essence of national life unknown to itself, and faith was credited to it.”

In the 60-90s of the 19th century, Russia embarked on the path of capitalist development.

In the period after the liberal-bourgeois reforms of the 60-70s. The capitalist system was established in all spheres of socio-political and economic life. Capitalist relations, both in the city and in the countryside, were intertwined with strong remnants of serfdom: landownership and semi-feudal methods of exploitation of the peasants remained. The so-called “Prussian” type of capitalism in agriculture prevailed, characterized by the preservation of landowner property and the gradual transformation of landownership into capitalist landownership.

Due to these circumstances and the increasing complexity of the social structure, the socio-political development of Russia in the second half of the 19th century was filled with acute contradictions. These contradictions in the life of post-reform Russia were reflected in the struggle between various currents and directions of Russian social thought, including in the field of philosophy.

At this time in Russia, as before, the officially dominant direction of social thought was the monarchical direction, the stronghold of which was religious ideology and idealistic trends in philosophy, the so-called. "monarchist camp" It was based on various idealistic teachings - from the most religious movements to positivism. According to its social origins and essence, philosophical idealism in Russia in Tue. floor. XIX century was an expression of the interests of the ruling class - the landowners and the liberal-monarchist bourgeoisie. Despite the fact that the Russian bourgeoisie was a relatively young class and was only strengthening its position, it was not only not revolutionary, but, on the contrary, feared the revolutionary proletariat and sought an alliance with the landowners under the auspices of the autocracy.

Therefore, one of the main directions of philosophical thought of adherents of conservatism in Russia was the fight against the revolutionary democratic and proletarian movement, against materialism.

In Russia on Tue. floor. XIX century in the conditions of the emergence and formation of capitalist relations, the ideology of classical liberalism acquires a conservative function. The transition from the past to the present was conceived by the ideologists of conservatism as the stabilization of a social form that was not subject to change. Conservatives declare the possibility of a subject's intervention in the course of the historical process to be a social utopia; they are skeptical about the possibilities of volitional solutions to social problems.

Representatives of radicalism and revolutionaries constantly referred to science and scientific progress, and at the same time emphasized that they alone had the right to speak on behalf of science. Thus, they provided conservative circles with exactly the arguments they were looking for. After all, if science, and especially philosophy, are the basis for destroying the entire existing legal order, then the benefits of philosophy are doubtful, and its harm is obvious. For the Slavophiles, this was further confirmation of their belief that all Western wisdom is simply spiritual poison.

It would be a truly thankless task to defend science and its freedom, on the one hand, from the revolutionary democrats and subsequently the Bolsheviks, who declared a monopoly on it, and on the other, from the suspicions of right-wing conservatives. This task falls to the lot of conservative liberals, such as Chicherin or Katkov. Katkov was convinced that revolutionary teaching, despite its logical validity and harmony, had nothing in common with science and that, on the contrary, the spread of these views was a consequence of the suppression of scientific thinking and scientific freedom. In his newspaper “Moskovskie Vedomosti” /No. 205, 1866/ Katkov wrote: “All these false teachings, all these bad trends were born and gained strength in the midst of a society that knew neither science, free, respected and strong, nor publicity in affairs... ".

By absolutism Chicherin meant autocracy in Russia. He spoke rather harshly about democratic form government: “Anyone who does not join the general trend or dares to vote against the majority risks paying with property, and even with life itself, for an angry crowd is capable of anything... Democracy represents domination: by elevating the masses, it lowers the upper strata and brings everything down to a monotonous, vulgar level."

As the history of philosophy shows, in the second half of the 19th century, Russian idealist philosophers of that time were ideologists of the ruling classes, striving to protect and perpetuate the existing order at all costs, sincerely believing that for Russia this was the only way to avoid social upheaval and bloodshed. Conservative sentiments are present in their creativity, their works, their thoughts: they tried to strengthen the autocracy, the influence of the church, and strengthen the religious worldview.

Representatives of Russian conservative thought in the 19th century, especially in its second half, accumulated a wealth of material for reflection. But in 1917 a socialist revolution took place in Russia, and the development of the free philosophical process was interrupted. Many philosophers never accepted the October Revolution, could not come to terms with the existing state of affairs, and were forced to leave the country. In general, the Russian intelligentsia was declared an “ideologically alien class,” and many of them went into exile for their own safety.

At the same time, in socialist Russia the former diversity of philosophical systems was forcibly put to an end. Relevant government bodies made sure that one philosophical line prevailed in the country - Marxist-Leninist. In Soviet science, a very tendentious stereotype has developed on the creative heritage of such public figures as, for example, Radishchev, Herzen, Belinsky, Chernyshevsky, and others, and a clear overestimation of the global significance of their philosophical systems. The teachings of the classics of Marxism-Leninism and the works of their followers, domestic statesmen and public figures, which were published in the country in multi-million copies, were considered the only true and correct ones.

They were strongly encouraged to be guided in all spheres of human life. All dissent was simply prohibited and even persecuted. The very word “conservative” in our country was synonymous with the word “reactionary,” and they themselves and their views were angrily denounced in their writings as state leaders, for example, V.I. Lenin: “The anti-national character of Russian idealism, its ideological collapse are clearly manifested in the political evolution of its preachers... Katkov - Suvorin - “Vekhi”, all these are historical stages of the turn of the Russian bourgeoisie to defend reaction, to chauvinism and anti-Semitism...” / , as well as representatives of official science, for example, L. Kogan: “Russian idealism, especially in the last third of the 19th century, was organically hostile to science, tried in every possible way to discredit its achievements, its materialistic conclusions, to take advantage of the contradictions and difficulties of its development. Despite all the differences in their views, the reactionary Danilevsky and the liberal Katkov agreed in their hatred of Darwinism"

This revealed the one-sidedness of the development of Soviet social sciences, in the prominence of some aspects of the philosophical process and the absolute silence of others. But it is impossible to give an objective assessment of the work of the same Belinsky, Chernyshevsky, Lenin and others without knowing the opinions of their opponents.

Unfortunately, in Russia, the works of representatives of the conservative movement were simply forgotten for many decades; their thoughts and views were not in demand by society. But among them there were outstanding thinkers, speakers, leaders in their professional fields, whom N.O. highly appreciated. Lossky: “A feature of Russian philosophy is precisely that many people devote their energies to it... Among them... many have great literary talent and amaze with their rich erudition...”.

Since 2005, the main platform for the formation of the ideology of modern Russian conservatism has been the Center for Social Conservative Policy (TSSKP). In the understanding of the CSKP experts, “conservatism is not a “repressive” ideology, not an apologetics of the state and normative order as a value itself, but an ideology that recognizes the human personality in its true dignity and meaning. It is the anthropological foundations of conservatism, an appeal to the spiritual understanding of the essence and human destiny is the central circumstance in connection with which all other aspects of the ideology of conservatism stand. Thus, with all its ambiguity, attachment to specific historical and cultural contexts, in general, conservatism is distinguished from “non-conservatism” by: recognition of the existence of eternal spiritual things. the foundations of human and social existence, the desire for the practical implementation of requirements for man, society and the state arising from the recognition of the existence of their spiritual foundations. The most common definition of conservatism today is as an ideological position that recognizes the value of historical experience in the context of modernity and the tasks of social development. fair, but not enough.

Ideas of conservatism in the works of F.M. Dostoevsky

The profound social changes that took place in Russia in the middle and second half of the 19th century were reflected in the artistic creativity and worldview of the greatest Russian writer Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky 1821-1881.

Although Dostoevsky himself was not a professional philosopher, his discovery of the pressing issues of the destruction of the old and the establishment of a new way of life was important for philosophy.

Philosophical views of F.M. Dostoevsky is now even more demanded detailed analysis, that Soviet official science considered them “a deep delusion and the reactionary side of his worldview” for quite a long time.

The great Russian writer F.M. Dostoevsky expressed the contradictions of his era in a very unique form. The letters of the young Dostoevsky indicate his deep interest in philosophy. But his philosophical views already at that time were influenced by religious and mystical ideas. He saw the basis of existence in God and the “pure spirituality of nature.” He believed that man is an “illegal child” of higher spirituality and cannot cognize with his mind all Divine creations - nature, soul, love, etc., because this is cognized with the heart, and not with the mind, since the mind is a material ability. Thus, art and philosophy for Dostoevsky are the highest revelation.

But despite these religious-idealistic sentiments, in the writer’s artistic work there is clear sympathy for the “humiliated and insulted.” His humanism was formed under the influence of the educational and freedom-loving traditions of Russian and world classical literature. During this period, Dostoevsky showed interest in utopian socialism. In the 50-60s. XIX century he makes a turn towards conservatism and mystical philosophy, puts his faith in autocracy and Orthodoxy in Russia. The internal inconsistency of the writer’s worldview and creativity depended, first of all, on social status those petty-bourgeois layers on whose side Dostoevsky had sympathies and whose life tragedy he so brilliantly described in his works.

Dostoevsky rejected historical role revolution, denied socialism as the only real way to change existing living conditions. Faced with the fait accompli of the development of capitalism in Russia after the bourgeois-liberal reforms of the 60-70s and unable to appreciate it, the writer sought a way out in the religious and moral improvement of the individual. The focus of Dostoevsky’s attention as a thinker was not so much on the problems of epistemology and ontology, but on issues of ethics, religion, aesthetics and partly sociology. As an idealist, he believed that the path of personal moral improvement leads to a change in the morals of society. For him there was no scientific theory of the development of nature and society. Reason was given the last place, all hopes were placed on feeling, on the “heart,” on the “living divine soul of man.” The root of morality, in his opinion, depends on faith in God and the immortality of the soul. He associated the growth of immorality in society and crime with atheism and philosophical materialism.

The ethics of Dostoevsky, who preached Christian ideas of “personal improvement,” were directed against the theory put forward by Russian revolutionary democrats of the active role of the social environment and the need to transform it to change people’s views and their morality. He saw in this theory an infringement of the freedom and significance of the individual. The writer tried to outline the path of moral regeneration of the individual with the help of “active Christian love.” Let us become better ourselves, and then the environment will change—this is the meaning of his objections to materialist philosophers.

Dostoevsky did not accept capitalism with all the passion of an artist and thinker, but, having become disillusioned with the ideals of utopian socialism, he was unable to oppose anything other than the ideas of primitive Christianity to bourgeois ideology and morality.

Dostoevsky's worldview in the 60-70s was imbued with objective idealism.

In the 60s, on the pages of the magazines “Time” and “Epoch”, which he published together with his brother, he propagated the theory of “pochvennichestvo”, a peculiar kind of late Slavophilism. Its main goal was the reconciliation of the warring classes in Russia, the return of the intelligentsia to the bosom of autocracy and the Orthodox faith, the justification of patience and meekness. He formulated his theory as follows: “To be on the ground, to be with one’s people, means to believe that through this very people all humanity will be saved and the final idea will be brought into the world, and the kingdom of heaven in it.” It was in isolation from this “soil” that Dostoevsky saw the roots of disbelief, nihilism, and infatuation with Western socialist theories. Perhaps the most unpleasant thing for the Social Democrats and their leaders in “pochvennichestvo” was the denial of scientific socialism and violent attacks on materialism, for which the theory was subsequently declared “reactionary.”

The followers of “pochvennichestvo” were the editorial staff of the Dostoevsky brothers’ magazine – N.N. Strakhov and A.A. Grigoriev, and at the beginning of the 20th century - “Vekhi people”. The ideas of “pochvennichestvo” found their final completion in his last speech - in the speech “On Pushkin” in 1880. In the context of a brewing revolutionary situation, he called on the intelligentsia to “humble themselves” in order to heal their troubled souls with universal love, uniting humanity around the Orthodox “God-bearing people” .

The genre of dystopia, brilliantly continued and developed by artists and thinkers of the 20th century, began with Dostoevsky’s “The Grand Inquisitor” in Russian philosophy and literature. This genre often required the language of parables, confessions, sermons, a rejection of academic forms of theorizing, a purely rationalistic method of proof and justification, heart-felt, experienced, hard-won truths.

Throughout the 20th century, the deep internal contradictions in the worldview and creativity of Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky more than once led to diametrically opposed assessments of his legacy. Naturally, conservative ideas, his religiosity, rejection of the theory of necessity socialist revolution in Russia, denial of materialism, belief in the “divine soul” of man, etc. were absolutely unacceptable for revolutionary democrats, who were called by Soviet science “advanced people of Russia” of that time. Dobrolyubov, Saltykov-Shchedrin, Pisarev and others mercilessly criticized religious-idealistic philosophy in their works, but at the same time highly appreciated him as a realist artist.

Official Soviet science, taking into account the thoughts of V.I. Lenin, M. Gorky, Lunacharsky, Olminsky and others, spoke out against “Dostoevschina” - the reactionary, in her opinion, ideas of Dostoevsky’s philosophy, condemning his “deep errors”, spoke sharply about the existential nature of his work.

Dostoevsky's religious and mystical ideas were picked up and raised to the top by bourgeois liberals, reactionaries, churchmen and other obscurantists. They covered up their contempt and hatred for the people with the “teachings” of Dostoevsky, the reactionary aspects of which they adapted for the fight against revolution, materialism and atheism. Following Merezhkovsky and Rozanov, the “Vekhiites” presented Dostoevsky as a God-seeker and God-builder, a preacher of universal love and suffering. Modern bourgeois idealists, theologians, theosophists take from Dostoevsky’s legacy everything that is most reactionary for their philosophical systems, reviving the mystical teachings of the past - the most widespread opinion of proletarian ideology about Dostoevsky’s philosophical heritage.

“Other obscurantists,” by the way, also did not agree with Dostoevsky’s theories in everything; they also pointed to “serious contradictions” in his work.

But, nevertheless, V.I. Lenin said that "Dostoevsky really brilliant writer, who examined the sore sides of his contemporary society”, that “he has many contradictions, kinks, but at the same time – living pictures of reality”

Artistic creativity of F.M. Dostoevsky rightfully entered the golden fund of Russian and world culture."

The originality of the conservative ideas of K.N. Leontyev

Konstantin Nikolaevich Leontyev was born on January 13/25, 1831 in the village. Kudinovo, Kaluga province, in the family of a landowner. I lost my father early. Decisive influence The fate of the future writer was influenced by his mother, who was distinguished by deep religiosity. Since childhood, Leontyev was surrounded by the atmosphere of a modest but elegant life. The taste for beauty, the remarkable subtlety and depth of the mother’s religiosity, and the strong monarchical beliefs shared by family members played a decisive role in shaping the beliefs of the future thinker.

Having received home education, Leontyev continued his education in the Cadet Corps, then graduated from the Faculty of Medicine at Moscow University. Already in student years The first works of the young Leontyev were highly appreciated by I.S. Turgenev, who closely followed him throughout his literary career. Desire to earn a living literary work in the capital ended in failure, but did not break Leontyev’s will. The writer is forced to look for a service that would provide not only a piece of bread, but also free leisure. Since 1863, he was enrolled in the Asian Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, working as a consul in various cities of the European possessions of Turkey. The sudden serious illness that happened to Leontyev in 1871 became a turning point, which was associated with changes in the writer’s life and in the fate of his work. Having left his official duties, he tries to become a monk. Two more difficult events in the writer’s life coincided with the illness: the death of his beloved mother and the mental illness of his wife. The mental turmoil experienced by the writer seeks a way out in an attempt to find harmony, in monastic service. In 1891 he took secret monastic vows under the name of Clement. In the same year, the writer dies in the Trinity-Sergius Lavra.

Shortly before his death, V.V. found him here. Rozanov, who loved to “discover” undeservedly forgotten writers. Their correspondence lasted almost a year. This subsequently gave Vasily Rozanov the opportunity to present Leontiev’s worldview in a series of journal articles entitled “Aesthetic Attitude to History” and publish correspondence with him.

Even during his lifetime, the work of K.N. Leontyev caused heated debate. Both opponents and supporters of his ideas could not forgive him for his “inflexibility,” but in fact, the firm position he took in defending his views. Interpretations of the complex work of Konstantin Leontiev were guilty of excessive journalisticism and a superficial approach. He was considered a follower of N.Ya. Danilevsky, but the writer became acquainted with the work of this thinker when his convictions were already formed. With the most harsh criticism of K.N. Leontyev was presented by P.N. Miliukov. In his famous lecture “The Decomposition of Slavophilism. Danilevsky, Leontiev, Vl. Solovyov,” which was soon published as a separate brochure, he called the entire work of the writer reactionary-utopian. He believed that Leontiev’s conclusions were based on nationality, and that, as a physician by training, Leontiev, applying the biological theory of organism development to world history, was inclined to abuse metaphorical comparisons. Leontiev’s approach to human history, Miliukov believed. Therefore, the work of Leontyev, along with the work of Danilevsky and Solovyov, can be defined as the decomposition of Slavophilism.

However, Leontyev was never a Slavophile, and he sharply criticized the positions of neologism. Many modern scientists and researchers of his work rank Leontyev among the conservatives for the presence in his works of features characteristic of this movement. Firstly, an expression of the need to preserve traditions inherited from ancestors, a negative attitude towards the radical negation of values ​​and institutions, an understanding of society as an organism, and political problems as religious and moral at their core. Secondly, rejection of the idea of ​​“natural rights and freedoms”, “natural kindness of man”, “natural harmony of interests”. /This is how K.N. evaluates the features of conservatism. Leontiev in his monograph “Basic Ideas of Russian Philosophy” by L.G. Queen/.

N.A. Berdyaev in his essay “The Russian Idea. The main problems of Russian thought of the 19th and early 20th centuries” notes that, unlike the Slavophiles, Russian landowners, enlightened, humane, but very rooted in the soil that they still felt under their feet and did not foresee future social catastrophes, Leontyev was already captured by the catastrophic feeling of life. Ironically, Berdyaev notes, the revolutionary Herzen and the reactionary Leontyev equally rebel against the bourgeois world and want to oppose the Russian world to it. Rightly praising Leontiev’s work, Nikolai Berdyaev writes that he is many times higher than Danilevsky, that he is one of the most brilliant Russian minds, that “if Danilevsky can be considered the predecessor of Spengler, then K. Leontiev is the predecessor of Nietzsche.”

Leontyev was a deeply Orthodox thinker. The main pathos of his works is the relationship between religion /in particular, Orthodox Christianity/ and the individual, culture and religion, the role of the individual in history. The ideas he proclaimed were developed in the conservative theory of “Russian Byzantism.” He saw a way out of the historical situation that developed in Russia in the middle of the 19th century in upholding national “original customs,” imbued, in his opinion, with the ancient Orthodox spirit, and, above all, with severe orthodox asceticism. In the conflict between culture and Orthodoxy, Leontyev took the side of Christianity and once expressed the following idea: more or less successful preaching of Christianity leads to the extinction of the aesthetics of life on earth, i.e. to the extinction of life itself.

K.N. Leontiev significantly supplemented the theory of N.Ya. Danilevsky’s spatio-temporal localization of cultures by the law on the triune process of their development and the concept of Byzantium. These thoughts of his were set forth in the work “Byzantism and Slavism.” Europe already had its own, almost formed, statehood and did not need the spiritual experience of Byzantium. The political and social foundations of the dying empire were adopted by simple and inexperienced East Slavic tribes in state building. The writer in his work formulates in detail the law on the triune process of development and decline of cultures:

1. "Primary simplicity." those. underdevelopment and discreteness;

2. It’s time for “blooming complexity”, isolation and diversity of forms;

3. The decline of once bright colors and the ordinariness of previously bizarre forms.

Historiosophical concept of K.N. Leontyev is very simple in essence. On average, in his opinion, the historical period of development of peoples is one thousand two hundred years. This period is divided into three periods: initial simplicity, blossoming complexity and secondary confusion. The division of the entire history into three periods is very arbitrary, since it is very difficult, or rather, almost impossible, to fit all the variety of events into it. S.N. Bulgakov noted that Konstantin Leontyev was not sufficiently educated and knew “comparatively little compared to what the power of his mind required,” but that the historiosophical concept itself, despite its extremely simplified biological nature, was not devoid of consistency and insight. If there is no place for a moral moment in nature, then it should not exist in the dialectics of historical development. The moral principle is introduced into history from above by the providence of God. The writer draws a conclusion from this: the egalitarian process is destructive in nature: form is the despotism of the internal idea, which does not allow matter to scatter.

K.N. Leontyev is a representative of the “protective” line in Russian social thought. He is characterized by her characteristic views on the role of spiritual culture in society. How F.M. Dostoevsky. A.A. Grigoriev and others in the 50-60s. of the 19th century, and later by V. Rozanov and D. Merezhkovsky, he warned that the rapprochement of art with life, individual creativity with the historical creativity of the masses is fraught with the destruction of culture as a whole, a lowering of its values, evaluation criteria and norms.

For Leontyev, the main thing in the analysis of Russian history was that in Russia, since ancient times, the primary responsibility of a person was considered to be caring for the soul. The desire to improve one’s internal, spiritual world, in contrast to the European structure of a person’s external, material situation, is the main national psychological feature of Russia. According to the thinker, three things are strong in Russia: Orthodoxy, tribal autocracy and the rural land world /community/. What bothered him most was the Russian characteristics historical development, the desire to accept everything in ready-made form. Having received the Byzantine inheritance, Russia had no intention of changing it or meaningfully adapting it to its national conditions and circumstances.

The habit of transformations was not developed, as well as practical skills for their implementation. This became a fatal circumstance in her subsequent historical fate. Trying to prove this by analyzing the historical development of Europe. Leontyev does not simply state facts, but substantiates the need for an individual, unique path for Russia. Not being a fan of the Slavs, he believed that Byzantium was the driving force in the historical development of Russia. Byzantium is a special kind of culture, which has its own distinctive features, its beginnings, its consequences.

To preserve Russia's national identity, not only radical foreign policy changes are needed, but also domestic ones. They should lead to the emergence of a “special style of cultural statehood.” K.N. Leontiev spoke out against national nihilism, warning about the danger of denationalization of culture and the dominance of one global cultural style as disastrous for humanity, because separation from national origins threatens the loss of national identity.

Russian philosophy and its history have traveled a difficult, largely contradictory path throughout the 19th and 20th centuries. Under the dominance of Marxist-Leninist theory in Soviet times in our country, the works of thinkers of a certain type who stood in the positions of revolutionary democracy or sympathized with them were studied and analyzed. Revolutions, the war against fascism, a grandiose and cruel socialist experiment, the ideological monopoly of totalitarian power, its collapse and the collapse of the USSR - all this happened before the eyes of one generation.

Conservatism at the present stage of development

In modern conservatism in the world, three movements are usually distinguished: traditionalist, liberalist and non-conservative (or liberal-conservative). They are closely intertwined and interact with each other, preserving the features of evolution, their own origins and creating a heterogeneous, complex structural whole, which is designated by the concept of “modern conservatism.”

The traditionalist movement of conservatism, which historically was the first, the beginning of conservatism, is associated with such names as E. Burke (1729-1797), J. de Maistre (1753-1821), L. de Bonald (1754-1840). In the 20th century, the main herald of this trend was R. Kirk, who published the book “Conservative Thinking” in 1953. The birthplace of conservatism as a political ideology that became a specific reaction to the ideas of the Enlightenment and the French bourgeois revolution, England appeared. It was here in 1790 that E. Burke’s book “Reflections on the Revolution in France” was published. The founding fathers of conservatism also include L. de Bonald and J. de Maistre, original classics of feudal-aristocratic conservatism. E. Burke, the scion of a modest Irish lawyer, was characterized by the duality and inconsistency of the feudal-aristocratic and bourgeois components of the system of his political views, which, however, did not really bother him. Moreover, it is precisely thanks to contradictions and inconsistencies that many of Burke’s provisions can be interpreted very widely and, in different contexts, find support among wider social groups.

The political ideology of conservatism included many of the categories developed by these thinkers. One of the most important in it is the concept of “natural aristocracy,” which, according to Burke, includes not only nobles, but also wealthy businessmen, educated people, lawyers, scientists, and artists. Wealth, for reasons of reason and politics, deserves a privileged social position. Otherwise, “relapses of the revolution” are possible.

The concept of “traditionalism” plays an important role. In contrast to the ideas of the Enlightenment, tradition is opposed to reason and is placed above it, since submission to it means acting in accordance with the natural course of things and age-old wisdom. Traditionalism underlies the understanding of change, renewal, reform, the implementation of which should not disrupt the natural course of things. At the same time, there are two main types of reforms: reforms aimed at restoring traditional rights and principles, and preventive reforms aimed at preventing revolution. At the same time, a distinction is made between “change” and “reform”. Change changes the essence of the object, reform does not affect it and is a forced means that has to be used. J. de Maistre and L. de Bonald, rejecting the republic and any reform and opposing tradition and authority to it, saw the path to salvation in strengthening the political role of religion. The core of de Maistre's political ideas was the idea of ​​balance, understood as the creation of a strategic balance in political and spiritual life on the basis of a theocratic approach. De Bonald, without giving priority to either secular or religious authorities, put forward the idea of ​​​​a union of religious and political society.

In general, the political idea of ​​traditionalism includes an organic concept of society, according to which it exists initially, like organic nature, and does not arise as a result of social evolution: the interpretation of individual participation as not representing any independent value, but entirely dependent on the support of a conservative order; the ideas of Hellenism and anti-democracy, according to which the inequality of people is an axiom of politics, since “equality is the enemy of freedom” (Burke), freedom for the well-born and the wealthy; rejection of the idea of ​​progress and opposition to it of providentialism and ideas of the historical cycle (Mitterich).

In the 20th century, R. Kirk, developing traditionalist principles, wrote that in revolutionary eras people are carried away by novelty, but then they get tired of it and are drawn to old principles. He interprets history as a cyclical process. Therefore, at a certain turn, the conservative order returns again. He considered the period after the Second World War as the most favorable for conservatives. The burden of responsibility for the fate of Christian civilization has fallen on them, and they are able to cope with this task. Great conservatives, Kirk believes, are prophets and critics, but not reformers. It is argued that since human nature is irreparably damaged, the world cannot be improved through political activity.

Traditionalist conservatives seek to create a broad national consensus by appealing to traditional beliefs and prejudices, authority and religion. They often translate social and economic issues into a religious and ethical plane. Thus, in the 80s, R. Kirk identified the following principles of traditionalist conservatism: faith in order more high level than human adaptability, and the belief that economics turns into politics, politics into ethics, ethics into religious concepts. In recent decades, the “new right” has been an important ally of traditionalist conservatism.

The liberalist movement in conservatism, according to its representatives, inherits the classical liberal tradition of the 18th and 19th centuries. as the only genuine one. Liberalism from these positions is called upon, on the one hand, to perceive and continue the desire for freedom that has developed in past eras, and on the other hand, to exclude the spread of socialist ideas that became widespread in the West from the mid-19th century, caused by the economic rise of the post-war years. Leading representatives of liberalism F. Hayek, M. Friedman, J. Gilder, I. Kristol, L. Bauer argue that the erosion of free enterprise, individual and family responsibility leads to stagnation and poverty, that a revival of the classical tradition of liberal individualism and free market economy.

In their opinion, “dying socialism” has been replaced by a revived classical liberalism. Supporters of liberal conservatism are often seen as part of a new intellectual movement, the “New Enlightenment,” which is a continuation of the Scottish Enlightenment. Representatives of the latter - D. Hume, A. Fergusson, A. Smith, J. Millar, W. Robertson.

This Enlightenment was distinguished by the fact that it proceeded from the existence of a “commercial society”, in which, as a result of a free social contract, the “master-worker” order was established as a model of social relations. Revolutionary movement he wasn't. Continental Europe experienced a fundamentally different Enlightenment, whose proponents saw human reason as the basis of all their social changes. This approach led to revolution, Marxism and socialism. The Scottish Enlightenment absorbed the special Anglo-Saxon trait of individualism and formalized it into a theoretical system. Based on the sociobiological views of A. Fergusson, A. Smith, D. Hume, liberalism, like conservatism in general, viewed man, first of all, as an “imperfect being” squeezed within natural “boundaries.”

Liberals defended the traditional principles of free enterprise, the demand for order and legality, put forward arguments against the idea of ​​the welfare state and linked them with the idea of ​​​​a “universal moral law”. The root of many modern evils, it is believed, is the violation of natural, God-given principles, free enterprise and the free market, primarily by the state.

At the same time, they emphasize that natural rights are “negative” rights. In their view, in the 20th century, Marxism and social democracy perverted the true concept of human rights. They established in their minds the so-called “positive rights”: the right to work, to rest, a roof over their head, the right to fair wages etc.

Liberals everywhere advocated a minimal social policy of the state, allowing only to defuse dangerous social tensions, and called on the government to rely exclusively on the market in the implementation and implementation of its programs. At the same time, it is considered advisable to shift a significant part of the responsibility for the program to help the poor to local authorities and intermediate public institutions: family, church, school, charities, charity and donations from the rich, etc.

Liberalism is convinced that the basis of public freedom is private property, that social hierarchy and recognition as the only possible only “moral equality” are necessary, that respect and faith in the traditions of the people are an essential feature of state policy. Right-wing intellectuals of the Labor type had enormous success in the 80s in Britain, Europe, Japan, and the USA. At the same time, one should keep in mind the fundamental difference in the social content of the political ideas of classical liberalism and modern liberalism.

For classical liberalism, the principle of laissez faire implies a struggle for rights and freedoms that were deprived of the third estate. For liberalism, this demand means the demand for the protection and protection of achieved privileges, private interests and property from demands for democratic reform coming from below.

The non-conservative (liberal-conservative) trend of modern conservatism is relatively new. The objective basis for its appearance is considered to be the structural crisis that gripped the world economy in the 70s. He discovered the inadequacy of previous reforms of the market system and demanded more radical means. The existing belief was called into question that “scientific civilization” itself stabilizes society due to the rationality of its mechanism, that it does not need moral reinforcement, legitimation and has some kind of internal regulator.

It was assumed that not only the economy, but social relations, the spiritual state of society have some kind of automatically operating stabilizer contained in the system itself. The crisis has undermined these illusions. Neoconservatism, according to one of its leading representatives in Germany, G. Rohrmoser, is being recreated again and again by the crisis of modern society.

It is generated by the weakening of the moral foundations of human society and the crisis of survival, in conditions of which it appears as one of the mechanisms for preserving the system. Neoconservatism is based on the idea of ​​freedom of market relations in the economy, but is categorically against the transfer of such principles into the political sphere and therefore presents itself as both an heir and a critic of liberalism. His political doctrine highlights a number of central provisions: the priority of subordinating the individual to the state and ensuring the political and spiritual community of the nation, the readiness to use, as a last resort, very radical means in their relations with the enemy. Polemicizing with liberals, neoconservatives accuse them of putting forward political slogans of a purely declarative nature that are not feasible in real life. They believe that in conditions of increasing manipulative capabilities of means mass media the will of the majority cannot be the final argument in politics; it cannot be made absolute.

They saw the main content of the crisis in the uncontrollability of the state, coming from the disobedience of citizens corrupted by liberalism, and in the crisis of governance, resulting from the inaction of the authorities, since the rejection of adequate decisions leads to the escalation of social conflicts into political ones. In conditions where, according to neoconservatives, a more active and clear policy is required, the model of elitist, or limited, democracy can become effective and acceptable.

Conservatism in countries of the world

Depending on the country, the policies and goals of conservative political parties vary. Both conservatives and liberals advocate private ownership, in opposition to communists, socialists and the Green Party, who support public ownership and the implementation of laws requiring social responsibility on the part of property owners.

Mainly, disagreements between conservatives and liberals arise on issues of social importance. Conservatives do not accept inappropriate social norms behavior. For a long time, conservative parties fought to limit the voting rights of non-Christians, women and people of other races. Modern Conservative parties often pit themselves against Liberals and Labour. For the United States, the use of the term “conservative” is specific.

Belgium, Denmark, Iceland, Finland,

France, Greece, Luxembourg, Netherlands,

Norway, Sweden, Switzerland,

In countries such as Australia, Germany, Israel,

Italy, Japan, Malta, New Zealand,

In Spain and the United States, there were no conservative parties, although there were right-wing parties - Christian Democrats or Liberals. In Canada, Ireland and Portugal, the parties on the right are the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada, Finn Fáil and the Progressive Democrats in Ireland, and the Social Democratic Party of Portugal. Since then, the Swiss People's Party has joined the radical right and is no longer considered conservative.

Claus von Beime, who developed a method for classifying parties, found that no modern party in the West could be considered conservative, although communist and pro-communist parties had many similarities to conservatism. In Italy united by liberals and radicals during the Risorgimento, it was the liberals, not the conservatives, who formed the party of the right. In 1980 in the Netherlands, conservatives united to form the Christian Democratic Party. Conservatism in Austria, Germany, Portugal and Spain was modified and included in fascism or the extreme right movement. In 1940, all Japanese parties were united into a single fascist party. After the end of the war, Japanese conservatives immediately returned to politics, but most of them were exempted from government activities.

Louis Hartz believed that the lack of conservatism in Australia and the United States was due to the fact that their colonies were considered part of liberal or radical Great Britain. Although Hartz argued that there was little Conservative influence in English-speaking Canada, later scholars claimed that it was those who rejected the American Revolution who spread Tory ideology in Canada.

Hartz explained conservatism in Quebec and Latin America as a result of early settlements in the form of feudal communities. American conservative writer Russell Kirk suggested that conservatism was widespread in the United States and presented the American Revolution as "conservative".

For a long time, a conservative elite ruled the Latin American people. This was achieved to a greater extent through control and support of the institutions of civil society, the church and the armed forces, rather than political parties. Typically, the church was exempt from paying taxes, and clergy were protected from legal prosecution. Where conservative parties were weakened or non-existent, conservatives increasingly relied on military dictatorship as their preferred form of government. However, those countries in which the elite managed to find support for conservative parties in society have achieved political stability. Chile, Colombia and Venezuela are examples of countries with strong conservative parties. In Argentina, Brazil, El Salvador and Peru, conservatism did not exist at all. After civil war in 1858-1863 the conservative party of Venezuela ceased to exist. Chile's conservative party, the National Party, was dissolved after a military coup in 1973 and did not revive even after the return to democracy.

The Conservative National Union was governed by an alliance between the business elite of English-speaking Canadians and the Catholic Church of Quebec from 1936 to 1960. This time, called the "Great Darkness", ended with the Quiet Revolution, and the party finally disintegrated.

Founded in 1991, the Democratic Party of Albania became the leading party after Albania's parliamentary elections in 2005. It is an observer of the European People's Party and a full member of the International Democratic Union and the Centrist Democratic International. The party came to power in 1992, for the first time in the history of democratic Albania.

Founded in 1945 as the Christian People's Party, the Christian Democrats and Flemings dominated politics in post-war Belgium. In 1999, the party's support waned, relegating it to fourth place.

While supporting a constitutional monarchy, the party rejected the power of the Republicans. After World War II, she managed to join the United National Front, which in turn came to power on the basis of anti-communism and ultranationalism. However, the votes received in support of the party were canceled, which prompted the Populists to create an expanded party under the leadership of General Alexandros Papagos. Conservatives opposed the dictatorship of the leaders of far-right parties, and in an attempt to overthrow the dictatorship they formed the New Democracy Party. The new party set itself the following tasks: to prevent the Turkish policy of expansionism in Cyprus, to revive and strengthen democracy, and to establish a strong government in the country.

The Conservative People's Party of Denmark was founded in 1915. In the 2005 elections, the party won 18 of 179 seats in parliament and became the junior partner in the Liberal coalition.

Iceland

Founded in 1926 as a conservative party, the Independent Party of Iceland adopted its current name in 1929. Since its formation, the Independent Party has gained the support of approximately 40% of the population. Combining liberal and conservative orientations and supporting nationalization, she opposed class conflicts. While in opposition for almost a decade, she embraced economic liberalism and participated in the state's protectionist policies. Unlike other Scandinavian conservatives (and liberals), its base has always been the working class.

Canadian Conservatives were formed from a party (the Tories) that left the United States after the American Revolution. These Conservatives, who occupied key positions in administrative and judicial institutions, were called the Family Conspiracy in Ontario and the Chateau Clique in Quebec. They strengthened the socio-economic and political stratification that existed during the first three decades of the 19th century, gaining greater support from businessmen and the church elite in Ontario and slightly less in Quebec. John A. MacDonald was an excellent leader of the movement for the unification of the provinces and during his time as Prime Minister was able to unite the English-speaking Protestant oligarchy and the Catholic estate of Quebec and preserve their conservative union.

Conservatives combined the ideas of Toryism and economic liberalism. They advocated activist government and government intervention in the economy. The position of the elite obliged them to provide support to the less prosperous classes. From 1942 to 2003, the party was known as the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada; in 2003, it merged with the Canadian Union to form the new Conservative Party of Canada.

Colombia

The Colombian Conservative Party was founded in 1849 and owes its existence to the government of Francisco de Paulo Santander. While the term "liberals" was used to describe Colombia's political forces as a whole, conservatives began to refer to themselves as conservative liberals and referred to their opponents as "red liberals". From the 1860s to the present, the party supported a strong centralized government, the Catholic Church, especially in its role as defender of the sanctity of family ties, and opposed the separation of church and state. The party's policy was aimed at the equality of all people, the right to own private property and opposition to dictatorship. The Conservative Party of Colombia was the second largest party after the Liberal Party.

Luxembourg

In 1914, Luxembourg's most influential party, the Christian People's Social Party, was formed. Initially it was considered “right”, but in 1945 it acquired its current name. In the 20th century it occupied leading place in Luxembourg politics, and had the largest number of members.

Norway

The Conservative Party of Norway was formed thanks to the ruling elite of statesmen and wealthy merchants. The party's goal was to fight the populist democracy of the liberals. With the establishment of a parliamentary form of government in 1884, the party lost power. The first parliamentary government was formed in 1889, and only in the 1930s did power become concentrated in the hands of the main political party, the Labor Party.

In the United States, conservatism included a wide variety of political trends, such as financial, economic, social, liberal, and religious conservatism.

Modern American conservatism traces its heritage to the Anglo-Irish politician and philosopher Edmund Burke. US President Abraham Lincoln wrote that conservatism is a commitment to the old and proven versus the new and unknown. Ronald Reagan, a self-proclaimed conservative and the 40th President of the United States, was perceived as a symbol of American conservatism.

After World War II, the Gaullists supported French conservatives, putting forward nationalist slogans such as loyalty to tradition, order and the unification of the country. Since World War II, conservatism has remained a major political force in France. It is unusual that the French form of conservatism was formed around the personality of Charles de Gaulle, and was similar to the traditions of Bonapartism.

Gaullism in France flowed into the Union for a Popular Movement. And the word “conservative” itself has become a dirty word.

Sources

free-referat.ru – Abstracts

bankreferatov.ru - Bank of abstracts

ru.wikipedia.org Wikipedia – The Free Encyclopedia