CC BY
17POLITICAL SCIENCES
RUSSIAN MARXIST CONCEPTION OF THE NATION BY JOSEPH STALIN AND DE-
STALINIZATION TRENDS IN SOVIET SOCIAL SCIENCE IN THE SECOND HALF OF THE
TWENTIETH CENTURY
Vilkov V.
PhD (Philosophy), Associate Professor, Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv Senior staff scientist at Faculty of Philosophy (Kyiv, Ukraine) https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3542-0756
Abstract
For the first time in the post-Soviet period, in a separate publication, based on the principles of historicism, methods of systemic, comparative, discursive and content analysis, the prerequisites, key ideas, theoretical, methodological, ideological and political prescripts of Stalin's definition of the essence and attributive features of the national community are analyzed and revealed in detail. An assessment of his additions and comments to it is proposed (1913, 1929). Based on a deideologized study of a large number of scientific sources, the characteristic tendencies of modernization of the concept of the nation within the framework of Soviet Marxism of the 1960s -1980s were covered. The article also highlights how this process was directly related to its ideological functions, which lied in the theoretical justification of the strategy of the ruling party in the USSR (CPSU) with the apologia of its policy.
Keywords: socio-political studies in the USSR and Ukraine in the second half of the 20th, Stalin's definition of the nation, "Russian Marxist Theory of the Nation", Marxist-Leninist historical and economic theory of the nation, Austro-Marxism, Scientific communism, concept of the "nation", concept of the "Soviet people"
Introduction. The process of creating the theory of the nation by the leaders of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDRP (b)), its theoretical, political and ideological prerequisites, the authorship of the basic postulates, was revised and revalued many times in the Soviet scientific literature depending on the political leaders and elites who headed the USSR, as well as the specifics of the geopolitical processes of the twentieth century, the main ideological components of the official version of Marxism-Leninism, the prescripts of the programs and strategies of the ruling Soviet Communist Party. A big role was also played by the tendencies in the development of social, political sciences and cultural studies in the USSR and abroad in respect of the specifics of revision or attempts to modernize the axiomatics and the conceptual apparatus of the Marxist-Leninist theory of the nation.
A lot of works were dedicated to the problematics of the Marxist-Leninist Theory of the nation in the USSR and far beyond its borders during the second half of the twentieth century. Perhaps, the number of researchers and their works of different scientific status (monographs, anthologies, dictionaries, textbooks, articles, dissertations, etc.) and disciplinary nature (philosophy, political sciences, sociology, culturology, ethnology, psychology, etc.), where different problems of the Marxist conception of the nation were considered, or where the real facts of social life were analyzed from its ideological, theoretical and methodological standpoints, not only in the Soviet Union but also in the rest of the world, exceeds the number of researchers and their publications where other theoretical models (e.g., politics, economics, culture, spiritual life), that became a backbone element in the Marxist teaching of society, were the main object of the study.
Such high attention on the part of the Soviet scientific community and the party apparatus to the theoretical and practical problems of interpreting the phenomena of the national community and statehood, nationalism and internationalism, as well as interpretations of the processes of national genesis and nation-state building, the strategy of development of interethnic relations in the USSR and the nature of national relations in other countries (capitalist and developing), was predetermined by many interrelated factors, first of all, the scientific, political and ideological ones. The latter often became dominant in the system of requests and requirements for the social sciences and humanities in the second half of the twentieth century. It was they who determined the nature and direction of scientific research in the subject field of the theory of the nation, and had a decisive influence on the public assessments of scientists who specialized in the field of ethno-national problematics. The reasons for the ideol-ogization of the research work of Soviet scientists and their accessible results (accessible to all citizens, rather than a limited group, especially in the 1980s), were that the theory and concept of the nation were of traditional interest not only for Marxism as a science. They also performed such important, for the political system and power in the USSR, functions as: the theoretical substantiation of the system of regulatory and legal statuses of ethno-national communities (nations, ethnic groups, ethnic minorities) in the Soviet Union; scientific apology of the party strategy of "bringing nations together under socialism"; the development and popularization in the mass consciousness of the ideology of the "new historical community" - "the Soviet people"; ideological, theoretical and methodological support for the propaganda work of the CPSU and its structures and, in general, the struggle of the institutionalized power of
the Soviets against the manifestations of "bourgeois nationalism"; conducting counter-propaganda against all non-Marxist or anti-Marxist ideas, theories, ideologies and mythologemes that were created in the West and were considered hostile to the "matter of socialism and communist building", the victory of the national liberation movements of oppressed peoples, especially in developing countries.
I. "Russian Marxist Theory of the Nation" by Joseph Stalin. Undoubtedly, the Smith's highly negative assessments of the theoretical status of the Marxist interpretation of national genesis and the nature of nations will be left on his scientific conscience or civility. If we turn to the estimates of the alternative committed and ideological camp (to Marxists themselves), than it should be admitted that the Soviet Marxist-Leninist name of the theory "Historical and Economic Theory of the Nation" is fully justified, since the axiomatics of the Marxist materialist understanding of history is ideologically and conceptually localized and its objective logic (common lows) of the development through the change of social and economic formations and the world-wide historical role of the driving forces of social transformations is conceptually reflected ("the subjects of the historical process", such as classes, peoples and nations). However, in the Soviet scientific discourse the name "Historical and Economic Theory of the Nation" was not historically original or politically and ideologically authentic. Since it was Joseph Stalin (in his work "Marxism and the National Question" (1913), on the basis of the fundamental criticism of the ideas of the Austro-Marxists Otto Bauer and Karl Renner, introduced the basic postulates of the Marxist concept of the nation and proposed such a definition, that the Soviet social scientists throughout the post-Stalin era, even in the wake of the anti-Stalinist moods in the 1950s and early 1960s, could not substantially "supplement" or "modernize") who, in 1929, gave it a clear name "Russian Marxist Theory of the Nation". Moreover, he categorically added, "There is only one option left, to recognize that the Russian Marxist theory of the nation is the only correct one" [1, c. 335].
The public introduction by Joseph Stalin of the term "Russian Marxist" can be explained by the fact that, perhaps, he was the first, among Russian social democrats, to develop a clear conception of the nation, which he contrasted with another influential trend in European social democracy - Austrian Marxism, which had its own theory of the nation and a popular, in the early 20th century among many ideologues of national movements and left-wing parties, project of "cultural-national autonomy". Moreover, in 1929 there was no one to oppose to the head of the USSR and the Bolshevik party, even in terms of terminology. Therefore, only a "faithful continuator of the Lenin's work" could afford to abandon his categorical political and ideological attitude, which he formulated in the appeal "To the Jewish Workers" in 1905, "The Party (RSDLP. - V.V.), to destroy any thought about its national character, gave itself the name not Russian, but Russia's" [2, c. 267].
The name of the theory, called "Russian", perhaps, was the only thing that the multinational and "internationalist" scientific community of the Soviet era
social scientists did not discuss publicly and could not borrow it under the "Stalin brand". In the literature of the second half of the 20th century, since the time of the "Khrushchev thaw", its mentioning was secretly tabooed. In numerous publications of that period on the "history of theories of the nation" (of a scientific and educational nature) the following stages were normally distinguished: "pre-Marxist ideas about nations"; "the scientific contribution of K. Marx and F. Engels to the development of its scientific, materialistic concept"; "the Leninist stage in the development of the nation's historical and economic theory" and "modern bourgeois theories", whose scientific value was always questioned in the USSR.
Undoubtedly, numerous and multifaceted publications of the classics of Marxism-Leninism (Marx, Engels and Lenin) allowed Soviet researchers to find additional arguments to recognize the priority of their ideas for scientific interpretation of national genesis and states, determine the essence of national entities and characteristics of their attributive traits and types, as well as assessing the role of nations in the political and cultural history of Europe and the world.
For this reason, after the end of the epoch of Stalin (during the 50s - started the 60s) and within the framework of de-Stalinization requirements, Karl Marx, Frederick Engels and Vladimir Lenin were recognized by Soviet scientists and their colleagues from other socialist countries as the creators of the ideological, theoretical and methodological foundations of the MarxistLeninist theory, or as it was officially positioned during the 1960s - 1980s, "the genuine scientific theory of the nation", as well as the authors of the basic political and ideological prescripts for the practical solution of the "national question"". Indeed, the basic postulates of the historical-materialist interpretation were made in the numerous works of the classics of Marxism, both in the context of the axiomatics of the materialist socio-phil-osophical and politico-economical theory of society, and in the analysis of a purely national (theoretical and applied) problematics. They are as follows: the origin, essence, characteristics and typology of nations, the class dualism of national culture and identity; the relationship of nation and state (feudal, bourgeois and socialist) was revealed; a class assessment of nationalism and internationalism and their functions was given; policy regulations for the communist and socialist parties in the field of national politics were formulated; recommendations for the ideological support of socialist (proletarian) revolutions and national liberation movements, nation-state building in the first phase (socialist) of the communist socio-economic formation were proposed.
However, despite large numbers of works by the founders of Marxism and their followers (including the ideologist of the Second International, the leader of the German Social Democrats Karl Kautskiy), in which the genesis and social nature of nations, the essence and historical limitations of national states and nationalism were considered in various aspects (historical, economic, political, cultural, social, ideological, psychological, etc.), none of them proposed a definition of the
national community. Only in the polemical and partially commentary works of Vladimir Lenin, who avoided the "definition game", there are fragmentary statements about such basic, from the point of view of social and philosophical teaching and political doctrine of Marxism, signs of nations as "unity" of "economic relations", "territory" and "language".
And yet, Joseph Stalin in his work "Marxism and the National Question", was the first, among the theorists and ideologists of Marxism (both European and Russian), to offer a logically clear formula for the concept of the nation, which was conceptually related to the axioms of this doctrine. In 1913, this formula was published in an article style in three issues of the "Enlightenment" journal, which was edited by Vladimir Lenin, and who was well acquainted with its ideas, spoke well of it and recommended to the Bolshevik party organizations in Russia for review.
In this work, Stalin intended, as he noted, "to resist militant nationalism", whose "wave" was "threatening to capture the working masses". Having analyzed in detail popular among European and Russian Social-Democrats ideas of the Austro-Marxists, and analytically "exhausted", as he writes, "all signs" of the national community ("unity of language", "unity of territory", "unity of economic life and economic cohesion" and "unity of mental make-up"), which most political thinkers and ideologists of the second half of the 19th, beginning of the 20th century considered typical of nations, he finally stated, "A nation is a historically constituted, stable community of people, formed on the basis of a common language, territory, economic life, and psychological make-up manifested in a common culture" [3, c. 296]. It must be noted that this is a well-known part of the Stalin's definition. In addition, the author, debating with his ideological opponents of the time, and taking into account some possible prospects of an ideological struggle with anti-Marxists (for example, if in modern terms, adherents of constructivism, in-ventionalism or primordialism), emphasized that, "Any nation is not an accidental or ephemeral conglomerate, but a stable community of people"; "A nation is not a racial or tribal, but a historically formed community of people"; "The nation, like any historical phenomenon, is subject to the law of change, has its own history, a beginning and an end" [3, c. 293, 297].
Another important theoretical postulation and doctrinal political idea of one of the ideologists of the RSDLP (b), which further influenced the national liberation processes in the Russian empire, especially lawmaking in the USSR and its initial legal regulations that determined the hierarchy in the multinational federal state (cultural-national, national-territorial or union republican status), was the statement that "none of the indicated characteristics is enough individually exhaustive to provide a definition of the nation. Moreover, the absence, of at least, one of these signs is enough for a nation to cease to be a nation". In general, the categorical Stalin's theoretical and political answer, "Only the presence of all the signs taken together gives us a nation" [3, c. 297].
The Stalin's definition of the nation cited from the work of 1913, the formational framework of national
communities and the interpretation of their basic features were almost undeniable dogma for the Soviet social scientists of the second half of the 20s - 50s of the 20th century. The Soviet scientists of later ideological epochs (1960s - 1980s) faced a difficult dilemma - to reject Stalin's concept of the nation or significantly modernize it, and thus create a new anti-Stalin or counter-Stalin version of the definition of the nation, and not to abandon the systemically important postulates of the Marxist-Leninist teaching and the prescripts of the official communist ideology (which together turned into metanarration in the USSR) was impossible. Stalin logically built up his interpretation of the essence of the national community on the axioms of the Marxist theory of society, its structure and development.
Moreover, in the work of 1929 Stalin gave a detailed substantiation of the phenomena and concepts of capitalist and socialist nations, described the main trends in their development, which in the future, despite the explicit and implicit anti-Stalinism in the US SR, became the basic theoretical and ideological construction in the typology of nations and interpretation of their historical perspectives in the works of Soviet social scientists of the 1960s and 1980s.
A new solution to the problem was that in the postSoviet period, Ukrainian scholars disputed not only Marxism-Leninism's own, self-sufficient and scientific theory of the nation, but also began to prove that Stalin, who for many decades was considered to be the first author of the Marxist definition of the concept of the nation, was at most a good plagiarist.
II. De-Stalinization of the Concept of the Nation in Soviet Marxism in the Second Half of the Twentieth Century. The Ukrainian scientists F. Go-rovskiy, A. Kartunov and Yu. Rimarenko were among the first, who, in 1991, at the time with the already obvious collapse of the USSR, showed sharp but not very reasoned criticism of Stalin's definition of nation and, above all, in the aspect of its theoretical "innovation" and political mission. They stated that in this theory Stalin, first of all, "relied on the provisions of K. Kautskiy and partly of O. Bauer". Secondly, in spite of the fact that his "theory of the nation was different from the standpoints of K. Marx, F. Engels, V. I. Lenin, and K. Kautskiy", nevertheless, he "committed a forgery", because he borrowed "some features" of national community that were formulated in the writings of the "founders of Marxism and Lenin", and then "included" them in his "definition of the nation", but "gave them their own, dogmatic interpretation, which was absolutized, hypertrophied and linked them to each other rigidly". He then emphasized that only unity, only the presence of all the features "combined together gives us a nation". Third, the researchers reminded that in the work The National Question and Leninism (1929), Stalin "introduced the division of nations into capitalist and socialist". Finally, they concluded that, on the whole, "Stalin's approach" to the definition of the nation "was not accidental". For, on the one hand, "it was due to the absolutization and hypertrophication of the place and role of the class principle, the class struggle in the political life of society, and the underestimation and ignoring of the national factor". On the other hand,
Stalins approach "laid a theoretical foundation for the politicization of nations, their identification with the state". Thus this foundation allegedly «led to the inequality of ethnic groups, their artificial division into "nation-state" and "non-state" nations" [4, c. 46-47].
Identical detailed criticism was repeated by the same authors in the Nation article in the publication called "Ethnonational Development of Ukraine. Terms, the Definition of Personality" (1993). Although the accusations of Stalin of "forgery" lost the scientific logic. Since, on the one hand, it was stated, "As it is known, neither the founders of Marxism, nor Lenin did not give a definition of the nation. They only ambiguously mentioned some of its features, in particular: common territory, economic relations, language and culture". And, on the other hand, the Ukrainian researchers actually stated that Stalin committed forgery in relation to those who could not define the nation in the framework of the Marxist paradigm and only ambiguously stated that there were some common features of national community. And what did he replace in the nonexistent and indefinite? The authors wrote that the essence of this forgery "laid" in the fact that "by having included the mentioned features in the definition of the nation, he gave them his own, dogmatic interpretation, absolutized, exaggerated and rigidly tied to each other" [5, c. 251-252].
After the final change of social, political and ideological epochs in Ukraine (from "pseudo-socialist" to "pseudo-democratic"), many prominent Ukrainian scientists stepped up criticism of the ideas and theoretical constructions of Joseph Stalin. In particular, the same F. Gorovskiy (in such a fundamental, collective and unique publication for the post-Soviet scientific communities as Short Encyclopedia of the Ethno-State Science, 1996) said that the "Stalin's definition of the nation is of a compromise nature, since it eclectically united historical, economic and psychological views on the nature of the phenomenon of the nation itself". In addition, F. Gorovskiy emphasized, "With a careful analysis it is not difficult to notice that the first three signs of the nation are given by Stalin "the way Kautskiy did it", while the fourth is taken from Bauer" [6, c. 139]1. A similar assessment, but with an additional emphasis on the fact that the Stalin's definition is a "plagiary", was offered by A. Kartunov in his textbooks [7, c. 66]. G. Kasyanov did the same but more tactfully by giving a reference in his monograph (1999). This way Stalin received a new accusation of non-Marxism. "It is not difficult to notice", he stressed, "that Stalin in some elements of his synthetic definition appears to be a real "Veberian", although being an orthodox Marxist, he introduced a very important element in it "the unity of economic life" (in this respect he appears to be not so much Marx, who had little interest in the issues of nations in general, but the German thinker
1 In this case, we note that in the works of Karl Kautskiy, who sharply criticized the theory of the nation and the project of cultural-national autonomy of Austro-Marxists Karl Renner and Otto Bauer (especially the latter, because he did not understand the essence of national culture, progressiveness in the capitalist era of such a form as a "national state" compared to a "state of nationalities", considered Jews to be "a nation
Friedrich List, who was one of the founders of the economic theory of the nation)". In general, as a result of the analysis of the Russian-Soviet Marxist approach to the conceptual modeling of the nation's phenomenon, G. Kasyanov stated, "If we turn to taxonomy, then it should not be called "Marxist-Leninist", but "MarxistStalinist" or, for example, "Marx-Stalin-Kautskiy-Ren-ner" (the list goes on)". Although he still admitted, "Some parts of it, if perceived not as a canon, but as a more educational means, seem to be quite correct and interesting for the researchers of the question of the nation, therefore you should not treat it as an "ideological trash", what some modern researchers suffer from" [8, c. 46, 49].
But before turning to the analysis and evaluation of innovations in the interpretation of nature and signs of the national community, which were made by the Soviet social scientists in the discourse of Marxism-Leninism and the CPSU history narrative in the second half of the twentieth century, it is necessary to recall our own Stalin's clarifications of the definition of the nation.
Therefore, in this case, of particular importance is the fact that the USSR scientists, in their intellectual searches and generalizations, took into account, as a rule, the wording of the text "Marxism and the National Question" (1913). And in fact, they did not take into account the very important ideas that were presented in the later Stalin's publication "The National Question and Leninism. The Answer to the Comrades Meshkov, Kovalchuk and Others" (1929).
In this publication, for analyzing and evaluating the evolution of theoretical ideas about the nature of nations in Soviet Marxism of the second half of the 20th century, two things seem fundamental. Firstly, Stalin himself corrected the meaning of the "fourth feature" of the national community ("psychological makeup, manifested in the unity of culture"), the interpretation of the name and the meaning, what caused great discussions among Soviet specialists during the 1960s -1980s. Secondly, he categorically refused to recognize the state as the necessary "fifth" attribute of the national community.
Thus, in the definition that he edited in 1929, Stalin emphasized, "Russian Marxists have long had their own theory of the nation". According "to this theory, a nation is a historically formed stable community of people that emerged on the basis of the following four features, namely, on the basis of a common language, common territory, common economic life and common psychological makeup, manifested in the unity of specific features of the national culture". In other words, Stalin himself changed the meaning of his own initial interpretation of the "fourth attribute". Although he did not present it in details [1, c. 333].
that has no future" and therefore does not need cultural-national autonomy), defined attributive, for social and political philosophy of Marxism, features of the national community (especially the historicity of its nature, an unconditional necessity for the formation of the nation of "community of language" and "territory"), nevertheless, did not suggest a definition for it.
At the same time, concerning the ideas of "stat-ism", which opponents of Stalinist Marxism persistently offered to us in order to supplement the concept of the nation; its creator rejected them in a reasonable way. Such an approach can be recognized not only as a claim for the infallibility of the "faithful continuer of Lenin's work" in the theory of the "national question", but also by striving to make the Marxist understanding of the nature of the national community more ambiguous and precise, and politically more instrumental. It allowed preventing all the unnecessary controversy in the future (even non-public) in the Soviet scientific community and political class.
The essence of the problem was in the following. The Ukrainian scientists F. Gorovskiy and Yu. Ryma-renko who were influential in the scientific world of Soviet social scientists in their work, which was published in 1985, stressed, "In literature attention is payed to the well-known evolution of the views of K. Marx and F. Engels on the interpretation of certain aspects and provisions of the general theory of the nation, and indicate, in particular, some of their adherence to the generally accepted statist theory, which placed the main emphasis on the «statehood» of national communities. K. Marx and F. Engels often used the term "nation" to denote a particular state in their writings, even if these peoples belonged to a slave-owning or feudal society, but retained some kind of common origin and language" [10, c. 18].
By the way, in his publications of the post-Soviet period, F. Gorovskiy made Stalin's definition identical with the statist way of defining the concept of the nation. Contrary to the basic ideas of the Marxist historical and economic theory of the nation and, moreover, to the sense of his definition of the nation (including the list of its features of 1913) and, especially, the later additional Stalin's explanations (1929), with which the Ukrainian scientist was familiar, he said, "Stalin's definition of the nation was the most damaging because it actually identified the national and state community. We can still feel its disastrous consequences today in the form of hypertrophic politicization of national relations" [6, c. 139].
So, Stalin, back in the late 1920s, on the proposal to improve "The Theory of the Nation of Russian Marxism" and "add one more attribute of the nation to the existing four", namely, "the existence of its own separate state", "without having which" "no nation can exist", replied, "I think that the proposed scheme with its new, fifth feature of the concept of the nation is absolutely erroneous and cannot be justified either theoretically or practically politically" [1, c. 334].
Explaining his disagreement with the need to "supplement" and "correct" the "Russian Marxist theory of the nation", he said that theoretically such a scheme "leads to absurd conclusions" and "cannot be considered scientific". The leader of the Soviet Union, and the chief ideological theoretician of the Communist Party (Bolsheviks) wrote, "With your scheme, we would have recognized only those nations that have their own, separate from others, state, and all the oppressed nations deprived of independent statehood, would have to be blot out of the category of nations.
Furthermore, the struggle of the oppressed nations against national oppression and the struggle of colonial peoples against imperialism would have to be removed from the concept of "the national movement" and "national liberation movement"" [1, c. 334]. He also stressed, "Moreover, under your scheme you would have to assert that Irish became a nation only after the formation of the Irish Free State, and until that time they were not a nation"; "Norwegians were not a nation until the separation of Norway from Switzerland, but became a nation only after this separation"; "Ukrainians were not a nation when the Ukraine was a part of Russia, they became a nation only after the separation from Soviet Russia at the time of the Central Council and hetman Skoropadskiy, but they again ceased to be a nation after they united their Ukrainian Soviet Republic with other Soviet republics into the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. A lot of similar examples could be cited" [1, c. 334-335].
From a "practical and political" point of view, Stalin remarked that such a "scheme", firstly, "leads to the justification of national, imperialist oppression, the carriers of which resolutely do not recognize oppressed nations, nations that do not possess full rights and those nations that do not have their own individual states, and believe that this circumstance gives them the right to oppress these nations". Secondly, this "scheme leads to the justification of bourgeois nationalists in the Soviet republics", which "prove that the Soviet nations ceased to be nations after they went to unite their Soviet republics into the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics" [1, c. 335].
In the anti-Stalin epoch, especially during the 1960s, and the early years of the 1970s (and not only because of counter-Stalinism), but again in the second half of the 1970s, the first half of the 1980s, in the Soviet scientific community with the participation of researchers from European socialist countries, an active discussion among the representatives of various humanitarian, social and political sciences, took place on the problems of conceptual understanding of the phenomenon of the nation. One of its main reasons was to strive for either de-Stalinization or scientific modernization of the "historical and economic theory of the nation" through a more precise definition of the characteristics of the national community. That, respectively, required the development and introduction of a new scientific discourse, adequate to the social and political realities and ideological trends of the time, new its definition.
And above all, in the second half of the 20th century, the Soviet social scientists got engaged in the terminological correction of the Stalinist theoretical classification or designation of nations as "historically established stable communities of people". Most of them (each of these scientists maximally exploited the quotations of Karl Marx, Frederic Engels and Vladimir Lenin) stated in their publications that all communities of people (including the nation) are, without a doubt, "historical" and took an active part in the updating of the general noumenon (historical), initiating the tendency of using of ideas of theoretical sociology and ethnology. At the same time, they often unnecessarily
played with the meanings and senses of the newly introduced concepts.
In their works, many of the Soviet researchers and their colleagues from the socialist countries began to insist that the nation is a binary "social and ethnic organism" [11, c. 58]. Or "a social organism with which and on the basis of which nationality was formed and strengthened as a complex of characteristic ethnic features, attributes and specific qualities'" [12, c. 173]. Some authors (usually historians, social philosophers) changed their accents and offered to interpret nations as a "historical phenomenon", but above all as "social" [13, c. 42], which has a clear timeframe of being and formational (capitalism/socialism) features in the world history. A number of social scientists (mainly ethnographers, ethnopsychologists and philosophers) emphasized that national communities are a "historical social phenomenon" that "exists only in the ethnic form" [14, c. 7]. Some of them, especially in the publications of the 1980s, proposed to consider national communities "in the contradictory duality of the social" (social-class) and "ethnic" [15, c. 63], and recommended appropriate names for them: "ethnosocial" or "socio-eth-nic" community. In the early 1980s, under the influence of the works of the high-status Soviet community ethnographers, the concept of "ethnosocial organism" was introduced into scientific circulation as one of the most common noumena for the national community [16, c. 63].
Certainly, on the issue of the "correlation between ethnic and social-class in the national and the nation" and in numerous works by Soviet researchers, one can come up with theoretical approaches that are close to the above mentioned one.
At the same time, in the work of A. Kozing (Academician of the Academy of Sciences of the GDR), along with the joint opinion, in the context of the paradigm ideas of the Soviet Marxists about the relationship between the social and ethnic, the most generally understood as a "form of national community", as a "concrete form of its social content" or "social essence" and that a nation, as a historical form of the community of people differs mainly from other large and historical stable forms of communities (social groups) - ethnic groups, nationalities, classes, social strata, castes, ethno-confessional groups, etc., a rather non-standard social-political-philosophical idea for the Soviet Marxism-Leninism was expressed (published in the USSR in 1978). Actively quoting V.I. Lenin, like all Marxists, he, but in his own way interpreted Lenins axiom, "Nations are an inevitable product and an inevitable form of the bourgeois era of social development" [17, c. 93], and argued that they (nations) are not just a form of community (collectivity, or a large social group) of people of a certain, post-feudal period of history, but something more. He stressed, "In both socio-economic formations - the capitalist and socialist, nations is first and foremost a natural form of the development of society" . "A nation is a form of development of social being that continues to exist even after the liquidation of capitalism and plays an important role in the historical development of society" [12, c. 120, 124].
On the assumption of such a general sociological message that equates "community" and "society", but without taking into account the fact that nations are not the only "social product" of social development processes even under capitalism, the German scientist made quite radical theoretical and political (because he did not take into account the institutional aspect of national reality, that is, the forms of state structure existing in the world and the nature of globalization processes) conclusions. He stated that a "bourgeois society naturally develops in a national form", and a "socialist nation" is "a form of development of a socialist society" [12, c. 121, 125].
However, such a theoretical novelty remained almost unnoticed among Soviet social scientists and did not affect the process of modernization done by them of the historical and economic, Marxist-Leninist theory of the nation.
As a result, the main trend in the course of de-Sta-linization/reform of the Soviet Marxist-Leninist theory of the nation and its basic concept was that scientists began to treat "ethnic" not as the essence of a nation, but only as its "socio-historical uniqueness", or "universal historical form or method of organizing its content". And on the contrary, the social in a nation was recognized by them as its essence, substantiality, qualitative certainty which manifests itself in the ethnic form, but completely depends on the class nature of nations. It is the social and class essence of a nation, all social scientists and humanities tirelessly repeated, that influences its political institutionalization, the type of ideology, the society dominating values (nationalistic or internationalist) and the character of cultures (bourgeois, democratic or socialist).
It should be especially mentioned that active discussions and innovations in the interpretation of the essence and dialectics of the interrelation of the phenomena and concepts of "ethnic", "ethnicity", "nationality", "national affiliation" and "national identity" in the human and social sciences in the USSR in the second half of the 20th century were not only preconditioned by the internal factors of their development.
A major role was played by external challenges and requests. Firstly, the rivalry with Western researchers and their latest theoretical models of nation and nationalism, many of whom actively used the above-mentioned concepts in their theories. The most fundamental question was, precisely, the definition of the essence of "ethnic" and "social" and their correlation in the national and the nation. Moreover, their objective content, as well as subjective (national: consciousness, self-consciousness, identity, identification, psychology, feelings, etc.) manifestations, structure and functions were also important. Secondly, the problematics and themes of the relationship between "ethnic" and "social" turned out to be extremely relevant not only for the purpose of further updating the Marxist-Leninist, historical and economic concept of the nation, but also because of the need to develop theoretical foundations for the Communist Party ideological innovations stated in the early 1960s. And above all, the main idea of the new ideologem and mythologem, which were proclaimed in 1961 at the XXII Congress of the CPSU in the report
by Nikita Khrushchev, was that from the representatives of different nationalities (nations, ethnic groups, etc.), a "new historical community of people - the Soviet people", was formed in the Soviet Union.
Over time, this "type of consolidation of the peo-ple"2 was interpreted in the literature by the Soviet scientists not only as historical, but also as a social and international community, which is characterized by: state-political and territorial unity (with a federal, union structure), common socialist economy, uniform in social peculiarities and diverse in national characteristics culture, strong socio-political and ideological (based on Marxist-Leninist ideology, communist ideals and goals, principles of internationalism, Soviet patriotism, the policy of strengthening the friendship of peoples done by the CPSU) inviolable unity of all classes, domains, nations and nationalities who, like a "family of the peoples of the USSR" under the influence of the socialist system and the Soviet political system, developed a common cultural way of expanding the sphere of the use of the language of international communication (Russian), values and features of the nation's psych.
For example, here is one of the standard definitions of the "Soviet people", which is given in a typical textbook (1981) on "Scientific communism", which, we remind, in the 1960s became a generally obligatory discipline in the system of higher education of the Soviet Union. "The Soviet people", stated the authors of the textbook, as well as the academicians and first figures in the formal and informal hierarchy of the Soviet community of social scientists and ideologists (P. Fe-doseyev, V. Afanasyev, F. Burlatskiy, A. Yakovlev, V. Zagladin, S. Kaltakhchian and many others), "is a community of people that has one common homeland, common territory, one single economy that is based on social property, one single culture with socialist content and diverse in national characteristics, national languages and a language of international communication, common federative state and one common goal - building of communism.
The Soviet people represent a single collective of workers from cities and villages of the multinational USSR. The socialist social system gave rise to new psychology and a new spiritual image of the Soviet people. In their activities, they are guided by Marxist-Leninist ideology, the communist ideals of the working class, and the principles of proletarian and socialist internationalism.
In the formation of a new historical community of people - the Soviet people, the leading role was played by the CPSU..." [20, c. 320].
Of course, in terms of its content, the above definition of the Soviet people is, to some extent, similar to the Marxist-Leninist definition of the nation.
2 In modern Western literature, the concept of the "civic nation" is used for this phenomenon, i.e. liberal and democratic interpretation of the political national community. It is conceptually defined as a solidary political and legal community of equal citizens of a democratic state (a republic where the principle of "sovereignty of the people" is guaranteed constitutionally), whose identity is not ethnic, but political. Its men-
For this reason, in order to somehow operational-ize the difference between the meanings and senses of these two concepts, in literature one significant theoretical clarification was given to its ideological pathos and stereotypes, "The Soviet people is not some kind of supernation that assimilates and replaces nations, but their international community"; its "social, ideological and political unity, integrity", which "functions as a complex international system, the structural elements of which are socialist nations and nationalities"; "the systemic organization of people of different nationalities". The Soviet people is a community of people "of a higher order than a nation". "The interaction of the national and the international occurs within" this "social and international community" and "is the source of the flourishing and rapprochement of the nations and nationalities of the USSR" [20, с. 321].
By the way, such a distinction between the phenomena and concepts of the "Soviet people" and the "nation", which was clearly carried out in the end of the 1980s, at least in theory and ideology, shows the illegality of a number of analogies and critical assessments that were stated in the post-Soviet period. For example, the Ukrainian researcher, G. Kasyanov, relying on the Western terminological and ideological tradition which was formed in the complex of paradigms of the theories of the nation and nationalism, said, "Although it is paradoxical, the development of the concept of "a new historical community" led to the formation of ideas of the so called political nation. At the same time, the term "nation", obviously, should have been out of use, instead, a politically more neutral term "the people" was put forward. In fact, the term "Soviet people" was synonymous with the term "political nation" [9, с. 48].
It is worth reminding that following great discussions, the Soviet social scientists also agreed that the "four features" (social and ethnic) of the national community that are classical for Marxism (common territory, economic life, language and psychological makeup manifested in the common culture) are necessary and sufficient to determine the nation. And some logical corrections of the features, proposed by many of them, were insignificant.
Even less scientifically significant and theoretically reasoned in the Soviet period of the 70s and 80s of the last century were the recommendations of the scientists to proofread the names of the main ("four") features of the nation. The first of them, ("common language" in its original version) was proposed to be interpreted as "common literary language", "homogeneity of language", "unity of written language". The second was offered to rename: "the unity of the territory", "the integrity of the territory". The third basic feature of the nation, as well as the two previous ones, did not cause any particular objections on the part of the Soviet social
tal and ideological core is not ethnonationalism, but patriotism, as well as the principles and values of multiculturalism. Read, for example: Вшков В.Ю. Генезис поняття наци. Ви-дання 3-ге. - К.: Видавець Карпенко В.М., 2014, с. 317322; В1лков В.Ю. 1деологема та м1фологема «Нацюна-льна вдея»: украшська полггико-фшософська традищя в дискура сучасно! теори демократи (частина друга) // Wspolpraca Europejska, 2018. - № 5 (36), с. 10-22.
scientists, but it was suggested to clarify its meaning like this: "commonality of economic relations" or "commonality of industrial economy".
The most heated theoretical debates among Soviet researchers arose on the issue of understanding the essence (including structural elements) and the name of the "fourth" Stalin's characteristic of the nation - "The unity of mental makeup", manifested in the cultural affinity. And the problem of the theoretical modernization of this feature was generated in the Soviet scientific community not only by the complexity of the social and philosophical understanding of the subjective, social, psychological and mental constituent of all the processes of national genesis, national liberation or unification movements and nation-building, but also by the disciplinary differentiation and underdevelopment of the categorical apparatus (tools) of the set of "science of the spirit".
As a result, by the early 1980s, from the set of ideological and conceptual innovations to replace the outdated Stalin's name "mental makeup", in the discourse and the logic of the ideas of the Marxist-Leninist theory of the nation, which was influenced by the work of such iconic figures in the Soviet system of human and social sciences as E. Bagramov, Yu. Bromley, A. Gadzhiev, A. Dashdamirov, L. Drobizhieva, S. Kaltakhchian, M. Kulichenko, to designate "the spirit and soul of the nation" as the subject of cultures and politics the following categories became dominant in the Soviet scientific literature: "national character", "national psychology", "national consciousness" and "national self-consciousness"3.
Of course, each of the Soviet researchers, depending on his sectoral or disciplinary membership, his own theoretical ideas and preferences, sought to modify the interpretation of the essence, structure, socio-political and cultural functions of the above-mentioned mental phenomena. Thus, one could correct the meanings and senses of the concepts traditional for the Soviet Marxist-Leninist theory of the nation. There were those who rejected all sorts of innovations, even lexical ones, tried to prove the "non-scientific status" of such a "novelty". And some, contrary to the "collective voice", formed in the scientific community, unsuccessfully, but with the help of a complex, as a rule, "scientific-like" argument, tried to introduce into the scientific circulation their own non-standard ideas and concepts for the theoretical reflection of the spiritual side of the existence of nations.
On the other hand, the collective Soviet modernization of the Marxist-Leninist ("Russian Marxist") theory and concept of the nation did not lead to borrowings from its ideological opponents, did not take steps to come closer to the paradigmatic theoretical models that were created by Western scientists in the second half of the 20th century on the basis of axiomatics and methodologies of various social sciences. Certainly, they became known to the representatives of the Soviet Union
scientific community, but were criticized by them because of their conviction or even because of the totality of the Communist Party "voluntarily-compulsory" control. Although, it was mostly done, not from theoretical, but from political and ideological standpoints. And above all, the Soviet Marxists rejected the innovative, heuristic ideas of those modern approaches and concepts whose authors developed the dichotomy of nationalism, national communities and identities as ethnic and political phenomena.
The definitions, that became classical by the mid 80s of the last century in the USSR, says a lot about the rejection of Western experts in the field of "theories of the nation and nationalism", as well as the modernization of the "Russian Marxist" (Marxist-Leninist) theory of the nation and its basic concept. Thus, in the highstatus and exemplary for the Soviet times scientific publication - "Philosophical Encyclopedic Dictionary" (the article was written in 1983 by S. Kaltakhchian), the nation was defined as "a historical community of people formed during the formation of the unity of their territory, economic ties, literary language, some features of their culture and character" [21, c. 417].
Conclusion. There were several stages in the evolution of Russian and then Soviet Marxism, as well as in the series of attempts to reconsider and, as a result, modernize the theory of the nation. The first anti-Stalinist stage is considered to be the most unexpected and radical. It began under the influence of the Twentieth Congress of the CPSU (February 1956), after the report of Nikita Khrushchev at a non-public meeting devoted to the exposure of the personality cult of Joseph Stalin. The de-Stalinization measures in the political sphere began to be held in the very first months after the meeting of the Congress, however, in the sciences society the disclamation of Stalin's merit in creating the theory and concept of the nation, within and from the standpoint of the Marxist teaching, began at the beginning of the 1960s. In the publications of the late 50s, Stalin's ideas and works were still actively cited in a positive context. In scientific terms, his definition of the nation was highly appreciated, as well as the characteristics of its features. The abrupt change in assessments in the works of Soviet social science experts in national themes, the "de-Stalinization" of the theory of the nation itself and its "Leninization", became more active in the 1960s and actually ended by the mid-1970s. It can be considered the completion of the second stage of the renewal of the theory of the nation in Soviet Marxism. The first half of the 1980s is believed to be the third stage. The criticism of Stalin's theoretical ideas about the nation or his judgments and recommendations for conducting national policy (this problem disappeared from the discourse of social science in the USSR), was no longer its specific feature, but a diverse correction of the meanings of the basic elements/features of the national community, which representatives of various social sciences tried to implement.
3 At the same time, we need to stress that the concept of "national identity", which is more characteristic of the conceptions (theoretical models) of the nation and nationalism of Western researchers, has hardly been used.
Finally, it is necessary to recognize that the numerous scientific disputes and the second half of the 1970s, the first half of the 1980s of the twentieth century, were practically ineffectual. A scientific breakthrough in the radical renewal of the Marxist-Leninist, historical and economic theory of the nation, respectively, the meanings and senses of its concept, did not happen. The representatives of the social sciences were reconciled by a research attitude similar to the one that was announced 1970 as a result of a broad discussion of the 1960s ("Voprosy Istorii" journal: 1966, No 4, 6, 12; 1967, No 6-7; and finally number 8, 1970). They came to the conclusion that, "a detailed discussion during the debates confirmed the opinion of the majority" of Soviet scientists, that "the definition of the nation that we have (similar to Stalin. - V.V.) includes the main features of all types of nations"; it "is scientific, Marxist", "is a part of the Marxist-Leninist theory of the nation". And although such a definition "does not disclose the specific features of each" of the types of nations, however, "the accepted Marxist concept of the nation (with the exception of some clarifications) does not need to be reconsidered" [10, c. 64-65].
In general, despite its duration and a large number of participants who represented different branches of sociopolitical and humanitarian knowledge in the USSR, the discussion did not bring any fundamentally new scientific, theoretical or political significant results. Stalin played a "cruel joke" with the adherents of Marxism-Leninism when an unsolvable problem and dilemma arose. Rejection of the meanings of the Stalinist definition of the nation would inevitably mean the abandonment of the basic tenets of the Marxist theory of society and its history. And vice versa, the recognition of the scientific truth of the axiomatics of the Marxist theory of the historical process logically and naturally required such a definition of the national community with its main features, which would make it possible to introduce nothing more than a stylistic correction of the Stalin's formula.
If one concisely assesses the transformation of conceptual knowledge about nations, dominant cognitive attitudes among representatives of the scientific communities of the post-Soviet period, then it can be noted that since the early 1990s, as an alternative to the uniformity of the theoretical and ideological prescriptions of Marxist-Lenin metanaration, especially its historical economic theory of the nation, the authors "intellectual freedom" had appeared, more similar to a scientific-theoretical anarchy. Although at that time Soviet Marxism often remained an ideological foundation of social science, it did not transform the Stalinist interpretation of the nation radically, but its ideas were already actively, unsystematically, uncritically combined in symbiosis with individual postulates of those theories, paradigms or approaches, which were created by Western anti-Marxism researchers. Moreover, within the framework of academic and university science of the post-Soviet period, unlimited freedom to choose ideological bases for personal theoretical generalizations and constructions, complete nihilism in relation to the previous theoretical legacy (primarily Marxist), created an atmosphere of chaos of "points of view"
in the subject field of the theory of the nation, stimulated scientific irresponsibility and strong tendencies to eclecticism, relativism, as well as to the substitution of independent and systematic analysis by compilations or by judgments deprived of any scientific specificity. In addition to this, in the situation of a radical change of political systems and ideological doctrines that occurred in the new independent states, many scholars in their interpretations of sociopolitical phenomena and processes that were related to national problems, were often driven not by strictly scientific, scientistic theoretical and methodological criteria, attitudes, arguments and requirements, but by political sympathies and ideological preferences.
In the theoretical aspect, the definition proposed by leading Ukrainian specialists (F. Gorovskiy, A. Kartunov and Yu. Rimarenko, 1991) were one of the most visible manifestations of the consequences of the processes noted above. They stressed that "a category of nation could be defined as an ethno social (and not always blood-related) community with the existing stable self-awareness of its identity (common historical fate, psychology and character, adherence to national material and spiritual values, national symbolism and national ecological feelings), as well as (mainly at the stage of formation) territorial, linguistic and economic unity, which later under the influence of integration and migration processes manifests itself ambiguously, often losing its decisive significance, but by no means does not disappear. Due to various life conflicts, national unity can be maintained, both materially and for a number of nations, by spiritual and psychological factors, in particular, by common origin and historical destiny" [4, c. 49].
Another example, as one more characteristic feature of the post-Marxist stage of the development of theoretical models of the nation, which implicitly began to form in the USSR in the late 1980s and became one of the determining factors after its collapse, was the tendency to interpret the national community. Firstly, it was done on the basis of very abstract ethnological and ethno-psychological ideas (in the latter case, even the nineteenth century), and secondly, not to include in the definition of the nation a list of its specific features. For example, the definition of the nation that is proposed in such a Russian edition as "Politology: An Encyclopedic Dictionary". The dictionary defines nation in the spirit of the ethicist interpretation with some elements of agnosticism, "A nation (from Latin. Nation - tribe, people) is a type of ethnos, a historically arising socio-economic and spiritual community of people with certain psychological make-up and self-consciousness. It is so complex in content and diverse in its specific rules that it is impossible to embrace it with a general, formal definition, without distorting its essence, without leaving aside many essential characteristics and features" [22, c. 212]. Another even more pro-Marxist definition, although with the active use of postulates from the Western theories of ethnicity, as well as psychological interpretations of the phenomenon of the nation, was offered in the collective work of Ukrainian scientists "Politol-ogy Encyclopedic Dictionary: higher educational establishment students manual", in which the authors
noted, " A nation (from Latin. A nation - tribe, people ) is a type of ethnos, a socio-economic and spiritual community of people with a certain psychological make-up and consciousness, the occurrence of which was predetermined historically and which has a persistent aggregate of essential characteristics" [23, с. 222].
As for the prospects of the Marxist-Leninist theory of the nation (i.e. the historical and economic version of the interpretation of the system of nation-forming traits), now, as a result of the official or unofficial (personal author) decommunization, it has practically lost its political relevance, influence and significance in the post-Soviet space, including Ukraine. The general situation among the scientific communities of the post-Soviet states, which study the theoretical aspects of national problems, was that most of their representatives were completely reoriented towards the intellectual product created by Western researchers in the field of theoretical modeling of the phenomena of nations and nationalism. In fact, many modern social scientists stopped independent scientific research and retrained to popularize basic non-Marxist paradigms.
Moreover, some of the most influential theorists in both Soviet and post-Soviet times, in particular, Ukrainian (G. Kasyanov, M. Stepyko) and Russian (V. Tishkov, V. Malakhov, A. Kustarev), following the well-known Western authorities in the theory of nation and nationalism (for example, such as B. Anderson, P. Alter, R. Brubaker, E. Carr, F. Hertz, K. Minogue, J. Summers, K. Symmons-Symonolewcz, H. Seton-Watson, P. White, etc.), became vocal supporters of either constructivism (especially of the postmodern, cognitive and linguistic type), or adherents of the "paradigm of strategic relativism"and agnosticism. They openly proposed to abandon both, the notion of "nation" and any scientific theoretical modeling of the phenomenon of national community, the definitions of its main features, the understanding of its institutionaliza-tion processes, etc. [18, с. 231-255]. They argued that that there had long been a fundamental and insoluble problem of the "definition uncertainty" in the complex of national sciences (unlike many other social, especially natural, branches of knowledge). Its essence is simple and lies in the fact that even in the medium term there are no scientific and theoretical prerequisites and opportunities to formulate a definition of the nation that could become universally accepted and common to all scientist, at least within the scientific community of one country.
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