The Russian ethnos in the XXth century: Stages of the extensive culture's crisis (Hypotheses of an ethnoecological model)

Abstract

The author makes an attempt at clearing up the peculiarities of political, social and cultural development of the Russian ethnos in the XXth century as a consequence of the Russia's transition from the extensive mode of development to the intensive one. The Russian ethnos is a unique ethnos of Eurasian Continent which expanded almost continuously its living territory during all its history. Thus the new natural resources were involved into the living sphere: land, woods, minerals etc. Human resources were also unlimited as high rate of population growth was typical for the Russian ethnos. It grew especially in late XlXth — early XXth centuries during the demographic transition period. The non-limited character of all kinds of resources allowed to cancel contradictions inside the ethnos. For example the stability of the social basis - of the Russian rural community — was achieved through an outflow of "superfluous" people beyond the borders of the main area of population. Contradictions arising in the process of extensive urbanization were also solved through involving of the practically unlimited human and natural resources. The community's stability limited the quantitative growth of towns. And the lack of dense network of urban settlements preconditioned by hugeness of the territory restricted the collapse of rural community, hindering the growth of labor productivity.Therefore the vicious circle existed, which was broken as a result of the first crisis of the extensive development and the Great October Revolution became a political embodiment of the crisis. The main reason of the crisis consisted in the impossibility of the further extensive development of the agricultural technologies being traditional for the Russian ethnos. At the same time the outcome of the crisis was possible only due to the forced development of the basic traditions of ethnic culture for a moment of the crisis. This stage of the Russian ethnos development continued within the life period of three generations and corresponded to the period of construction of "real socialism". It was historically inevitable, making evident discrepancy of the extensive culture principles and new situation. The Russian ethnos in twenties and thirties of the XXth century was not ready yet for the development of democratic institutions of power, nor for "implementation^ market relations. The mentality of people masses being thrown out from villages to towns and having formed marginal strata could not form the basis for the development of these institutions. Namely in the process of socialism construction the system of predominating valuables was changed immensely, making possible a new step in transition from the extensive model of development to the intensive one.The condition of transition to the intensive model of development consists in exhausting of three sources having provided for centuries the possibility of attraction of unlimited quantity of resources for solution of intrinsic conflicts: of high natural population growth, of newly mastered lands, of super cheap raw materials (ore, fuel etc.).The new stage of the Russian ethnos and the whole civilization development is connected with transition of urbanization processes from the stage of quantitive growth of towns (mainly in connection with migration) to the stage of formation of qualitatively new urban local substructures. To the end of the XXth century the demographic conditions for an emergence of real urbanistic culture in Russia were quite different from the European ones.In the end of the XXth century the Russian ethnos entered the principally new stage of its development — the stage of final transition from extensive to intensive development model. Therefore the Russian ethnos will be changing qualitatively and these changes will effectuate the ethnos structure as well as the content of the Russian history in wide sense. The main directions of the structural changes are differentiation of the Russian ethnos, crystallization of stable groups (territorial, social, ethnic and cultural). Stabilization of migration mobility as well as revival of local markets will inevitably lead to localization of processes inside the Russian ethnos and to localization of the Russian society as a whole.The society of the "developed socialism" period was characterized with relatively movable borders of local and social groups. Localization of ecological and demographic processes will in its turn, increase the influence of local element in culture and in structure of ethnic self-consciousness.At the new stage the role of competition as a factor influencing all the elements of social life of the Russian ethnos will grow, since in the process of extensive development competition was canceled on account of attraction of additional sources. So the role of social and cultural mechanisms regulating the results of competition will increase. In particular the role of laws in society's life as a management principle in comparison with personal regulation will be necessarily higher.Formation of the intensive culture is the long-term process of confirmation of an experience of contradictions solution in the ethnos culture. Contradictions between principles of the extensive and the intensive culture will arise at the intergroup level, for example between the groups, having mastered the principles of intensive cultures and the groups preserving preference of the extensive norms as well as at the level inside the group and even at the personality level. It will lead to the psychological tension growth in the ethnos environment. As a whole perception of the main principles of intensive model by the Russian ethnos is inevitable. Still its culture was formed initially as the extensive one and it 'is not clear if would lead to a loss of its best qualities or even of integrity. The Russian culture is the last extensive culture of the mankind, and the question of possibility of its revival in new conditions is very important because its loss may become fatal for the whole civilization.