Some states, as, for example, in Article 1 of the Romanian Constitution. Ideally, such a state assumes that all its citizens (or subjects) have a common language, culture and values, and that they are all part of a single society, with its and its problems.
Ideology
Civic nationalism claims that the legitimacy of the state is determined active participation its citizens in the political decision-making process, that is, the extent to which the state represents the "will of the nation". The main instrument for determining the will of the nation is the plebiscite, which can take the form of an election, a referendum, a poll, an open public discussion, etc.
At the same time, the belonging of a person to a nation is determined on the basis of a voluntary personal choice and is identified with citizenship. People are united by their equal political status as citizens, equal legal status before the law, personal desire to participate in the political life of the nation, adherence to common political values and a common civic culture.
At the end of the 19th century, Renan drew attention to the role of civic nationalism in Everyday life: "The existence of a nation is an everyday plebiscite, just as the existence of an individual is the eternal affirmation of life." Indeed, as Gellner has shown, in modern nations throughout their lives, citizens actively affirm their national identity and thus the legitimate status of the state.
As for the “primordial” representatives of the nation from the cultural and ethnic point of view, according to civic nationalism, they may not exist. It is more important that the nation consists of people who want to live next to each other on a single territory.
Civic nationalism is more pronounced in those young nations that arose in an already existing state with a fairly homogeneous population in terms of culture. This is exactly what happened in pre-revolutionary France, so early nationalism actively supported the ideas of individual freedom, humanism, human rights, and equality. He was characterized by a rational belief in universal and liberal progress. However, he played an important role in later times as well. Thus, in the middle of the 20th century, the national liberation struggle of the third world countries against colonialism often relied on civic nationalism as a path to the integration of society, contrasting it with the “divide and conquer” principle characteristic of imperialism. The exponents of such ideas were Gandhi, Nehru, Mandela, Mugabe.
The political and philosophical substantiation of the concept of nation-states was given in the works of J. Bodin (“The Book of Six States”), who formulated the concept of “sovereignty”, N. Machiavelli (“Sovereign”), who developed the category of “state interest” and G. Grotius (“On law war and peace "), which laid the foundations of the corps international law; as well as in the works of T. Hobbes and B. Spinoza.
Among the main goals of the nation state are:
Such goals can be reflected in the constitution, the educational program, the concept economic development and other official documents.
Criticism
see also
Notes
- Zorkin V. Apologia for the Westphalian system // "Rossiyskaya Gazeta" No. 4150 dated August 22
- Westphalian era Chapter from: Zyuganov G. A. . Geography of Victory: Fundamentals of Russian Geopolitics. M., 1997.
- Penrose J. Nations, states and homelands: territory and territoriality in nationalist thought (English) // Nations and Nationalism. 2002 Vol. 8, no. 3. P. 277.
This is a complex phenomenon that consists of three interrelated elements:
Forms of government;
Territorial device;
Forms of state regime.
Form types state structure depending on the sovereignty of the subjects of the state:
- simple forms a: unitary state. A unitary state is a simple state that consists of administrative-territorial units that do not have sovereignty, or a state that is not divided into administrative-territorial units (Singapore, Malta);
- complex shape: confederation and federation. A confederation is a temporary union of several sovereign states (USSR). The Federation is a complex state consisting of sovereign state entities (the Russian Federation).
Commonwealths and interstate associations cannot belong to the forms of state structure.
Policy
One of the forms of the state in antiquity was the policy. The policy was a state association of landowners who were engaged in various crafts.
A polis is a people's state-city, whose citizens had the right to property, socio-economic and political rights. The policy consisted of two parts: the center and the chora adjacent to the center of the agricultural territory.
The political system in the policies was the most diverse: democracy, monarchy, oligarchy. The supreme power in democratic policies belonged to the people's assembly, in oligarchic ones - to the census assembly, in monarchical ones - to the monarch.
Nation
A nation is a large group of people who are united by cultural, political, socio-economic and spiritual generalization.
A nation can be viewed in two ways: as a group of people who are citizens of one state, and as an ethnic generalization of people with a common language and similar identity.
The nation is divided into two types: monoethnic And polyethnic. Nowadays, mono-ethnic Nazis are extremely rare, and mostly in remote countries, for example, in Iceland.
Often, a nation is created on the basis of many ethnic groups, which, due to historical circumstances, were brought together on one territory. The concept of "nation" appeared not so long ago - at the beginning of the 18th century, and was finally entrenched in society during the French Revolution.
State - nation
The nation-state is a constitutional type of state. The nation-state expresses the form of organization and self-determination of the nation that lives on the territory of the state itself. The national character of the state is always enshrined in constitutions.
The nation-state has a monopoly on the use of force within its territory and on the formulation of binding rules. The basis of the nation-state is the recognition of all citizens as a single nation, with a common culture, history and language.
The ethnic picture of the world remains motley and contradictory early XXI centuries. There are over two thousand different ethno-national entities in the world, and about 200 UN member states. Some of them are predominantly mono-national (Austria - 92.5% Austrians, Norway - 99.8% Norwegians, Japan - 99% Japanese), in which are inhabited by a small part of representatives of other peoples Dov, others are multinational, uniting a number of indigenous ethnic groups and national groups (Iraq, Spain, Russia, etc.); the third - mainly the states of the equatorial part of the planet - consist mainly of tribal formations.
The problem of relations between the nation and the state has long been a subject of study and discussion. F. Engels found an internal connection between the nation and the state. K. Kautsky believed that the classical form of organizing national life is nation state. But since all "classical forms" often exist only as a model that does not always achieve full realization, in practice not all nations enjoy their statehood. M. Weber considered the ideal combination of national and state community, in which their coinciding interests are realized. One of the first who pointed out that the Ukrainian ethnos will become sovereign only when it has its own statehood was N. Kostomarov.
Nation (lat. - tribe, people) - historically arises in a certain territory as an economic, spiritual and political community of people with their specific consciousness and psychological features, traditions. Modern nations were born as a result of the formation of market relations. The most important factors in the consolidation of people in the nation, their rapprochement and communication were commodity production and trade. Only with the formation of the world market, commodity-money relations acquired a universal character and became the basis for the destruction of the patriarchal-communal and feudal way of life, the formation of ethno-political communities as a global phenomenon. This process covers the period of the XVI - XX centuries. For the 20th century characterized by the further disintegration of colonial empires and the formation of the nation-states of Asia, Africa, and Latin America.
In Europe, earlier than on other continents, national movements were born and a system of nation-states was formed. In the middle of the XIX century. The state of ethnic movements and the formation of nation-states can be divided into the following groups:
- post-integration, constituting one whole (English, Russian, Austrians, French, Swedes, Danes, goal Landes), and their dependent countries;
- pre-integration, close to unification or liberation from dependence (Germans, Italians, Spaniards, Portuguese);
- integrated into foreign political structures while maintaining a certain integrity (Irish, Norwegians, Belgians and those that were part of the Austro-Hungarian, Russian and Ottoman Empire);
- disintegrated - divided between states (Poles, Lithuanians, Ukrainians, etc.).
In terms of scale and consequences, the level of disintegration of Ukrainians was the highest. Only the internal collapse of empires created conditions for them to unite in a single state. Some of the peoples named above are still fighting for political self-determination today. But in general, the relationship between the formation of the nation and the state is obvious. Nations, self-determining, become the basis for the legitimation of statehood, the creation of viable economic systems and socio-cultural institutions.
The emergence and development of a nation-state is impossible without the majority of its citizens having a subconscious idea that would unite the country's population into a nation. / The national idea turns the people, inspired by it, into the creator of its historical destiny, into a guide for the future.] When the population is deprived of such an idea, then the nation sleeps and remains in the state of an ethnos that cannot claim political self-determination and stable statehood. The national idea reflects the whole complex of problems of the nation's self-affirmation, its rights and freedoms, and the people feel their internal unity, the connection between generations and traditions, see the prospect of their activities. The highest manifestation of such an idea, according to J. Bell, is the people's understanding of the ideal structure of social life and their own state. Then it will become an internal stimulus to political activity, and the national state will act as an external one, ensuring the sovereignty and social progress of the nation as a political community. M. Grushevsky, M. Dragomanov, S. Dnistryansky, V. Ligashsky, I. Franko saw the need to translate the Ukrainian national idea into state building.
The idea of a "sovereign nation" or "political nation" was born in the French Revolution, when the so-called third estate, which constituted the majority of the population of France, won civil rights for itself. At the same time, the "state" concept of a political nation was formed, according to which the concept of "representative of the nation" was identified with the concept of "citizen of a sovereign state." "A political nation is a community that, along with an ethno-cultural essence, also has a legal and state structure" (G. Setton-Watson). It is this understanding of the nation that is most common in economic developed countries where nation-states arose relatively earlier. An important role in their formation was played by the peoples' awareness of their national and socio-economic rights, by exercising which they brought their countries to the forefront of world progress. Accordingly, a sense of patriotism was formed, according to which a citizen defends his homeland, and it guarantees him personal security and other human rights. In the national-state idea, as we see, the need for the existence of a national state is clearly visible. However, in what direction should it develop and does it retain its connection with the nation? History knows examples when, under certain circumstances, the state can evolve with the priority of the national or class - to totalitarianism, and when the universal remains leading in the national - to a democratic, rule of law state.
In the political science concepts of F. Hegel, M. Weber, V. Lipinsky, the idea of a national state arises as an addition to the idea of a legal state. liberal idea, substantiating the equality of civil human rights, does not resolve the issue of the equality of the rights of each ethnic group, in particular the right to its state self-determination. The national idea differs from the liberal one in that it seeks to solve not only the problem of the legal equality of people of different nationalities, but also the question of the equality of nations, understood as their right to independent political development.
It is significant that where the idea of the nation-state is combined with the concepts of the liberal-demo cratic perspective and the rule of law, the progress of society is obvious ( North America, Scandinavian countries). The nation-state proved its advantage in this variant. Empires will sink into oblivion, and "non-historical peoples", whom their ideologists predicted death (Nietzsche, Marx, Dontsov), create their own states, the number of which is growing. In other words, the national state, which ensures the ethnonational unity and political stability of society, guarantees the development relations, freedom and equality of interethnic relations in its political field, cannot but be at the same time a constitutional state that protects the interests of a person, his rights and freedoms.
In a modern society, with priority universal values the decisive role is played not by classes, but by political nations as communities. There are no other effective ways of modernizing society outside the national one (N. Berdyaev), and this applies to both the countries of the so-called "third world" and post-socialist ones. Even in conditions when the country is torn apart by class contradictions, civil wars, the nation, as an ethno-community, remains, unites people around its national idea. The conquest of independence by an ethnos means its formalization into a nation-state. The German sociologist F. Gekkerman argues that the nation-state forms an ethno-community that has "not so much a common origin as a community of value ideas (orientation), institutions and political convictions."
Therefore, the nation state is a form political organization where the political-civil and ethnic affiliation of people are combined. It is "formed by the respective nation, compactly residing in a certain territory, as a result of its exercise of the fundamental right to political self-determination, which provides the necessary conditions for the preservation and development of the heritage of this nation and the enrichment and development of all nations, ethnic groups living in this state" [Mala encyclopedia! - K., 1996. - S. 539]. However, with the formation and development of nation-states, the problems of national relations do not lose their relevance.
One of the most important principles of the organization of modern statehood, which arose as a result of the collapse of traditional social ties and a sharp increase in the mobility of the population in the process of developing commodity-capitalist relations. The nation state as a political and legal reality arises from the need to clarify the traditional status of the state's subjects, who now, unlike foreigners, are subject to more stringent criteria of political loyalty, as well as civil rights and obligations defined by law. One of the most important functions of the nation state was the regulation of population migration. The principle of the nation-state is determined primarily by the system international relations and is not only the realization of the desire of national movements to create their own statehood. This is the meaning of the international recognition of new states or, on the contrary, non-recognition of separatism and rebellious territories; this also explains tough policy rich countries in relation to poor migrants.
The real subject of the nation state can be two kinds of nations: ethnic and civil origin. The first kind of nation is created by ethnicity, which gives such objective criteria of national identity as a common origin, a common language, a common religion, a common historical memory, a common cultural identity. Accordingly, a nation-state with a single ethnic basis seeks to identify its political boundaries with ethno-cultural ones. Such kind of national states are typical, for example, for Central and Eastern Europe (Hungary, Czech Republic, Poland, etc.). A nation of civil origin has a non-ethnic (and in this sense cosmopolitan) ideology (mythology) as its starting point. This role can be played by: the idea of popular sovereignty, "human rights", the communist worldview, etc. In any case, a nation of civil origin emphasizes the non-natural aspects of the national community, although it also implies the presence of such natural unifying moments as a common (state) language, common cultural and historical traditions, etc. The classical states formed from nations of civil origin were France and the United States. In the 20th century, such a type of nations of civil origin as "socialist nations" arose, many of which were composed of several ethnic communities (USSR, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, etc.). Although the populations of many nation-states of civil origin are multi-ethnic, this in itself does not mean that they are less cohesive than the populations of nation-states of mono-ethnic origin. However, as historical experience shows (in particular, the collapse of "socialist nations"), the politics of large ethnic groups creates a potential or actual threat to the existence of civil nations.
As a result of the processes of modernization and globalization, the distinction of nation-states mentioned above is becoming more and more relative. On the one hand, none of the modern ethno-national states is completely mono-ethnic, and ethnic minorities existing or appearing in it are in no hurry to assimilate into the dominant (titular) ethnicity (nation). On the other hand, no nation-state of civil origin has ever been quite a "melting pot" for the ethnic characteristics of its citizens. The latter, expressing full loyalty to the national state and developing a cultural identity consistent with it, at the same time can retain important features of their ethnic origin (language, traditions), such as, for example, "Russian Armenians" in the Russian Federation or "American Chinese" in the USA . Taking into account the growing convergence of various types of nation-states, a number of common features can be distinguished for them:
National language as a means of official communication;
The system of officially adopted national-state symbols (coat of arms, flag, etc.);
State monopoly on the legitimate use of violence and on taxation;
Rational-bureaucratic administration and common legislation for all;
Stable currency with national symbols;
Access to the labor market and social guarantees for "citizens" and corresponding restrictions for "non-citizens";
If possible, a unified education system;
Development and promotion of national-patriotic ideas and symbols.
priority of national interests in foreign policy.
", read in the summer of 2013.
The original text of the lecture was posted on April 19, 2014 on the site NEOKONOMICS or World Crisis.
Lecture 3
Oleg Grigoriev: At the beginning of the lecture, we will say a few more words about, and then we will move on to the question of what went wrong in Western Europe.
If we look at history, we will see a rather monotonous cyclical process: empires arise, exist for a while, then something is sure to happen to them - they collapse, are captured, etc., then on the same, as a rule , the place new empires arise, and everything repeats.
For the first time, this process was noticed not today, but back in the XIV century: a prominent Arab scientist, perhaps even the founder of political sociology, Ibn Khaldun described the rise and fall of empires, and today historians make extensive use of the so-called Khaldun cycle- the cycle of the existence of the empire.
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Why do empires collapse? Because they stop growing, and when they stop growing, then the internal mechanism of the empire - what we now call social elevators - stops working. While the empire is growing, while it is capturing new territories, while it is expanding, social elevators work both for itself and for proto-elites: for those who wish to become an elite, there are always opportunities to rise to the top. As the empire grows, the elite always have two interests:
When the empire ceases to expand, a period of internal crisis sets in, and it is immediately diverse. As the empire expands, I get my elite position depending on how effectively I serve some general process of empire growth. As soon as the empire stops growing, I can no longer serve anything by occupying some place, and my position in this status becomes suspended. I would even like to serve, but there is nothing. The position of any dignitary can be called into question: he himself does not understand why he is a dignitary, he cannot confirm his status. His only desire becomes, saying modern language, privatization of its status. This is a very important point for understanding many processes. . The Western model is based on sacred right of private property. Only in Europe did the elite at one time manage to completely privatize their elite place and create the sacred right of private property. But this is the dream of any elite at all times - to privatize their place and create the sacred right of private ownership of the place occupied and the benefits associated with it. Again: succeeded only after a long history and only in Europe . AND the principle of sacred private property is not an economic principle, as Marx and many others thought, this is an elite principle that worked only at a certain stage and only under certain conditions in intra-elite showdowns. |
The first to achieve it was the English elite, it is the elite. But the elite fought for this not in order to develop the economy and capitalism. These are purely elite showdowns that indirectly influenced the development of capitalism. The basis of capitalism is, first of all, a way out of those political intra-elite squabbles that are ripe and would not be allowed to develop further.
The way in which the Europeans destroyed other empires - they proposed to introduce the sacred right of private property - this is one of the slogans. This happened with the USSR: introduce the principle of private property, and everything will be fine with you. Look at us: we are developed, and you are undeveloped simply because you do not have the principle of private property. The principle of private property is introduced - and the empire falls apart. This slogan is a propaganda tool. And it works because the imperial elite in the era of stagnation dreams about it. The elite is fighting for the privatization of its place, and as soon as it begins to separate, this is a sign of the crisis of the empire.
Secondly, during the stagnation in the empire, pressure on the lower classes begins. If earlier the elite had the opportunity to earn more, participate in the campaign, rob, get money, now it has the only opportunity to earn income - to put pressure on the lower classes and thus begin to rob the population. As a result, not class contradictions, of course, but inter-class contradictions begin to grow, and the normal mechanism of the internal social world is disrupted. At the same time, the central government loses its authority. The central government is essentially the leader of the gang, he leads the raids, he provides the elite with everything they get, he leads it, and during the stagnation he stands at the top and provides nothing and leads nothing. From a leader and a warrior, he turns into a swindler who is trying to somehow regulate elite relations, to act as an arbiter - relatively speaking, he becomes the first among equals.
Ibn Khaldun called the totality of these processes the loss of asabiyyah, some original energy and motivation inherent in the gang, which creates the empire. The loss of this energy causes the weakening of all social mechanisms that hold the empire.
The reasons for breaking the empire can be very different. This may be the arrival of what Khaldun called nomads, that is, far better structured third-party gangs that roam around the empire and who, with their small numbers, but very highly motivated, outplay the empire.
The second reason may be riots and uprisings of outlying rulers. Very often, by the way, the arrival of nomads and the revolts of outlying rulers are one and the same. Either the outlying rulers enter into an alliance with the nomads and with their more motivated army and with the help they seize the central government and destroy it, or they themselves, on their own initiative, oppose the empire, but at the same time they simply hire an outside military force.
The third reason, although possible, is rare. I can say that historically this happened in China: these are internal uprisings, which in modern terms are called civil wars, although in fact they are not civil, but are a manifestation of strife between elites. These are not civil wars, but rather an analogue of feudal fragmentation. The initial reason is the fragmentation of the elites and their attempts to privatize their places within the hierarchy, and as soon as everyone starts thinking about privatization, we can assume that the empire has already collapsed mentally, it is no longer in their heads.
At the same time, the empire is usually restored, because when it collapsed (it usually falls apart into a bunch of mini-empires), and when people come from outside, they always use the services of a part of the former imperial elite, usually retaining the mechanisms for the formation and functioning of the empire.
And these cycles of the creation and death of empires happen all the time. And if there hadn't been an incident in Western Europe, it probably would have continued. So let's now look at what happened in Europe.
According to official history, the vector of development of Europe began to change from the VI century AD. Let me explain: the fact is that now I will begin to tell the story, and we will understand that in historical descriptions there are actually very big problems - somewhere there are riddles, but there are just holes. I will identify them along the way. I believe that they are important, that without them we would not have real history what was happening, and maybe in order to shut them up, this story needs to be strongly revised, I will not go in this direction now. Let's label these holes.
According to official history, the Roman Empire existed, including on the territory of Europe, which logistically formed very rationally, because it had a powerful logistical core inside it - the Mediterranean Sea.
But the Mediterranean is very large, so the outward detour was very large, and, of course, one can say in any case that an empire of this size under those conditions could not hold its outskirts for quite a long time. And the last centuries of the existence of the Roman Empire are constant attempts to fight off raids from all sides, the loss of territories, their return, because territories were lost, but new empires did not arise there, until a whole wave began, a chain of waves of invasions that destroyed empire: Vandals, Lombards, Gauls and other Germanic tribes.
This all fits Khaldun's scheme, if we consider the Germanic tribes as nomads who are destroying the empire. Again, we know that the Germanic tribes were hired to serve the empire, interacted with the imperial elite, and probably there were some joint decisions.
Mystery number one. Let's try to disassemble it. Historians say that in the Roman Empire, apparently, money circulation was developed, and there was a powerful market. Question: where did the money go? When the barbarians came, there was no money in Europe. The money is gone. This is a big difference from the history of other empires that collapsed.
We will not consider pre-monetary times, because then there were no large empires. What is a moneyless empire? By our standards, this is a small kingdom, for example, Kievan Rus as it is described, this is the initial stage, where there is the main city - Kyiv, which is a warehouse and where the prince brings the collected tribute in kind. At the same time, the prince, collecting tribute, can personally go around only a limited area, logistically connected with the center.
The monetary empire is different. It collects tribute in cash. And the central government pays money with its dignitaries, troops and others. When the nomads come, the old elite helps them to collect tribute in the first place, and the vast empire continues to function. Markets are not destroyed, money circulation and the monetary mechanism of the functioning of power continue.
The barbarians came, they captured the Roman Empire with a developed market and with a developed money circulation and suddenly it turns out that there is no money there. Until the XII century, there was no money in Europe: old money got there - Byzantine or Arab, there is no money of its own. Venice is a trading colony of Byzantium, it then broke away from Byzantium into an independent city-state. After the collapse of the Roman Empire, the market was supposed to survive. The barbarians came, the mechanism of the functioning of the empire did not fall apart: the church mechanism for maintaining the empire remained almost completely intact, and many administrative mechanisms of the Roman elite were preserved. Question: why did the old elite not help the barbarians to establish the functioning of the imperial mechanism? Markets work, we take tribute with money and pay with money.
According to documents, Charles I never spent the night twice in the same city. Although he had the official capital of Aachen, he rarely went there. He was constantly engaged in polyude throughout Western Europe. All his letters and decrees were written in different cities.
Question: where did the money go? It's a mystery, but it's a fact. Historians say, and let's believe them, that before the 12th century there was no money in Europe. This means that from the 6th century to the 12th, that is, six centuries, the power mechanism was different (again, according to the descriptions, Charlemagne, apparently, committed polyudie all the time), but we also understand that on this basis arose in Europe feudalism: because if it is impossible to collect tribute in money from the territories and pay money as a reward, then how can you reward those who helped to capture all these territories? I must somehow give them the occupied lands in kind. This is also an important point, maybe a side one, or maybe not. Okay, I distributed the land in kind. But how can I ensure their participation in my affairs? There was a money mechanism in the empire, now there is no money mechanism: I gave away all the lands - the feudal lords each settled on their own land and got the opportunity to privatize it all.
The consequence of this situation was an important feature of Europe, associated with the strong influence of law in regulating the mechanism of power. Since there was no monetary mechanism, it had to be replaced by law. Law arises when political forces come into conflict, none of which has a decisive advantage - then you have to negotiate and bargain. There are cases when the lord went to besiege the city with his vassals, and the vassals stand and look at the clock and say: oh, 12 hours, the contract has expired, we went home. This required strong regulation. A very high role of law is characteristic of Western Europe, in contrast to the eastern territorial empires, and indeed other forms of organization.
Thus, the conditions and opportunities for privatization created by the institution of feudalism led to the disintegration of the empire of Charlemagne into many mini-empires, which immediately began to fight with each other. The same can be seen in our history - princely strife in Ancient Russia- although all the princes were Rurikovich, this did not prevent them from fighting to the death with each other. Western Europe is the same mini-empires that aspired to become big. Sometimes it worked for a short time, but then they still broke up.
The second problem, or essential feature of Western Europe. Here come the barbarians with fire and sword, they have strength on their side. Of course, they greatly thinned out the old administrative and military elite of the Roman Empire, but at the same time, the very mechanism of the Roman Empire was based not on two hierarchies, but on three - administrative, military and ecclesiastical. However, the church hierarchy remained intact. Well, if only because the majority of the barbarians were Christians, although of the Arian persuasion (this is also a question, there was a whole bunch - mostly heretics, but there were also adherents of the then orthodox church, because missionary activities were carried out among the barbarians). The mystery is what happened to the Arians. We do not know, there are certainly no documents preserved about how much in modern catholic church Arianism, and what kind of compromise was reached on this issue. Nobody made ends meet here, at least I did not meet.
In a territory where there are many mini-empires that aspire to a big empire, and where there is already a recognized religion permeating the entire territory, an unexpected and very unusual situation arises. It turns out that the one who claims to collect the entire empire must negotiate with the church.
I jumped a little here. A feature of European history is the presence in a relatively small area of a large number of mini-empires that are at war or are in a strange relationship with each other. If such a situation had turned out somewhere in the east, then dashing people would have come quickly and seized this territory. And we know from history that dashing people came to the territory of Western Europe, and the historical line that Europe followed was threatened several times.
The first threat is the Arabs, the Arab Caliphate. The Battle of Poitiers is widely known, when Charles Martell defeated the Arab army, and the Arabs did not move further than the Pyrenees, being satisfied with Spain, Southern Italy, Sicily. An important point. If we look at the map, we will see that the great empires are located either on the highlands or on the plains. If there are mountains on the territory, then they are natural borders between empires. The Arabs captured the steppe, that is, the plane, but, colliding with the mountains, they could not cross them.
The second threat is the Ugric, today known as the Hungarians. The Hungarian Plain is a continuation of the Great Steppe, which runs from China across the entire continent. A nomadic tribe came, boldly all in the steppe, began to raid all of Western Europe, and if you look at the chronicles and annals, it became a giant threat. Again, if we look at the chronicles with regard to both the Arab invasion and the Ugric invasion, we very often see cases when some archbishop called for protection from a raid, and the population took up arms and went to war. This is the actual control mechanism. The abbot of some monastery (with regard to the Arab invasion) called, and the population went to fight with the infidels - these are the forerunners of the crusades, such mini-crusades that began at the initiative of the church. That is, the church was directly involved in administration, including participating in military administration, in particular, in defense. The Ugrians did not go beyond certain boundaries: apparently, the steppe ended, and they could not fight in the forests.
The Austrian Eastern Mark was created against the Hungarians, which then became a county, then a duchy, then the Austro-Hungarian Empire itself was formed from it, well, the Austro-Ugric Empire - to the question of where everything takes its roots. At the same time, all of Europe supported her, because she was a bastion against the terrible Hungarians.
This is the second threat that was real.
The third threat, about which, on the one hand, it is clear why it was not realized, on the other hand, is not clear. These are the Vikings, who are known as the Varangians. These are the same nomads, only waterfowl. Their technique was simple. They walked along the sea, then went up the rivers (cities were built on the rivers) and robbed anything (for example, Paris was plundered). The Vikings captured many territories in Europe: Normandy, Sicily, part of Southern Italy. The lands captured by the Normans retained their independence for a long time. It is not very clear why, but it is believed that this was not a centralized invasion, but separate detachments went: there was simply no general power in Sweden, and therefore separate detachments captured separate pieces, but could not capture everything. When the demographic pressure decreased, when their own colonies and territories appeared and it became possible to settle quietly, then the invasion itself came to naught. However, Europe long time was under threat.
The fourth threat is the Tatar-Mongols. Again, no one knows why Batu's invasion of Europe ended, historians are also silent here: it is usually said that since the khan died, Batu decided to return to Sarai and did not capture Europe. Other historians, usually ours, say that the Tatars did not capture Europe because Russia defended it with itself.
In other words, Europe could die many times, but did not die, it is still not very clear why, what happened there, since the Mongols won the battles with the elite troops of Western Europe, and, in general, there was nothing to oppose the Europeans.
Well, the last threat came already at a different time, and was not so sharply perceived - these are the Ottomans, the 17th century. The peak of the Ottoman invasion is the siege of Vienna, this is the time of King Louis XIV. At that time, Europe was already a little different. The same Louis XIV would be glad if the historical opponents of France, the Austrians, were destroyed by the Turks: Europe was ambivalent about these wars. The papal throne, by the way, was not against the capture of Vienna, because he continued the war with the emperor, who then belonged to the Habsburg dynasty, that is, he was the Austrian emperor. However, thanks to the Poles, this threat was not realized.
Although the Ottoman threat was no longer perceived as acutely as the previous four, but, nevertheless, it was real. That is, faced with the imperial mechanism of the Turks, Western Europe showed good results even in the 17th century. Why all this did not lead to the restoration of normal imperial cycles, we will not discuss now. Arabs don't know how to fight in the mountains, the steppes don't know how to fight in the forests, demographic pressure has ended in Sweden, and so on. The fact that all these threats did not materialize is also an accident. In any other geographical location, the structure of disparate mini-empires that has developed in Europe would not have lasted for long. Europe faced several threats, but it was lucky that they did not materialize. And not because the Europeans were especially valiant or something else. Why do Arabs need forests? They don't even know what to do with them. And there were no special riches in Europe at that time. The Arabs dominated the Mediterranean for a long time, and they could get whatever they wanted. It was the Vikings who confused them greatly, Sicily and Southern Italy were theirs. All this is pure luck, a chain of accidents.
I showed a little the role of the church, which unites and organizes the population for some common cause. Why? Because the church is essentially the only remaining imperial mechanism. And here we see a paradox: whoever wants to unite the empire must get the approval of the church (or create his own church, which is difficult, although later this is exactly what happened - I'm talking about the Reformation).
Here another important difference between Europe and the classical empires is revealed. Historians say that in the Eastern empires there is Caesaropapism, that is, the secular ruler is at the same time the high priest. The Muscovite kingdom is also caesaropapism, where the patriarch is the tsar's deputy for religious affairs. In this sense, the head of the spiritual authorities is in a completely clear subordination to the secular. And in Europe it happened like this: there is church authority, there is also a church hierarchy as such, but there is no emperor yet. And if someone wants to become an emperor, he must agree on something with the church authorities. This is the first very important point.
The church has worked out a scheme by which it would like to interact with a potential future emperor. This scheme was formulated as follows: the church is the legislative power, and the emperor is the executive. That is, the concept of separation of legislative and executive power was formulated. A completely new, again, scheme in comparison with all the eastern empires. (There were brahmins and kshatriyas in India, but there was no empire there - we know very little about this.)
So, from the dualism of secular and ecclesiastical power, the idea of separation of powers emerged, which still exists. It is clear that not a single normal contender for the imperial throne would agree to such conditions, but at the same time there was a desire to build an empire. Therefore, when the empire nevertheless arose, it entered into a sharp conflict with the church. This conflict was twofold. On the one hand, he was about abstract power - who is higher - the pope or the emperor, but, on the other hand, he also had a pragmatic side, since the church at that time was the largest landowner in Europe. With the important role of religion in public life, feudal lords often bequeathed land to the church. As a result, it became difficult for the secular authorities to reward their supporters, and the church, on the contrary, only multiplied the lands in this process. The history of the struggle for church property is a running thread throughout European history. This struggle was waged all the time, and depending on its outcome, the destinies of various states were formed.
I have already said that the chronic confrontation between the imperial and papal authorities lasted not a year, not two, not a century, but about 800 years. The acute phase of confrontation, called High Middle Ages, - these are two centuries when constant wars were fought. A more diplomatic and less pronounced phase - the remaining 600 years - continued until the last idea of a pan-European empire, the traditional empire of the German nation, was liquidated in connection with the liquidation of the very institution of the Holy Roman Empire of the German nation, which was abolished after Napoleon forced the Austrian emperor to renounce the title of Holy Roman Emperor.
The conflict between the pope and the emperor lasted for a long time - both military methods and diplomatic ones.
The first important consequence follows from this conflict, which consists in a strong change in a person, first of all, a representative of the elites. For a long time, representatives of the elite were in an extremely contradictory situation, consisting in the uncertainty - whom to serve? Your overlord or the Pope? Duty tells him to serve his overlord, but if this raises the threat of excommunication from the church, which has often been realized (contradicting the church means risking eternal salvation), then uncertainty arises.
This situation had another side: serving one's overlord was ecclesiastical justified, in a milder form - there was also such a ecclesiastical dogma. Its violation also entails the risk of eternal salvation. People are always faced with a choice. First of all, there was freedom of choice, the ability to walk between chairs. It was a forced situation. In contrast, in a traditional empire, all places are scheduled, there is a clear hierarchy and clear rules - what you can do, what you cannot do, what you are rewarded for, what you will be punished for and how.
In Europe, the fragmentation of elites has been institutionalized over the course of eight centuries. Let us remember that the pope was glad and helped the Turks when they besieged Vienna. Because Vienna at that time was the Holy Roman Empire of the German nation. And before that, the Habsburgs owned almost all of Europe: Austria, Spain, Hungary, etc.
For a long period, this intra-elite war had to be somehow resisted. People learned freedom of choice and independence in decision making. They constantly had to choose between two evils. This is an upbringing that changed a person, and in this sense, a Western person is not like a person of a traditional empire, and traditional empires do not perceive a Western person in this capacity until now.
The second consequence is the following. Historians have given much thought to the question of why things went wrong in Western Europe. They point out that in Western Europe, unlike elsewhere, there were free cities. This is very interesting point. Where did free cities come from in Europe?
For a long time, the point of view was widespread that European free cities are a legacy of the Roman Empire. That there were some Roman cities that, having survived the empire, became free: well, because there was Roman law and something else that allowed them to become the embryos of free cities. Previously, this was written in all seriousness, in Lately historians seem to have understood the contradiction.
After all, what is a traditional Roman city? Firstly, it is a fortress, or an administrative center. According to its economic model, the Roman city is very similar to our today's cities - regional centers. In these cities, in fact, there is no production. These are administrative centers that are supported by salaries received by officials, pensioners and other state employees. This cash flow creates some economic life, but mostly the money comes from the center.
A typical Roman city also consisted of officials and pensioners. Retired legionnaires settled there, who received a pension in money from the government. As soon as the source of money dried up, no Roman cities as an economic and social phenomenon should have remained, ruins with an incomprehensible legal status should have remained. Today, many Western historians are finally writing openly about this, although they meet some resistance.
Another common point of view on free cities (again, in modern history a lot of racism) lies in the fact that the inhabitants of Western Europe were not like everyone else, they were free, and therefore they were able to create free cities.
Let's see what a city is in its evolution. We have already said that initially the city is a central warehouse where tribute is brought, where the ruler of a given territory lives, where his army is stationed, and where, in case of danger, the surrounding population can run. There is a castle in the center, the neighborhood around the castle is protected by a wall, the walls are constantly being completed (look at our Kremlin, Kitay-gorod - this is also a wall). This infrastructure is being expanded as needed. Who lives in the city? Artisans who serve the feudal lord’s court, both his own serfs and free artisans, whom he invites, if it comes to an important skill - making weapons, jewelry, etc. Petty feudal lords, or vassals, live in the city, who do not have the opportunity build their own castle, but can build a house next to the castle of a large feudal lord. Merchants also live in the city. Here, however, the question again arises: if there is no money, then where do the merchants come from? As long as distribution is in kind, merchants are not needed. And there is no need to remember here what the neoclassicists say about the origin of money, that they are from needs and all that. We all know that the origin of money is different.
Let's build a hypothesis. Until the 12th century, there was no money in Europe and no special trade. Since the XII century, money in Europe appears in in large numbers, fairs begin to function, free cities appear - and all these processes occur very quickly. We said about the Venetians: Venice is a colony of Byzantium and the merchants there are Byzantine. But if we look at Byzantium at that time, we will see that in Galata, on the outskirts of Constantinople, there was a colony of Genoese merchants who intercepted a significant part of the Byzantine trade.
That is, in literally less than a hundred years, the situation in Europe is changing radically, which cannot happen through evolution, since everything changes too quickly. This is also a mystery.
Let's look more broadly. Let's look at the Eastern merchants. Who is an oriental merchant? There is a big difference between Eastern and Western merchants, which everyone also pays attention to. In Eastern society, imperial society, money and power are merged into one, where if a person loses his elite status, then he loses money. The same applies to merchants. If necessary, the authorities could take money from the merchants to finance the interests of the empire, because this is not personal money, but money given for use, since the merchant occupies a certain class position. In other words, a person has money only if he occupies a place in the hierarchy, and this money does not belong to him. He cannot privatize them.
And suddenly it became clear, probably during the Crusades, that there is a territory where money is not included in the concept of hierarchy, where the hierarchy is built on the ownership of land and natural resources. Money is excluded from the hierarchy. And if you take your money to this territory - offshore - then this money will become personal, no one will encroach on it, because they simply do not know in essence what money is and how to work with it. Further trade with Western Europe is being established. This territory, of course, is very poor compared to the rich east, and you won’t earn much here, but everything that you earn is all your own.
That is, Europe served as an offshore zone into which Eastern merchants turned it, and we even know which Eastern merchants are Jews (for a very simple reason: you need to deal with money transfers with co-religionists, and there were Jews in Europe). This monetary offshoreness has been preserved; it is at the heart of Europe.
Merchants brought money to Europe, and the feudal lords also made money on this, which ensured the safety of trade. If the feudal lord owns the city, then it is beneficial for him to attract merchants who ensure the development of trade, and, consequently, the flow of money into the city. And most importantly, the feudal lords understood why money was needed, because when the market appeared, they regularly and intensively begin to fight each other. But it is one thing to fight only with the forces that we have, and another thing is to take a loan, hire additional troops, and win the war with the help of money.
Then the situation develops. There are merchants who have money, and there are feudal lords who need money. The process of redemption of cities begins. Cities became free as a result of several operations, often as a result of a ransom. For example, one feudal lord wants to capture a neighboring feudal lord and capture the city - merchants give him money on the condition that the city comes under their control. Cities were often redeemed, usually by clubbing. And those who usually redeemed and then made up the magistrate of the city.
There were other cases that were represented by the war between the pope and the emperor. The local feudal lord could take the wrong side in this war, in the sense of the loser. If at the same time the citizens of the city (in this situation they could take the right side, and they had a choice) could agree with the right side that if they support this right side (open the gates, provide supplies), then the city will be their .
Historians describe the situation: after the city has been liberated, a liberties race begins, when the city bargains for itself additional privileges from both sides for support or neutrality in the war. And in an attempt to buy the city on their side, these privileges were granted.
It was in this situation that free cities appeared, which was nowhere else. Moreover, free cities usually possessed money that was in the hands of merchants. That is, free cities are money centers, completely independent. It was the cities that began to massively introduce mercenary armies. This, in particular, was opposed by Machiavelli when he said that a mercenary army is the worst thing that can be.
I will continue this story later, and now I will end with an important judgment.
Pragmatics and idealism. The dispute between the two hierarchies was pragmatic, but could only be carried on in idealistic terms. The ecclesiastical and secular hierarchies could only appeal to a higher abstract force capable of resolving it. In other words, the dispute had a pragmatic character, but it was conducted in the field of ideologies, in the ideal field. This is a very important feature of Europe, which we, the majority of the inhabitants of the territorial empire, do not understand.
Why don't we understand? Because the traditional territorial empire is based on pragmatics. We also have ideal considerations. But we do not quite understand where we get them from, and most importantly, when it comes to the actual case, it turns out that, in essence, these considerations do not exist.
Again, where do we get ideal considerations from? They come about because the territorial empire and its inhabitants think they live in a nation-state, or can live in a nation-state, are capable of building one. When we take the point of view of the West, we declare ideal considerations, but when it comes to concrete actions, then everyone remembers his home, his allotment, and sheer pragmatics begins. This is the very big misunderstanding of the West by us.
In the West, in turn, a whole tradition has developed: although in reality we are talking about pragmatic issues, they are discussed and resolved only in an ideal world. When the pragmatic task changes, the ideal field also changes. They themselves understand it.
When our intelligentsia looks from their territorial empire at their ideal field, they take it as the ultimate truth, and when the ideal changes, they are greatly surprised and begin to resent.
I will give an example to illustrate our misunderstanding. Let's look at V.V. Putin. He is a very imperial person both in upbringing and in spirit. He carefully looks at the West and says: guys, you are solving pragmatic problems, and I am solving pragmatic problems, why do you constantly turn to your ideals, let's agree on pragmatics. But they cannot do this, they must appeal to the ideal, such is their peculiarity.
But such a feature gives a lot of useful things: from here begins scholasticism, science and, in general, the ability to think abstractly, which is not the case in empires. In Russia, idealism is often superficial, since Russia is an empire that thinks in terms that are not typical of empires (that is, the intelligentsia thinks in such a way that it infected everyone). Therefore, in Russia there is some idealism, but some incomprehensible one, we do not keep up with the curves of Western idealism. In the West, they understand that they are solving pragmatic problems, but the way to solve them is in an ideal field, they do not know another. The problem needs to be translated into an ideal plane, to formulate a system of concepts there, and on their basis to formulate pragmatics - this is an approach. We do not understand this approach. Moreover, they approach this process flexibly, they insist on ideals, and at any given moment they broadcast these ideals. We, on the other hand, take some ideal system, perceiving it as the ultimate truth, and totally translate it down the vertical. And then we are surprised when this ideal system changes.
Our Russian belief in conspiracies also arises from the opposition between pragmatism and idealism. We all understand that marginalism in the 70s. XIX century was invented solely for the purpose of taking away from Russia the then undiscovered Tyumen oil fields. Well, we know that the West, with the help of marginalism and neoclassical theory, destroyed Soviet Union and is now pumping our oil. We are pragmatists, we understand that they invented all this on purpose to offend us. "All this was thought up by Churchill in the eighteenth year." We think so for the reason that we are also inclined to this idealism. At the same time, our idealism is their idealism, only yesterday.
I will illustrate. In the 90s. I read the memoirs of one of our intelligence officers about Churchill's visit to Moscow - this intelligence officer eavesdropped on the negotiations. He writes that upon his return from Stalin to the hotel, the British Foreign Secretary scolded Churchill, the Prime Minister, right to the point of shouting, because his statements on some issue did not correspond to adopted policy cabinet on this issue. That is, the subordinate scolded the commander. At the same time, the commander justified himself by saying that he could change this policy. To which the minister replied that when you think it over, write a document, formulate a new ideal, then we will all adhere to it. But as long as you don't change the old policy, I'll stick to it, and you should too. This story really impressed me.
In the course of the confrontation between ecclesiastical and secular authorities, several more important things happened that were of a pragmatic nature, but were formulated in an ideal field.
- Firstly, as I said, this is the concept of separation of the legislative and executive powers, developed by the church.
- Secondly, the second idea that supported the first is the system of law and the rule of law. It is too new idea, idealistic but designed to solve pragmatic problems.
- Thirdly, the idea of a nation-state was formulated. In fact, this was a revolution in dogma, because the Christian religion itself was built on universality, on the fact that there is a single Christian people, where there is neither Greek nor Jew.
Hence the idea of a universal empire, with a single people and a single church. But when it became clear that it was not possible to create a unified imperial power in accordance with the wishes of the church, that as soon as it was built, a terrible conflict arose between the church and secular power, threatening to seize Rome and overthrow the pope, another scenario had to be developed.
Charlemagne left a legacy of a France outside of imperial influence. And then the question arose: on the one hand, the pope would have to persuade France to become part of a single empire, but then the empire would be even stronger, and it is impossible to agree with the empire. On the other hand, in case of war with the empire, the pope could resort to the help of France. But then it was necessary to explain why France is outside the empire. To do this, it was necessary to change the dogmatics. That is, it was necessary to develop the idea that God created different nations. Although they are Christian, the diversity and richness of God's creation lies in the fact that the nations are still different, and they may have different authorities. That is, the idea of a national state is a very strong revolution in church dogma.
Like any global decision, it hit hard on the church itself. Because as soon as it became possible to say that there are different nations, the idea of the Italian nation immediately arose, which raised the question of the place of the pope himself in it. In the end, it all ended with the Vatican, a small patch, but which is an independent papal state. That is, the idea turned out to be about two ends. She helped in the fight against the emperor, but in the end it also affected the church.
- Fourth, the idea of democracy was formulated. The scheme was very simple. If there are different nations that have their own secular authorities, then the people must also have their own rights. After all, the Christian people go to church every day, which means that the church should rule this people. Secular authorities will rule, and the people should act as legislators.
That is, the church no longer directly interacts with the emperor according to the scheme the church is the legislative power, and the emperor is the executive, and the kings, as leaders of national states, act as the executive power, and the church through the people acts as the legislative power for them. In this context, another ideologeme arose: the power of the people is power from God
.All these ideas are pragmatic, they grew up in the framework of the struggle between church and secular authorities, but they were framed in the form of some abstract principles. These principles, in fact, set the direction for the development of thought and movement in Western Europe.
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