Historian, Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Professor, Director of the Institute of Scientific Information on Social Sciences (INION) of the Russian Academy of Sciences Yuri Pivovarov talks about the formation of the Russian state, the parallels between the past and the present, the history of government institutions, the most important documents and the people behind them.

Transcript of the 1st lecture by Yuri Sergeevich Pivovarov, aired on the Kultura TV channel as part of the ACADEMIA project:

Let's start our lecture. Today it is devoted to the topic "Traditions of Russian, Russian statehood and modernity." Why did I choose this particular topic for the lecture? Well, if you look at Russian history as a whole, like this, for all its millennial development, we will see that the state, power, various institutions of power have played and are playing a huge role in our history. And in this sense, I could call our culture - power, political, legal culture - “power-centric”. Power-centric, that is, power is at the center. In contrast, for example, from the West, from the European, which I could also call such a tricky word "anthropocentric". Anthropos is a man. That is, there is a person in the center. Man as a measure of all things. Everything begins from a person. With us - from the authorities. How did this happen? At what stage of Russian development? After all, at first, it seems, was not so. It is interesting to see this, and we will talk about it today.
Why traditions? Because tradition is not a museum that we come to and look at: aha, here is a picture of the fourteenth century. They don't paint like that anymore. And we went on. Tradition is something that lives on all the time. It works. Mimics, hides. Sometimes we don't even see that this is a tradition. And sometimes it seems to us that this is an innovation. But the historian will explain to you that five hundred years ago, maybe it was in some other form, but in fact it already happened. It is very important. In general, when we talk about historical processes ... History is a science. We know that. We must remember that this is a special science. Unlike, say, physics, chemistry or such natural sciences. This is, of course, my point of view. There are no laws. There are no laws of historical development. When I was at a young age, we were taught in universities that, here, there are laws of correspondence of something. Or inconsistency of something. And as a result, something happens. So, for many decades I have been engaged in historical science, political science. And I am both a historian and a political scientist rolled into one. I came to the conclusion that there are no objective laws of historical development. History is an open process. The process is open. There are patterns, there are traditions. They need to be studied. And here I am emphasizing - traditions. Since we are going to talk about it. But there are no iron laws, according to which, say, the October Revolution was supposed to take place in Russia and people would begin to build a socialist society. There was no such historical law of development. Why? And because a person is a being who has free will. And he can choose one way or another. And this is above all economic conditions, social, natural and climatic, and so on. It is very important. What else is very important when we talk about Russian or Russian history? We must remember that we are not a backward country. And that our development is in no way diviant. You know this word "divinity", a deviation, right? No no. We are going our own way, just like Poland, Portugal, Spain, Cambodia and any other country. And we did not lag behind anyone. We are not chasing anyone.
Our development is what it is. Within this development, there is a corridor of opportunities. It can be better, it can be worse, it can be successful or less successful. But we are certainly not lagging behind anyone. And our development is not somehow flawed. That is, we are walking, as we were, along our own historical path, which we can criticize or admire, or do both. But, nevertheless, this is also a very important prerequisite. But let's return all the same to the main topic of the lecture - "Traditions of our statehood and modernity." Why did I put “and modernity” at the end? Well, "modernity" in Russian has several meanings. These are the present years. Or, there, the years that were ten years ago. But this is also a special era. You know, there is such an English word. Surely, many are now learning English. Modernity. Modernity. This is a historical era that began at the end of the eighteenth century. Times of the French Revolution. And it continues now. That is, this is a modern society over the past two centuries.
And now I am always interested in comparing the Russian traditions, the Russian traditions of the power of statehood with that. With that. With what is the modern world. This is what I imagine to be very important. And we can explain a lot of what is happening with us if we know. And I have already spoken about this. But I will emphasize again. What happened before. And here it is very important to take some position, some initial point of view. In science, in general, point of view is very important. I once read a prominent German philosopher who wrote that physicists (and I don’t do physics, I don’t know) noticed that when they observe some object for a long time, the object begins to change. That is, this is some kind of mysticism. Yes? It is difficult to believe in this for a person who is not a physicist. But, here, the position from which we will look at the historical process is very important. Because, indeed, it depends on this position, on this view, how it will be presented to us. My position is to look at Russian development in the twentieth century. What happened in the twentieth century? It ended quite recently, ten years ago. And his breath is still palpable. Do you understand? Its air, its effects and consequences, they still work. And so we need to understand what happened in the twentieth century.
Every century, every century in any country, and here in Russia, is undoubtedly unique. The twentieth turned out to be quite unusual. Well, for the whole world it turned out to be unusual, if only because people invented a weapon that can destroy the whole world. This has not happened before. Crazy progress in science and technology. Well, you are witnesses to this, people of the early twenty-first century. But for Russia, there were many other things. The great Russian writer Alexander Isaevich Solzhenitsyn, the Nobel Prize winner, once in his old age, shortly before his death, remarked: Russia has lost the twentieth century. Russia has lost the twentieth century. And this man was not a pessimist. On the contrary, he was a man of such sternly optimistic will. And, nevertheless, he states. And I agree with him. His younger contemporary. I agree with him. We have lost the twentieth century. Despite the fact that it started out amazingly. At the beginning of the twentieth century ... Well, many people know about it. Development of the Russian economy. Development of Russian democracy, Russian education, culture. Yes, I have to tell you, it's fantastic. Now it is hard to believe that in the sixteenth year, during the war, the throughput of Russian railways was higher than that of American ones. Imagine that the capacity of the current highways in Russia would be higher than in America. This is how Russia developed. There was rapid economic growth. And Russia was moving towards democracy. Russia was on the way to prosperity, everyone noticed it. Of course, not everything was perfect, otherwise there would have been no terrible revolution. And there were many unresolved problems. And others grew. But, nevertheless, the general tone, such a general upsurge was felt by everyone. And suddenly - a terrible revolution. And then several more revolutions followed. First February, October. Another revolution of the fifth, seventh year.
And the end of the century. These are probably the times when many of you were born. Late eighties - early nineties, another revolution. Four revolutions in one century. And all were different from each other. Their nature must be understood. And we must explain why they happened. Why are there so many revolutions? Previously, it was not in Russia. What else about the twentieth century? The formation fell apart completely twice. In the seventeenth year, the Russian Empire. Despite her tremendous success. We were the only country that, during the First World War, from large countries, did not introduce a rationing system. Where was the development of the economy. And there was no hunger. Meanwhile, famine was already beginning in Germany. And here the country suddenly collapsed. You know how the wind blew and the house of cards fell apart. Although there was a powerful bureaucracy, a powerful army. A huge working country. And suddenly everything fell apart. Inexplicably. But the same thing, for example. This has already happened before my very eyes. Late eighties - early nineties. There was, of course, no such rapid flowering as at the beginning of the twentieth century. But it is also impossible to say that everything is so bad. And suddenly, in an instant, in a few days, the country instantly disintegrated in three or four days in August 1991. It is necessary to understand what these institutions of power are, which, on the one hand. And I tell you that Russia is a power-centric country. Here power determines everything and dominates everything. And suddenly the institutions of power crumbled. And the country turned out to be ownerless. Anarchy has begun. We must understand this too.
What else is very important for the twentieth century? An anthropic or anthropological catastrophe has taken place in Russia. What I mean? A huge number of people died in Russia. Wars, revolutions, famine, Stalinist, unprecedented in history, terror. Stalinist terror against his people. I think the most terrible of those that the history of large countries has known. Well, maybe somewhere in Kampuchea or Cambodia, as it was called, you can compare. But I have not seen anything similar in large countries, even in Germany, even in China. So, a terrible terror.
And what did this lead to at the end of the century? To a sharp drop in the population in our country. Demographic disaster. Everyone is talking about this, both President Medvedev and others. The population of Russia is shrinking terribly. But there was an anthropic, anthropological catastrophe also because the best were killed. Knocked out the elites, as they say in science. What is imperial, what is then Soviet. Etc. Through terror, through some kind of social change, when the best people were simply thrown out of the control system. ..... Russia for centuries, starting, well, from the end of the fifteenth century, lived by expanding its territory. Already by the thousand six hundredth year, the territory of the Muscovy was equal to the territory of Western Europe. And even surpassed her. Every year there was an increase of about one Holland. And so we expanded, expanded, expanded. And suddenly the narrowing began.
Moreover, three times in the course of a century, we have lost our best territories. First, according to the Brest-Litovsk Peace Treaty, the eighteenth year, which the Bolsheviks signed. Russia has lost about a million, well, a little less square kilometers and about forty-five million of its population. Moreover, this is the European cultural population. These are lands with a good climate. This is today's Ukraine, Belarus. There is Don, Crimea and so on. Then the forty-first year. A million square kilometers are occupied by the Germans. Seventy-five million of the population, forty-two percent, were under the Nazis for several years. We played this case again. And, finally, the ninety-first year, the collapse of the USSR. And about the same Sámi territories are leaving. That is, by the end of the twentieth century, Russia finds itself in a completely new situation. The population is shrinking. And before it grew. Russia in the late nineteenth - early twentieth century experienced a demographic boom. And then she started to fall. And it's the same with the territory. We expand, expand ... and suddenly narrowed down. Today the territory of Russia is the territory of about the middle of the seventeenth century. Approximately, never for sure. These are the times of the reign, the initial reign of Alexei Mikhailovich Quiet, the father of Peter the Great, before the annexation of the left-bank Ukraine. That is, we went into the middle of the seventeenth century. And this is a completely new situation for Russia. But all the institutions of power, in general, the entire system of government, political, political culture were based on territorial expansion and on demographic expansion. Now the narrowing has begun. And it is necessary to look, although they have been modified, to work further. This is a huge task for historians and political scientists. And we must definitely tackle it. Otherwise, we will not understand where to sail next. Another such, well, essentially, though, and introductory remark that people. People tend to exaggerate novelty. When I was young, like you, it also seemed to me that I was living in a completely new world, my generation would explain to old people how to act. And today, against the backdrop of a fantastic electronic revolution, against the backdrop of a fantastic information revolution, with all computers and so on, it seems, the world has completely changed. They talk about nanotechnology, an innovative way of development, about some completely different economy, social structure, globalization is underway. But, at the same time, a lot, and in part I have already said about this, has not changed. There is such a wonderful American sociologist Emmanuel Laverstein. He was once asked: what has changed? He replied: "Everything, - comma - nothing." And this is not a game, so to speak. This is not the coquetry of such a prominent scientist, intellectual coquetry. This is indeed an indication of dialectics. That yes, on the one hand, rapid changes. Yes? Well, for example, which we haven't talked about yet. The twentieth century. The beginning of the twentieth century. Russia is a peasant country. Russia is a peasant country. Up to eighty percent of the population lives in the countryside. The end of the twentieth century is the opposite. Russia is an urban country. And they moved to cities. And they live in big cities. Conversely, the village is empty. Yes? And Russia is becoming an empty country as people are drawn into cities.
According to some estimates, up to one seventh of the population of the entire Russian Federation lives in Moscow. Let this be a bit of an exaggeration. Or maybe not an exaggeration. But this means that Russia, so to speak, Moscow and large cities are pulling the population out of the province. Which was completely absent at the beginning of the twentieth century. And then there was overpopulation in the village, and now there is a clear overpopulation in the city. We all collide in the metro, in traffic jams, and so on and so forth. This is due to the surplus of people in big cities. That is, of course, the situation has changed. She changed a lot. And at the same time, we can find a number of constants. That is, something that does not change. That still define our lives. Let's start from the beginning? What is the key factor for the development of our political institutions, power institutions, political culture, right? Here is the term "political culture", it was introduced into science by political scientist Gabriel Amond, an American. This is our attitude to politics. This is what we think about the institutions of power, about the state and so on. Yes? That is, it is the study of what we think about power. Yes? As we imagine it. So, what was the determining factor? ... Adoption of Christianity. We must always remember that Russia is a Christian country. Despite the fact that for most of the twentieth century, and my generation - absolutely the largest part of my life - we lived in an atheistic country where religion was persecuted, destroyed and so on. Although in recent years all this has been much softer. We are a Christian country. This is perhaps the only thing that unites Russia with the West and with Europe. In all other respects we disagree. And with Europe and the West. Christian West. And we are Christian. It really unites us. And what does it mean when your lecturer says that the country is Christian for our topic? And this means the following. I always say to my students in the audience: "Have you been to the Tretyakov Gallery?" Well, most of them nod: yes, of course, they have been, they took me to school and so on. And there is a picture of an artist with such a typical Russian surname - Ge. Yes, the typical Russian surname is Ge. Such a picture, you know, so oblong. And there is a young man with his eyes downcast. And there is a man of my age in front of him. So, with such a short, general's, haircut. And he asks him: "What is truth?" The picture is called that. And this young man dropped his eyes so despondently. These are Pontius Pilate and Jesus Christ. The question is, why is it Christ, the son of God, dropped his eyes and does not say what is truth. For a long time I could not understand. Then I realized when I began to read books. And in Christianity this question is impossible. In Christianity, a question is possible: who is the truth? Christ is the truth. Therefore, he does not answer this general and invader of Judea, Pontius Pilate, Jesus Christ.
Christianity is a personalistic religion. Personal religion. Personality theme. Human theme. Hence, then politicians say that human rights and so on, on, on, on. And therefore, everywhere, the Western Christian civilization, as I told you at the very beginning of our lecture, is anthropocentric, human-centered. And Russia began with this. And Russia did not follow the path of other religions, because, say, Islam, Judaism, and some other options claimed. Russia chose Christianity for itself. It happened so historically. And all Russian culture is personalistic. Personal. There is a theme of personality, a theme of a person. What we will not find, for example, in the Chinese civilization, in the Indian civilization, in the Arab and so on, so on, so on. Well, we won't waste time on that, as our topic is different. But with the adoption of Christianity, another thing happened. We adopted Christianity from Byzantium. Not from the West, not from Rome, from Byzantium. And this immediately fenced off us from the common European, common Western path. Immediately fenced off us. Because Latin is the language of Western Catholicism, the language of interethnic communication, a language similar to today's English, which binds everyone together, turned out to be unavailable for the ancient Russians, our ancestors. Well, just maybe for some bookers. And we took Christianity from Byzantium not in Greek. Because Byzantine Christianity was predominantly in Greek. And we took in what language? In Old Bulgarian, which became Church Slavonic. Since a century before the adoption of Christianity, Cyril and Methodius, as we know, invented the alphabet and so on. This even fenced us off from the main Orthodoxy movement of Byzantium. And it fenced off us from Byzantine scholarship, culture, from Byzantine law and so on. That is, on the one hand, we have made a step into the circle of European Christian peoples. On the other hand, at the same time they took a step, as it were, into isolation. As if in a ghetto. This, of course, this double influence of Christianity largely determined our further development, the path of development of our culture, including political. And immediately we took the model of power from Byzantium. What people often forget. Not those who are engaged in medieval Russia or, there, simply ancient Russia, but those who today are engaged in the analysis of power structures. That is, they forget that Russia has such a tradition, within the framework of which it has developed for centuries. This is the tradition of the Byzantine understanding of the relationship between the state and the Church. States and the Church are the two main subjects in the medieval world. From their relationship depended, well, what a person's life is. For example, in Catholic Rome and in the West, the concept was called "two swords." Not balls, but swords. Yes? That is, the swords with which they fight. One sword personified secular power. It was the emperor, therefore, of the German Empire. And the second sword, which personified spiritual power, was the Pope. These two swords fought with each other. And what did it lead to? This led to the development of pluralism. Each of the Europeans of that time could choose whom he relies on. To that power or to this one. He had a choice. And political scientists say: this is one of the reasons, one of the roots of European democracy. Pluralism, the moment of choice, the possibility of different identities. I am for these, I am for others. And already there were political parties that fought among themselves. That is, such a prototype of the future Western world.
We took the Byzantine model. This is a symphony model. Yes? Symphonies, that is, accords. Symphony, symphony - consent. The meaning of this model lies in the fact that in all spiritual matters, secular power yields to the palm of spiritual power. And, on the contrary, in secular affairs ... And in spiritual affairs - secular power. That is, they were inferior to each other, so to speak. Secular in spiritual matters, spiritual in secular affairs. Such is the agreement, the symphony. But in practice, of course, in practice it was not like that. And the main thing was the one who had, in today's language, more resources. And the secular authorities had a greater resource. It's clear. And therefore, having taken this model, we, as it were, initially submitted to the fact that secular power is stronger than spiritual. Therefore, the influence of the Church and, in general, the spiritual principle in Russian political history is felt less than, for example, in Western, European history. Moreover, it is interesting that in the West the center of spiritual power is in Rome, and the center of secular power is somewhere in the north, beyond the Apennines, in northern Europe, almost for Rome. And Byzantium, as later on in Moscow, the palace of the emperor and the palace of the patriarch were nearby. And with us, as we know, the patriarchal power or the metropolitan power has always been located approximately in the same place where the main sovereign, the head of secular power, was. This is fundamentally important for the formation of institutions. And so our institutions began to develop from the very beginning. What else is very important to say about the initial stages of the formation of institutions, which still plays a role. Probably, you know, there was such a wonderful Russian philosopher in the first half of the twentieth century. He died, died in exile in France. Nikolai Alexandrovich Berdyaev. Yes, such a very famous, beautiful name. And this man once said. He was, in general, a master of aphoristic expressions. He said that Russian history was eaten by Russian geography. What did he mean? The fact is that our ancestors, the Eastern Slavs, began to build civilization in those places where, in general, no one had built before them. If, for example, the Germanic, Aryan peoples who came from northern India and from the Iranian plateau to Europe, they settled the territory of the former Roman Empire, already cultivated and with a good climate, where more than one civilization with a very high potential, with great achievements, had already developed, then our ancestors, due to historical peculiarities, the historical process, I apologize for the tautology, turned out to be snowy in this northeastern Europe. Then twelve months are winter, the rest is summer. Where the soil is bad. Snow, forest. And there’s nothing. And in this sense, we found ourselves in very poor territories, very difficult to live in, for the development of the economy. I will not talk about all this, because, in my opinion, there is an ingenious book on this subject by a relatively recently deceased professor at Moscow University, Leonid Vasilyevich Milov. Academician, professor, "The Great Russian Pope and the Peculiarities of the Russian Historical Process." This is a great book that shows us so that we do not particularly turn up our nose. After all, we love, we love to say that the entire periodic table is hidden in our bowels, that we have there a third of the mineral resources, according to UN statistics, of all mankind. Perhaps this is so. But we live poorly nonetheless. And Leonid Vasilyevich shows how the Russian people and the institutions of power were formed in this poor, cold, northern environment. This is the first attempt by humanity to build a civilization in the north. We are neither west nor east. We are north. And no Gulf Stream reaches us. It is very cold here, despite all the warming of the climate now. And five hundred and a thousand years ago it was much colder. And these immense spaces with a small population, without a cultural background. That is, no one has actually done cultural civilizational work here before. All this has led to the fact that one of the fundamental qualities of Russian history is its material poverty. And our huge undefended territories. Enormous territories, because the Russian people spread in those directions, in general, where he did not meet any resistance. Do you know that our ancestors reached the Pacific Ocean. And without the state, the Cossacks themselves went and got there. Because there was essentially no resistance. It was only in the West, there was nowhere to go to the north. We have already mastered everything there, we have already been there. Arctic Ocean. And our borders are open. Such a walk-through courtyard. And the nomads back and forth. And the nomads back and forth. And we are not an island state, there are no mountains. That is, all this taken together gives us a very difficult and not always pleasant, not always convenient natural and climatic launching pad for the development of Russian history. We must remember this.
And in these conditions, in these conditions, with general poverty, and despite the fact that we have always been open, and to this day are open to various attacks, since we are not covered by anything naturally, there was a very small surplus product. That is, people produced, but very little remained of what could be divided and invested in further development. And because of this, the role of the state has grown. Since there is little wealth and there are many applicants for them, historically it so happened that the state said: it is better for me to control and distribute. I'd rather define the measure of consumption, the measure of distribution, the measure of conservation, and so on. And where to invest small resources. And this is also one of the foundations for the development of such a special state. This special type of power that we have.

One of the biggest, of course, influences on the development of our institutions of statehood was made by the Golden Horde. Mongol invasion. A lot of everything has been written about this. Yes? And before we were taught in schools, in Soviet ones. I don’t know how they teach in the post-Soviet now. That the Tatar-Mongol conquest stopped the development of Russia, there, and those-those-those-ones. Everything in this direction. It's all very bad. Later we learned that there is another point of view. That is, or rather, they were, they have already died, Russian philosophers, Eurasians, who assert: on the contrary, the Mongols did a great deed. They saved us from the corrupted influence of the West. They shaped our soul. They shaped our political orders, systems, and so on and so forth. However, there is one more point of view. Third. It belongs to the best Russian historian of all time, Vasily Osipovich Klyuchevsky. Who generally said that do not overestimate the importance of the Mongols. The Mongols influenced only the elite, at the top. The people knew nothing. I think that my favorite historian Klyuchevsky is wrong. And in many ways, of course, these two points of view are right that, yes, the Mongols, of course, stopped our development. Oh sure. The Mongols, by the way, acted very competently. They took away, as we know, literate people from Russian cities. Because they understood that knowledge is power. They took the masons away, because a wooden Kremlin or wooden gates and walls are easier to break open than stone ones. That is, everything was very competent. But the Mongols really played a huge role in Russian history. That is, the history that is already after the Kiev, Moscow Rus. And when, for example, today's Ukrainian historians say that you Muscovites are not the heirs of Kievan Rus, we are the heirs of Kievan Rus in Ukraine, and you are the heirs of the Golden Horde ... Well, yes. We are the heirs of the Golden Horde. Yes, in many ways modern Russia, Moscow, then Petersburg, Soviet and today's are, among other things, the heir to the Golden Horde, although Kievan Rus is also, of course. In this they are wrong. But we must not give up this legacy, this legacy. Since we got it.
In the twentieth century, I already told you this, I quoted about Berdyaev. His younger contemporary and no less remarkable philosopher, Georgy Fedotov, Georgy Vladimirovich Fedotov, also lived in exile and died after the revolution, he said. He commented on the end of the Mongol-Tatar yoke. Here's what happened. Yes? One thousand four hundred and eightieth, as we were taught in school. End of the Tatar-Mongol yoke. Although it, in fact, continued on. But it doesn't matter. What phrase did he sum it up with? "The Khan's headquarters was moved to the Kremlin." The Khan's headquarters was moved to the Kremlin. That is, the khan moved to the Kremlin. That is, Moscow otatarized, re-mongolized, and the Russian tsar, the Russian grand duke, is the khan. In a sense, he is, of course, right. Of course, no doubt about it. What's the matter? And the fact is that, being two and a half centuries under the Mongols, the Russian princes, coming, well, mainly to Sarai, yes, when there was already the Golden Horde, that is, the western part of the Mongol Empire, they met with some completely an incredible type of power that they had never seen before either in Europe or in their own Russia. It was an incredible amount of power for one person. Here is the Mongolian type of power, this is when one person is everything, and all the others are nothing. He can do everything absolutely. All the rest - his relatives, his children, wives, there, I do not know who, there, princes - is, in general, no one. Nothing. They don't exist. He is one subject. The rest are nothing. This was not typical for ancient Russia. But for centuries, being in such creative political communication with the Mongols, the Russian princes began to get used to this type of power. And it’s not just one volume. Power is a very complex, in general, such a substance. Yes? Power is always violence. Yes? Well, apply power. The same parental authority in the family. Yes? Or, there, I don't know, in some kind of friendships ... An older friend and a younger friend. His power. The power of the teacher in relation to the students. Even here there are elements of violence, and when we talk about the state and politics, even more so. But power is also a contract. Here is the modern power in Europe and the West, it has elements of both violence, but also a treaty. When we conclude an agreement: yes, I obey you, but on such conditions. I am a worker, I work at your factory. But here are the conditions. Such payment, such, so to speak, social assistance, and so on. That is, there is a contract. Self-restraint. I give in to you, you give in to me. The Mongolian government completely denies any agreement. Any convention. Any cooperation and agreement between the two. Mongolian power is exclusively the power of violence. And so. They are not bad either. They are no worse or better than others. And we are no worse and no better than others. But in the nomadic empires it was not possible in another way, apparently. And so the Russians are adopting it. Russian tsars, Russian grand dukes are gradually adopting this culture of power. It is this type of power. It is this political attitude. And it gets stronger, stronger, stronger. And even later, in times, so to speak, closer to us, in such civilized and beautiful. There was such an emperor Paul the First. Yes? This is the son of Catherine and the father of Alexander the First, who was killed, who did not rule for long. He was an absolutely wonderful man in his own way. “Our romantic emperor,” Pushkin called him. Once, talking with the French ambassador, he said to him: “In Russia, only that means something with whom I am talking. And only then, while I'm talking to him. " This is a very precise formulation of the Russian government. This is how it began then, this is how it goes on, on, on. And now, let's see. Well, there is. We will look at the twentieth century and see the same thing. This is the type of power that was formed by the Mongolian influence, these natural and climatic conditions and many others. It has existed and exists. And this is very important to understand. No matter how the power changes. Tsarist empire, republic, Soviet or system, or the Russian Federation, nevertheless, we see the same content, the same substance in changing forms.
But, of course, the formation of the Russian government was influenced in many ways by the well-known, I think that this audience knows this, the concept of "Moscow - the third Rome". Yes? Historians do not know exactly, they did not attribute exactly how it was. Well, this is some late fifteenth - early sixteenth century. This means that the teacher or the elder Filofei from Pskov, who formulates the concept "Moscow is the third Rome", which is absolutely not exclusively Russian. It is rooted, as we know, in the book of the prophet Daniel, in the Old Testament, where the entire history of mankind is interpreted as the history of successive kingdoms. And in Western Europe this concept was very developed. Incidentally, such a late replica, a late version of this concept, was Hitler's "Third Reich" concept. Also such a secular and such a fascist form, but, in essence, so to speak, it takes from here. So, Philotheus, as we know, with a number of letters addresses Tsar Ivan the Third, his son, Basil the Third, and says that Moscow is the third Rome. The first is, this is Rome, yes, where the Church begins.
The Apostle Peter, the first Pope of Rome, begins to build the Church. But the Romans beat Christians, persecution. And the Church. And the Church, according to Christian mythology, is the bride of Christ. And Christ is her bridegroom. The church flees to Byzantium, to Constantinople, where it becomes the state religion. Byzantine Empire. But then the Florentine union of 1439, when the weakening Byzantium asks for help from Rome and enters into the union and obeys it. The Church, of course, cannot remain in this "filthy" place where they entered into an alliance with the Catholics. And for the Orthodox, Catholics were worse, there, I don't know why. And where should they run? Well, of course, I ran to Moscow. Here is Moscow. This is Moscow - the third Rome. Last. The fourth will not be, as we know, - says Filofey. That is, this is where world history ends. We are God's chosen people. Although we know that according to the Christian faith, according to the Holy Scriptures, there is one people chosen by God. They are Jews. Yes? God concludes with them. And here we are. This is where the story ends. And what did it lead to? This led to incredible pride in the Russian people. Yesterday we were some kind of backward province and ulus of the Western Horde, and now we are, so to speak, ahead of the rest of the world, since Christianity has found its stronghold here. And we are the guardians of the ultimate truth. It's incredible, so to speak, such a proudly ambitious concept. But this is not the only thing that Filofey says. Philotheus talks about who directly has the key to open this chest with the truth or the door where the truth is kept. Who, so to speak, is holding it, who is the key to this truth? Tsar. Tsar. The Russian tsar becomes, according to the doctrine of Philotheus, the holder of the ultimate truth. He becomes a priest-king. In fact, the first clergyman. That is, on the one hand, you see what a powerful Mongolian tradition is in power as violence. And here is the Christian-Orthodox tradition, which is, first of all, the truth with us. And secondly, the king. That is, the personifier of power. That is, remember, "the Khan's headquarters has been moved to the Kremlin." So to speak, the Russian Khan has the ultimate spiritual truth. This is an absolutely amazing idea. And, by the way, you, historians, remember that this coincides with his marriage to Sophia Palaeologus. The niece of the last Byzantine emperor. With the construction of the current Kremlin. And with many such things, when the order of life is changing. It's still the same era. Now, the end of the fifteenth - the beginning of the sixteenth century. And amazing things are happening. After all, the Russians used to be ... I will allow myself such a lyrical digression for two or three minutes. Earlier, Muscovites, residents of Moscow, saw their Grand Duke or Tsar, as he was later called, quite often. He was, so to speak, the first among equals, in essence, such a Christian elder. Headman in the village. He differed from them, let's say, not much. And then the Byzantine splendor and courtyard. And people began to see their king twice a year. Once at Easter. And Easter, you know, in spring. Once at Christmas, when there was a procession. And this, you know, in winter. Yes? That is, our tsar appeared on Red Square twice. And why, since Moscow is, it means, the capital of world Christianity and the keeper of truth, they immediately began to approach the Kremlin, many churches began to be built around the Kremlin and in the Kremlin. The relics of the saints were brought down there. That is, they wanted to magnetize this place with holiness. Why am I telling this? At the beginning of the twentieth century, when the capital of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic returns from Petrograd to Moscow, and the concept of building a communist society is announced, the Third International will be convened. There is the third Rome, and here is the third International. And when the Soviet people declare that they are the custodians of the ultimate truth, since they are the custodians of the Marxist-Leninist truth, which is essentially a secular analogue of what happened before, they will begin to do the same in the Kremlin. When I was little, I went to kindergarten, we were taught such a song to verses, I think, by Sergei Mikhalkov: "Everyone knows that the Earth begins with the Kremlin." That is, here, the Earth is round, it begins with the Kremlin. And look what the Bolsheviks did. They also began to appear twice a year, to be shown to the people. Once in the spring. This is the First of May. Close to Easter. And another time in winter. Well, on the seventh of November, but it's already winter here, close to Christmas. About the same. And in the same way they began to magnetize with their relics, the relics of saints. And today you can come to their secular temple called the mausoleum. By the way, an architecturally brilliant piece. Where is the main saint. Yes? Moreover, he is really alive for them. Because, remember, if Mayakovsky is still being taught: "Lenin is still more alive than all the living." And Lenin died a long time ago. And this is why he said that? And because Christ died, but then he was reborn. Do you understand? And around a whole churchyard, a whole cemetery, where the relics of other saints lie. This is not at all accidental. It is a continuation of these traditions that work, work, work. And in this sense, I must say that if you look through the centuries at Russian political culture, at the Russian power culture, I would call it autocratic. Autocratic or domineering. The power of one. The power of one autocrat, who always personifies it in himself. This is a specific person. This is a specific person. And it has all the power. And spiritual, and political, and economic, and any other. And this practically does not change through the centuries. It can weaken, appear less intense. It always depends on the person. For example, Ivan the Terrible or Peter are tough characters. And they abruptly strained their power. Well, for example, some kind of Alexei Mikhailovich Quiet. Well, he was the quietest man, so to speak. When they were late with a report to him, he killed, so to speak, they killed on his orders. Not scary. Yes? And if it was any other person, he would have killed terribly. Well, there were tyrants, but they were not tyrants. But the essence of this did not change in any way. And she passed through the centuries. And this is neither our failure nor our fault. You may like it or not like it. Let's say I don't like it. But, again, this already tastes, there are no comrades for the color. But in principle, as a historian and political scientist, I see that yes, it all happened under certain conditions. Yes, it works in different forms, in different guises. And we must, of course, thinking about what will happen next, in the near future, especially you young people, thinking about what is happening now, of course, we must definitely bear this in mind. What else can we say about our institutions of power, about their traditions? Certainly, one of the most important elements ... And that's all, what I will say now follows from what has already been said. It is the existence of the phenomenon of property power. There is such a word, there is such a term in science, when the word “power” and “property” are combined into one, into one word, and “power ownership” is written. It is also, when historians say, the type of power in Russia. They say patrimonial or patrimonial. Remember the ancient Russian word "patrimony" or "patrimonial"? Power ownership. What does it mean? This is when property and power are not two separate phenomena, not two separate, two separate substances, but together. You can't even separate them. This means that the one who has the power is the one who has the property. That property doesn't walk on its own. Moreover, the word "property" is not entirely accurate, because ... Although, we do not have time for this. Property is a special legal institution. And here, rather, we are talking about property. About material substance. In the course of Russian political evolution, it so happened that power was always the controlling and commanding person over this material substance. Even at the end of the nineteenth century, when these wonderful reforms were already underway, which I told you about, which you know about. Under Nicholas II, during the first census of the population, Nicholas, as you know, on, in the column "profession" wrote "the owner of the Russian land." Master. He is both a ruler and a master in an economic sense. Moreover, it was when, it would seem, this tendency is not particularly evident. But to this day, in our country, whoever has power, has the disposal of property. And this, again, is connected with the course of Russian historical evolution. And property as a separate institution did not grow here. What else is such an important element of Russian power traditions? They always say: in Russia there is no law, there are no laws. And if there is, then they do not work. Their courts, there, bribe and so on. You will hear this not only today by turning on, there, NTV or REN-TV. This was a hundred years ago, and two hundred years ago they talked about this topic. A lot of wonderful works of Russian classical literature have been written. Why did this happen? And here is also an absolutely amazing, unique thing.
Mid-eleventh century. Eleventh century. Kievan Rus. Metropolitan Hilarion. Yes? The Metropolitan is the head of the Russian Church within the framework of the Patriarchate of Constantinople. One of two ethnically Russian people, metropolitans of the Kiev era. Monk, then Metropolitan. Writes the work "The Word of Law and Grace." It even takes place in schools. This is one of the first classics. It is artistic, legal, philosophical, foreign policy, whatever. Yes? And for me it has always been a mystery. A few decades ago, the Russian people were illiterate. That is, there was no Christianity, there was no, therefore, the alphabet, they did not know how to write, read. And suddenly, after a few decades, a thinker is born, a person is born who, well, as if after millennia saw where Russia would go. This is totally amazing.
I cannot imagine, and I do not know of a single analogue, at least in Russian history. Well, you know, this piece is pretty simple. He writes that there are different options, so to speak, of management. Well, I will speak in today's language, of course. Society. There is a law that guides us here in life, but it does not touch our inner structure, because it does not creep into the soul. Follow the law and everything is fine. Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment has been written on this topic. Yes? He wanted to kill an old woman, already a criminal. The criminal, when he has already killed. Now, the law - only if he killed. Well, there is grace. Grace is something that comes down from God, but not on everyone, because, again, according to Christian mythology, few will be saved. And for those on whom grace will descend, but it is not known who. Who is acquiring. This thing is so exclusive, rare, so to speak. Again, speaking in today's not very pretty language. And apparently ... I'm trying to reconstruct. Hilarion wondered how to connect. Because somehow this is not enough, and that is rare for social life. And he introduces the category "truth." Truth. Yes, truth is becoming a key term, which partly includes both the law and these legal principles. It also includes some elements, perhaps grace, as well as justice. Includes social justice, equity, and so on. That is, the word "truth". The term "truth" is loaded with huge meanings. Or, as they say in science, connotations. And, for example, it is very difficult to translate this word into English, French, German, because there are no these contents, these connotations. And again, remember? It is wonderful that the set of Russian laws in the first century of Russia's existence was called “Russian Pravda”. Yes? That is, it seemed to fly in the air. We also remember, for example, that at the beginning of the nineteenth century, an ambitious officer who wanted to make a revolution in Russia wrote a work also called "Russian Truth." Pavel Pestel. He thought Russia would live. And at the beginning of the twentieth century, an ambitious political emigrant called his newspaper Pravda. Yes? Vladimir Ilyich Lenin. And it became the main newspaper of the twentieth century. That is, this term remained in Russia for a thousand years.
"Pravda" is a key term in Russian political culture. Why am I saying this? And to the fact that the presence of this term for the presence of this concept, a phenomenon within the framework of which Russian culture fits, blocked the possibility of law. That is, our ancestors and you built the state of truth. Where there is justice, and equality, and law, and grace. And whatever you like. But our European brothers were building a state of law. Well, really, the law, which in their life does not particularly pretend to be anything. Therefore, in our culture, there was not even a desire to have a right. In general, the word "law", in the legal sense, arose in the Russian language when it was translated from German. Feofan Prokopovich at the beginning of the eighteenth century. Yes? The German word "das rekht", "right", was translated into Russian - "right". They also have a right hand - "rekht", and the right is the same with us. Yes? That is, this is, in fact, a translation word. That is, our ancestors did not even imagine what is law as the main regulator of social life, but there is truth. And this explains Russia's inclination towards communism, for example. Because this is also an attempt at some kind of truth on earth. And this explains why our courts are so weak. Why is our legal system so weak in general? Of course, in Russian history you can find some other traditions that can be qualified as legal. But we will not talk about it now. Do not have the time. But on the whole, this phenomenon of truth, I will tell you again, blocked the possibility of Russia's development along some legal paths. But today I would like to end our lecture with this. At the next lecture, tomorrow, when we get together, continue talking about the development of Russian political institutions, about their traditions. What is preserved, what is gone. Thanks.
QUESTION: At the beginning of your speech, you put forward one such position that the history of Russian statehood is power-centric. But, you see, if you describe everything else through power, whether it is property, relations with the Church, then it turns out that there is nothing but power. And if there is nothing but power, and everything is described through power, then it turns out that there is nothing at all. This is the first question. And the second question. You said that Moscow is the heir to the Golden Horde, in this sense it is an ulus. This is, of course, debatable. But this is the situation. This means that the situation remains in the sense that, indeed, since that time there has been a suppression of the rest of the population by the supreme bearer of power. And that the population itself, spreading, colonizing the rest of the territory, it actually fled from this center. And settling in new territories, it calmly got along, for some, at least, time without state power. And the state authorities were already catching up with them. What do you think about this? Thanks.
Pivovarov: I can answer. Yes? The questions are so correct, understandable and interesting. That is, you study well, then. First question. Yes, of course, in the lecture I am forced to somewhat stylize the approach in order to more vividly show what I want to say within the given time frame. Of course, it is impossible to completely reduce everything to power. It is natural. But look. I said: our culture, including political, is power-centric. He immediately said: the Western is anthropocentric, human-centered. Therefore, we can say: what, in Europe, in the West, everything is reduced only to a person, through a person? Of course not. But if we want to understand the features of Russian political state legal development, we still have to say about some of the most important features. From the point of view of this professor, it is power. And once, together with one of my colleagues, when we wrote one work on the methodology of Russian history, we called the Russian government "a mono-subject of Russian history." The only subject in Russian history. Realizing perfectly well that, of course, there are other actors, there are other figures. But we had to emphasize exactly this part. And to look. In general, this question that you asked is of the most important methodological significance. So I formulated for myself how to approach history, in general, to social phenomena. I named it. Well, everyone is learning English now, with a "possibilitist approach." Possibility. Possibility approach. That is, Professor Pivovarov will look through the authorities. Professor Milov - through the situation with the Russian plowman. Professor Yanin - through some archaeological things. And genius - through the European concept. Another - through some other. In a dispute, for example, the famous one, which to this day excites and brings to a heart attack Russian historians of Norman origin, not Norman. I am for the fact that there were different points of view. And the possibilitist is that this is an opportunity, these are different points of view. And only then, as you know, there are different cameras to see better. Yes, here? I am a football fan. Yes? And we see the match better. So is the historical process. Yes? But here I can just look into all the eyepieces. Today in this lecture I look through this eyepiece and emphasize it. Well, if, after all, a little bit of irony does not go away, indeed, I do not know of any other social history of Christian countries, where the power played such a role, and where the power was such. Now for the Golden Horde. And this is also a very interesting question. And, you know, where is the most interesting? That they walked on their own. They walked on their own. Yes. Of course. Moreover, at first, as we know, the authorities somehow did not quite understand where they were going, why they were going and, in general, what was happening. But there is an absolutely wonderful modern anthropologist - Svetlana Lurie, who writes. She investigates the matter. And which writes that the communities of the Cossacks, who, here, were advancing and engaged in colonization, they reproduced. And the Cossacks are those who fled from the central regions of Russia. They reproduced the social relationships they brought with them. That is, they were conquering, but they were building the same social power relations that they had until the moment they got there. And then the power came. And then I completed it all. Although, of course, there was some Cossack autonomy, the specifics were retained. That is, that, yes, they did it themselves. But they reproduced Russia and the Russian social structure, and the political power, economic structure in these lands. How. Well, the Golden Horde, this, in general, did not particularly bind, in fact. It has nothing to do with the Golden Horde. Because, well, they bore tribute, of course, and elements of this Horde tradition in Russian history. But, in general, you say: it is debatable whether we were an ulus or not. This is not a topic at all. Rather, the real theme is the theme that, of course, we are the successors of many traditions. This is quite obvious. Moreover, here one should not be proud, not cry. It is a fact. Moreover, any country is the successor of various traditions. Here we talk painfully about the Normans and so on. Well, okay, the Battle of Hastings. One thousand sixty-sixth year. Remember William the Conqueror. The Normans are taking over there. And they make this country different. Yes? And no one refuses to do it. The Normans arrive, capture Sardinia. And all, for example, the Italian aristocracy wears such? completely Italian surnames, like Belinger. This is the leader of the once Italian Communist Party, the Marquis Belinger. Do you understand? That is, they are everywhere, they are everywhere. In Italy there are Norman traditions. They don't refuse. That is, Swedish, Scandinavian. We have Horde. Why not?
QUESTION: At the suggestion of Dmitry Anatolyevich Medvedev and Vladimir Putin, there is a very popular term "feedback". That is, the response of the people to the actions of the authorities. In your opinion, is there a feedback between the people and the authorities in the Russian political historical tradition? Thanks.
PIVOVAROV: Thank you. I just have to, with all due respect to both Vladimir Vladimirovich and Dmitry Anatolyevich, say that it was not they, of course, who came up with the phrase “feedback”. It has been around for a long time. And they just, like the Russian people, use it. Yes? This is the same as it is sometimes said that the term "Asiopes" (from Eurasia - Asiopes, on the contrary) was coined by Yavlinsky. No, the historian and politician Miliukov came up with the idea. Feedback exists. Remember there was such a poet, Pushkin? He said, "A senseless and merciless riot." For example, Razin, Pugachev, peasant revolutions and so on. This is one feedback. When a people, driven to despair, to horror, to the horror of exploitation, both economic and moral, and all kinds of physical, physiological, and so on, revolts in a terrible one ... There were other riots. For example, the urban uprisings of the first years of the reign of Alexei Mikhailovich, when the townspeople very reasonably demanded the law. And hence the cathedral code, which was printed in two thousand copies. A huge circulation in those days, not only for Russia, but for the whole world. That is, there were such feedbacks. Feedbacks were also received in local government. And this is not only the zemstvo of the time of Alexander II, in which there were not only enlightened nobles and educated merchants, but also peasants. And this is also the zemstvo movement before that. Wasn't there feedback when power was falling? For example, popular movements to restore the state in times of turmoil, for example. In ancient Russia, in general, people's self-government, and in Novgorod - until the end of the fifteenth century, we know. Feedback is not only when people voted with their feet, as they say now. That is, the Cossacks. The Cossacks fled, this was also a feedback, when they fled and did not give. Feedback is when the Old Believers, not wanting to become Peter's recruits, burned themselves. This is also a feedback. Your question, in fact, is what influence the people, the masses had on this. Huge, of course. Enormous influence. At the same time, here, I already told you that, together with my colleague, we called the government such a mono-subject of Russian history. But we called the people a population. A special biological term. We didn't want to offend the people. We did not specifically name either a nation or a people, since these terms are already taken. They have their own meaning. A population is a population devoid of subjective energy. When speaking in such a strictly scientific language. Here is the subject of history, his energy, the people were deprived. And this is especially in the days of serfdom, when people were turned into nothing. The same thing happened, by the way, in the most terrible years of Stalinism, when people were turned into nothing. No wonder the VKP (b), as the ruling party was called, was deciphered among the people: "the second serfdom of the Bolsheviks." All-Union Communist Party. Not by chance. That is, Russian history is the history of the brutal suppression of the Russians' hedgehogs. Not the Mongols of the Russians, not like the Germans killed the Jews, but the Russians of the Russians. Russians, Tatars, everyone who lived here. Yes? Ukrainians, and so on, and so on, and so on. And in this sense, the history of both the people's resistance and the history of the people's struggle is very important. Yes, and people's self-government. You know, for example, that in the northern districts of Russia, for example, especially in the first half of the sixteenth century, this is before Ivan the Terrible, an absolutely remarkable time of economic growth and relative, so to speak, calm before the atrocities of this fanatic, shall we say, which he began in the sixties. years. Labial self-government, for example, flourished. Lip Wardens. Even the prototypes of jury trials. This is people's self-government. And it certainly was. By the way, the history of the occupation also shows that the people can do it. Here, the forty-second year, the forty-first, the forty-third. The people in the guerrilla territories recreated the structures of power. It was later from the center that partisans-security officers, emissaries and so on flew in. With weapons, there, with directives and so on. But the people themselves restored self-government and did not die out. And whole huge areas, including in some forest regions of Russia. Well, first of all, in Belarus, in the north of Ukraine, and so on, and so on. That is, the role of the people is immense. And, in general, I must tell you that the people ... The revolution of the seventeenth year is a people's revolution. And the role of the people - please. On August 19, 1991, ten thousand people gathered near the White House, where Yeltsin was, and so on. Of course, they could have been all tanks, but they stood up and said: no. And the tanks did not go. And the people overthrew this power. This was also a people's revolution. That is, the role of the people is enormous, but we must know that in Russian history the population, the people, that is, you and I, were endlessly suppressed. Like, perhaps, nowhere else among Christian countries.

The well-known historian, scientific director of INION, Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences Yuri Sergeevich Pivovarov, who for 17 years headed the INION RAS, is now in the hospital, he will have a serious operation. Earlier, searches were conducted at three addresses and his passport was confiscated; a criminal case was opened against him about allegedly fictitious employment at the institute. Yuri Sergeevich Pivovarov is known for his principled position on the protection of INION, he also earlier criticized the reform of the Russian Academy of Sciences and was never afraid to comment to the media about the problems of the historical heritage and the prospects for the development of the Russian state. In November 2016, giving a lecture as part of the Evening Readings project, he noted that “Russia desperately needs change,” and in February 2017, in an interview with French Radio International RFI, he said: “No dictatorship in the world has ended well ".

In early April, Yu.S. Pivovarov told about his persecution to Novaya Gazeta: “You can say that criminal prosecution has been going on against me since April 20, 2015. Committee, confirmed my innocence. That is, there is no connection with the fire in the actions or inaction of Academician Pivovarov. But instead of clearing the charges against me and closing the case, in November last year it was transferred from the Directorate for Especially Important Cases of the Moscow Investigative Committee to the Investigative Committee Russian Federation. And instead of one investigator - a senior lieutenant, now I have 8-10 major generals. "

The academician called his criminal prosecution harassment and a political order: “Of course, the emergence of this new case and the related investigative measures, like the previous criminal prosecution, is nothing more than harassment. Because of one and a half million rubles, which, given the current level of corruption in the country, even looks somehow offensive! Moreover, I never saw this money in my eyes, nor did I hold it in my hands, even the investigators were impressed by the modest way of life of the honored academician. If I am not arrested today or tomorrow, I will speak, tell, speak. This is not a private matter of an individual person, Pivovarov, it can affect everyone. "

We believe that the criminal prosecution of Yuri Pivovarov, as well as the persecution unleashed against him in the media and on the Internet, have no other goals than the following - to break and destroy a public figure who enjoys great prestige among the Russian intelligentsia and is not afraid to publicly speak out on topical issues. historical and political issues, as well as sow fear in the scientific community in order to discourage scientists from freely discussing the current state of affairs in Russia and the world.

Obviously, this is also done in order to undermine the resistance of thinking people of the so-called. "Optimization" of scientific and cultural institutions, which boils down to a decrease in state funding for science and culture, an increase in the bureaucratic press and suppression of the rights and freedoms of employees of academic institutions, universities, museums, libraries, archives, etc.

We call on Russian and international public organizations and the media to pay close attention to the case of Yuri Pivovarov and to defend him as an unjustly persecuted modern Russian dissident. His life is now in real danger, and only public attention to his case can stop the Russian authorities or certain groups of the so-called. "Siloviks" from further arbitrariness.

Boris Averin, literary historian
Konstantin Azadovsky, literary historian
Andrey Alekseev, sociologist
Victor Allakhverdov, Doctor of Psychology
Elena Alferova, Head of the Department of Jurisprudence, INION RAS
Alexander Anikin, Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Ruben Apresyan, Doctor of Philosophy
Yuri Apresyan, Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Alexey Arbatov, Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Mikhail Arkadiev, Doctor of Arts, Honored Artist of the Russian Federation
Alexander Arkhangelsky, writer
Vera Afanasyeva, Doctor of Philosophy, Professor
Valentin Bazhanov, Doctor of Philosophy, Professor
Nune Barseghyan, writer, psychologist
Alexey Bartoshevich, theater expert
Elena Basner, art critic
Leonid Bakhnov, writer
Sergey Beletsiy, Doctor of Historical Sciences
Stanislav Belkovsky, political scientist
Sergey Beloglazov, professor of the Ural State Conservatory named after M.P. Mussorgsky
Elena Berezovich, Doctor of Philology, Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Andrey Beskin, Doctor of Technical Sciences
Alexander Bobrov, philologist
Victor Bogorad, artist
Elizaveta Bonch-Osmolovskaya, microbiologist, corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Marina Boroditskaya, writer
Valery Borshchev, human rights activist Moscow Helsinki Group
Natalya Bragina, Doctor of Philology, Professor of the State Institute of Foreign Languages ​​named after A.S. Pushkin, professor of the Russian State University for the Humanities
Olga Bugoslavskaya, literary critic
Oleg Budnitsky, historian
Igor Bunin, Doctor of Political Science
Dmitry Bykov, writer
Andrey Bychkov, Professor of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Olga Varshaver, translator
Nikolay Vakhtin, Corresponding Member RAS, professor
Maria Virolainen, Pushkin scholar
Alina Vitukhnovskaya, writer
Boris Vishnevsky, head of the Yabloko faction in the Legislative Assembly of St. Petersburg, publicist, writer
Vladimir Voinovich, writer
Andrey Vorobyov, Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Tatiana Vorozheikina, teacher, researcher
Valentin Vydrin, Professor of the Faculty of Oriental Studies, St. Petersburg State University
Sergei Gandlevsky, poet
Alexander Gelman, playwright
Mikhail Glazov, physicist, corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Leonid Gozman, politician
Andrey Golovnev, Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Anatoly Golubovsky, sociologist
Yakov Gordin, historian, publicist
Tatiana Goryacheva, art historian
Natalia Gromova, leading researcher at GLM, writer
Lev Gudkov, sociologist, Doctor of Philosophy
Andrey Desnitsky, professor of the Russian Academy of Sciences, philologist
Mikhail Dzyubenko, philologist
Vitaly Dixon, writer
Olga Dovgy, philologist
Oleg Dorman, director.
Denis Dragunsky, writer
Olga Drobot, translator
Valery Durnovtsev, Doctor of Historical Sciences, Professor of the Russian State Humanitarian University
Anna Dybo, linguist, corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Vladimir Dybo, linguist, academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Vitaly Dymarsky, journalist
Galina Elshevskaya, art critic
Evgeny Ermolin, literary critic
Konstantin Erusalimsky, Doctor of Historical Sciences
Victor Esipov, writer
Alexander Zhukovsky, sociologist, political scientist
Leonid Zhukhovitsky, writer
Nina Zarkhi, Deputy Editor-in-Chief, Cinema Art magazine
Vladimir Zakharov, Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Andrey Zubov, historian, religious scholar
Vyacheslav Ivanov, linguist, academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Askold Ivanchik, historian, corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Stanislav Ivashkovsky, head. Department of Economic Theory, MGIMO
Igor Irteniev, writer
Evgeny Ikhlov, publicist
Sofya Kaganovich, Doctor of Philology
Katya Kapovich, writer, editor of the journal "FULCRUM: an annual of poetry and aesthetics"
Andrey Karavashkin, Doctor of Philology, Professor of the Russian State University for the Humanities
Ilya Kasavin, Doctor of Philosophy, Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
Tatiana Kasatkina, Doctor of Philology
Mikhail Kasyanov, Chairman of the Party of People's Freedom (PARNAS)
Nina Caterly, writer
Oksana Kiyanskaya, Doctor of Historical Sciences
Igor Klyamkin, Doctor of Philosophy, Professor
Alexander Kobrinsky, Doctor of Philology, Professor of the Russian State Pedagogical University named after A.I. Herzen
Elena Kolyadina, writer, journalist
Nikolay Kononov, writer
Vladimir Korsunsky, journalist
Nadezhda Kostyurina, Doctor of Culturology
Tatyana Krasavchenko, Doctor of Philology, INION RAS
Olga Krokinskaya, professor, doctor of sociological sciences
Grigory Kruzhkov, poet
Igor Kurlyandsky, historian
Olga Labas, art critic
Alexander Lavrov, Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Pavel Litvinov, human rights activist
Evgeniya Lozinskaya, Researcher, INION RAS
Natalia Mavlevich, translator
Dina Magomedova, Doctor of Philology, Professor of the Russian State University for the Humanities
Vladimir Magun, sociologist
Alexey Makarkin, political scientist
Alexey Makushinsky, writer
Marina Malkiel, musicologist
Lev Marquis, conductor
Alexander Makhov, Doctor of Philology
Velikhan Mirzekhanov, Doctor of Historical Sciences
Alexander Moldovan, Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Andrey Moroz, professor of the Russian State University for the Humanities, Doctor of Philology
Alexey Motorov, writer
Maria Nadyarnykh, philologist (IMLI RAS)
Maxim Nenarokomov, art critic
Andrey Nikitin-Perensky, founder of the electronic library "Imwerden"
Sergey Nikolaev, Doctor of Philology
Mikhail Odessa, Doctor of Philology
Dmitry Oreshkin, political scientist
Tatiana Pavlova, candidate of philological sciences
Tatyana Parkhalina, Deputy Director, INION RAS
Natalya Pakhsaryan, professor at Moscow State University, leading researcher at INION RAS
Grigory Petukhov, poet
Tatiana Pinegina, geologist, professor of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Andrey Piontkovsky, publicist
Nikolay Podosokorsky, publicist
Tatiana Pozdnyakova, Cand. ped. Sciences, Art. scientific researcher Museum of Anna Akhmatova in the Fountain House
Ella Polyakova, human rights activist
Lev Ponomarev, human rights activist
Nina Popova, director of the St. Petersburg Museum of Anna Akhmatova
Vladimir Porus, Ph.D., Higher School of Economics
Anna Reznichenko, Doctor of Philosophy, Professor of the Russian State Humanitarian University
Lorina Repina, historian, corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Raisa Rozina, Doctor of Philology, Chief Researcher of the Institute of the Russian Language of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Lev Rubinstein, writer
Yuliy Rybakov, human rights activist
Elena Rybina, Doctor of Historical Sciences, Professor of Moscow State University
Yuri Ryzhov, Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Olga Sedakova, writer
Adrian Celine, Doctor of Historical Sciences
Alexey Semenov, mathematician, academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Nikolai Sibeldin, physicist, corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Tatiana Sotnikova (Anna Berseneva), writer.
Mikhail Sokolov, journalist
Nikita Sokolov, historian
Natalia Sokolovskaya, writer
Nikolay Solodnikov, journalist
Monica Spivak, Doctor of Philology
Irina Staf, philologist, translator
Sergei Stratanovsky, writer
Love Summ, translator
Irina Surat, Doctor of Philology
Alexandra Ter-Avanesova, Leading Researcher, IRL RAS
Lev Timofeev, writer
Elena Titarenko, art critic, journalist
Svetlana Tolstaya, Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Ivan Tolstoy, radio journalist
Andrey Toporkov, Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Dmitry Travin, economist
Lyudmila Ulitskaya, writer
Mark Urnov, Doctor of Political Science, Higher School of Economics
Fedor Uspensky, Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences
David Feldman, Doctor of Historical Sciences
Irina Flige, human rights activist
Artemy Khalatov, editor-in-chief of the journal "Russia and the Modern World", INION RAS
Igor Kharichev, writer, secretary of the Moscow Writers' Union
Alexey Tsvetkov, poet, essayist
Andrey Chernov, writer
Elena Chizhova, writer
Yuri Chistov, Doctor of Historical Sciences, Director of the Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography (Kunstkamera) of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Marietta Chudakova, member of the European Academy
Marianna Shakhnovich, Doctor of Philosophy, Professor
Lilia Shevtsova, publicist
Nikita Shklovsky-Kordi, doctor
Lev Shlosberg, deputy of the Pskov Regional Assembly from the YABLOKO party, historian
Yuri Shmukler, Doctor of Biological Sciences, translator
Boris Stern, Doctor of Physical and Mathematical Sciences, editor-in-chief of the newspaper "Troitsky Variant"
Tatiana Shcherbina, poet, essayist
Mikhail Epshtein, culturologist, professor
Andrey Yurganov, Doctor of Historical Sciences, Professor of the Russian State Humanitarian University
Ekaterina Yakimova, Leading Researcher, Sociology Department, INION RAS
Viktor Yaroshenko, journalist
_____________

Sign the open letter in defense of Yu.S. Pivovarov can be found on the page of Nikolai Podosokorsky on Facebook.

“How and why historians lie - IV, or Yu.S. Pivovarov ". Part 1

Sergey Bukharin, KM website

V hiding the goals and mechanisms of the information-strike operation “Destalinization of Russia”, carried out in the interests of Russia's geopolitical rivals, we continue the series of articles under the general title “How and why historians lie”, forming the “top” 5 Russian historians, assessed as falsifiers.

Today we will talk about Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences Yu.S. Pivovarov.

In our day, falsifying history has become a systematic political work. Purposeful distortion of the past, mockery of the life of our fathers and grandfathers is one of the components of the strategic information war waged against Russia with the aim of its disintegration and the establishment of a regime of external control. Corrupt officials, business, science and education contribute to the achievement of this goal. The US State Department, through a system of non-governmental organizations, finances Russian universities, academic institutes, departments, individual "independent" scientists and experts ... As a rule, humanitarian and economic universities, departments, and academic institutes enjoy foreign financial support. It is these areas that decisively affect the sustainability of Russia's development.

In the process of training, students and postgraduates are selected, the most proven ones are sent to study "over the hill", to the "metropolis" to continue their education. Then, these masters and doctors, with the help of a lobbying system, are introduced to key positions in Russian business, politics, and education.

These young people can be found at the highest levels of government. They comprise a cohort of individuals representing the interests of Russia's geopolitical competitors and transnational corporations. This cohort also includes our "historians" who, out of selfish interests, malicious intent or stupidity, contribute to the erosion of the value system and the intellectual degradation of Russians. As a result of the activities of falsifiers, our own science and education perish before our very eyes.

Threats from such "historians" also consist in the fact that they are admitted to the process of teaching our children, write textbooks, introduce general educational standards, represent Russia at the international level, after which Resolutions are born like the OSCE PA Vilnius Resolution "Reunification of a Divided Europe" dated July 3, 2009.

Liberal professors talk a lot about "freedom" and "pluralism." However, “freedom” and “pluralism” exist only for them and not for students. For example, what assessment will the “historian” Y. Pivovarov give a student if the student at the lecture of the academician declares that he confuses Hindenburg with Ludendorff, names the dates incorrectly, invents events and, in general, he is not a historian, but an ignoramus and a liar?

Russia is losing "state immunity", so the falsifiers have completely lost their sense of proportion. In particular, Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences Yu.S. Pivovarov:

- is not afraid to propagandize his ideas of the disintegration of Russia and the reduction of its population;

Not afraid of legal responsibility for insulting the honor and dignity of our fathers and grandfathers and damaging the business reputation of the Red Army;

- is not afraid to demonstrate his ignorance;

- is not afraid that someone will have the courage to tell him that he is not a historian or a scientist!

“June 10-11, Hungarian Center for Russian Studies, Budapest University. Loranda Eotvos (Prof. Gyula Swak) and the Department of Eastern European History (Prof. Tomasz Kraus) held an international scientific conference in Budapest on the theme "The Great Patriotic War - 70 Years of the Attack of Nazi Germany on the USSR". The Hungarian news agency MTI published two short messages on its portal about each day of the conference.

Of all the reports of the conference participants, the MTI correspondent found only two speeches particularly noteworthy: Senior Researcher, INION RAS Irina Glebova and Director of INION RAS Academician Yuri Pivovarov. Thus, in his report, Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences Yuri Pivovarov noted: “The cult of Soviet victory in the world war is the main legitimate foundation of modern Russia. It is loudly voiced by television, newspapers, and other media. The consciousness of twenty-year-olds is built on this basis. This victory is everything for us, we will never give it up, only we can win - these are the main components of the myth. After 1945, the myth of victory in the world war, which had consigned to oblivion, became the main basis for legitimizing the second edition of the communist regime in the USSR, and then in present-day Russia. " So, for Yu. Pivovarov, as well as the employees of the academic institute headed by him, the Great Patriotic War is not the Great and not the Patriotic War, but the "so-called" war, and victory in it is a myth. The Hungarian MTI correspondent liked the last definition so much that he repeated it 15 times in his short message! "

Russian historian Alexander Dyukov spoke about the report of Academician Pivovarov as follows: “As for the speech at the conference, Director of INION RAS Yu.S. Pivovarov, then, being devoted not to the problems considered at the conference, but to a general view of the history of the Soviet Union, it clearly stood out against the general background. The listeners could see that the stated by Yu.S. Pivovarov created the concept not by generalizing facts and creating a consistent concept on their basis, but by using facts (including unverified ones) to illustrate an already formulated concept. This led to the presence in the speech of Yu.S. Pivovarov, a significant number of factual errors, which I pointed out during the ensuing discussion. Hungarian colleagues also greeted the report of the INION RAN Director with great skepticism. In any case, stated by Yu.S. Pivovarov, the controversial historical concept deserves careful scientific criticism »…

So let's take a critical look at the life path and "scientific work" of Academician Pivovarov.

Yuri Sergeevich Pivovarov(born April 25, 1950, Moscow) in 1967 entered the Moscow State Institute of International Relations (MGMIMO) of the USSR Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which he graduated in 1972. To enter the Institute of International Relations at that time was almost unbelievable. In this university, "mere mortals" could enter (as a rule) after military service in the Soviet army, if they managed to join the ranks of the CPSU there and receive a referral from the political department of the military district to this prestigious university or on the recommendation of the district committee of the CPSU (for Moscow) or the regional committee Communist Party for the province. This was a necessary, but not sufficient condition for obtaining a MGIMO student card.

In 1975 Yuri Sergeevich graduated from the Institute of World Economy and International Relations (IMEMO) of the USSR Academy of Sciences. He became a Doctor of Political Sciences, Professor, Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS) since 1997 (in the "democratic period"), Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences since 2006.

How alike they are, these are now successful "historians". All of them, without exception, made careers under the communist regime. Without exception, all, making excuses for this, call themselves dissidents. So Yuri Sergeevich, the grandson of a fiery revolutionary woman, Ilyich's comrade-in-arms, told us: “Today is February 13, 2002. On February 13, 1972, exactly 30 years ago, I was first arrested by the KGB. I was arrested at the Yaroslavl railway station in the early morning of February 13th. " “Arrested for the first time,” that is it is assumed that the young dissident was repeatedly repressed: he was imprisoned, exiled, etc.

« He was acquainted with dissidents, transported samizdat literature, was once detained with reprints, and the persecution boiled down to the fact that after graduate school they did not take a job and was unemployed for a year. He studied at MGIMO on the same course with Lavrov, Torkunov, Migranyan, with the Ambassador to America Kislyak in the same class at school - they were already making a career, and I went in a quilted jacket, in kerchiefs with footcloths, with a cigarette in my teeth ”(from here). It is necessary to be able to: in the USSR for a whole year "with a cigarette in his teeth" without work to blabber. At that time in the Criminal Code, the article was "for parasitism", which was defined as a long, more than four months in a row (or for a year in total), living of an adult able-bodied person on unearned income with evasion of socially useful labor. Parasitism was punishable under Soviet criminal law (Article 209 of the RSFSR Criminal Code). By the way, I. Brodsky was convicted under this article. But Yuri Sergeevich gets away with it, after a year of parasitism he is hired at a prestigious academic institute.

Thus, in the winter of 1972, the “dissident” Pivovarov was arrested by the KGB, in the spring of the same year he graduated from the prestigious MGIMO of the USSR Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and in the fall of the same year he was admitted to full-time postgraduate studies at the no less prestigious IMEMO of the USSR Academy of Sciences.

Since 1976, Yuri Sergeevich has been working at the Institute of Scientific Information on Social Sciences (INION) of the USSR Academy of Sciences. Since 1998 - Director of INION RAS, at the same time head of the department of political science and jurisprudence of INION RAS. Since the early 1990s. reads a number of lecture courses at Moscow State University and Russian State Humanitarian University. President of the Russian Association for Political Science (RAPN) since February 2011, Honorary President of the RAPN since 2004.

Deputy Head of the History Section of the Department of Historical and Philological Sciences of the Russian Academy of Sciences, member of the Bureau of the Information and Library Council of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Deputy Chairman of the Scientific Council for Political Science at the Department of Social Sciences of the Russian Academy of Sciences, head of the section "Scientific and Cultural Policy, Education" of the Expert Council under the Chairman of the Federation Council, member of the Scientific Council under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation, etc.

Yu Pivovarov about Russian saints

Is it possible to publicly spit on an icon in the presence of 83 thousand people or, surrounded by the same number of Muslims, defiantly step on the Koran? “What a stupid question,” anyone will answer. normal human. But why can one insult Orthodox saints? For example, the holy noble Grand Duke Alexander Nevsky. Here is how the historian Y. Pivovarov, the academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences, speaks of the prince: “The same Alexander Nevsky is one of the controversial, if not to say stinking, figures in Russian history, but you cannot debunk him. ... And Nevsky, leaning on the Horde, became its mercenary warrior. In Tver, Torzhok, Staraya Russa, he cut the ears of fellow believers who rebelled against the Mongols, poured boiling water and lead into their mouths. ... And the Battle on the Ice is just a small border conflict in which Nevsky behaved like a bandit, attacking a handful of border guards in large numbers. He acted in the same ignoble manner in the Battle of the Neva, for which he became the Nevsky. In 1240 he, having made his way to the headquarters of the Swedish jarl, the ruler of Birger, himself knocked out his eye with a spear, which was considered not comme il faut among the knights. " From the interview of Y. Pivovarov to the magazine "Profile" No. 32/1 (circulation 83 thousand copies).

The events that Yu. Pivovarov is talking about happened a long time ago. There are no documents that could confirm the correctness of the academician's conclusions. For this reason alone, we can say that he is wrong, since here the point is already subjective assessment the activities of the holy noble prince, and not in science. And the assessment is a matter " free will ".

The "free will" of the academician determines his conclusion regarding the activities of Alexander Nevsky. Yu. Pivovarov is not original in his reasoning; even under Nicholas I, a book about Russia "La Russie en 1839" by the Marquis de Custine was published in Paris. In his "travel notes" Custine does not limit himself to attacks on contemporary Russia, he seeks, on occasion, to debunk the Russian past, to undermine the historical foundations of the Russian people. Among Custine's attacks on the Russian past, attention is drawn to the ironic words dedicated to the memory of the holy right-believing prince Alexander Nevsky. Custine says: “Alexander Nevsky is an example of caution; but he was not a martyr for faith or noble feelings. The National Church canonized this sovereign, wiser than heroic. This is Ulysses among the saints. " And pay attention: even this caveman Russophobe does not allow himself to sink to the level of that dirty abuse, which the historian Y. Pivovarov lets go of the Russian saint.

There are several points of view on the actions of Alexander Nevsky. Yu. Pivovarov represents the point of view of Western liberals. The assessment of the activities of the Grand Duke Lev Nikolayevich Gumilev is exactly the opposite. And we have no reason not to trust L.N. Gumilev, because he is wise, tactful and does not "distort" the facts.

Likewise, in passing, Y. Pivovarov insulted the Russian Orthodox Church in his interview: “Do you know when Dmitry Donskoy was canonized? You will laugh - by the decision of the Central Committee of the CPSU. In 1980, when the 600th anniversary of the Battle of Kulikovo was celebrated, they discovered that Donskoy was not canonized, and the CPSU Central Committee “recommended” the church to “correct the mistake,” says the “historian” Pivovarov. It turns out that an academician-"historian" (mostly Yu. Pivovarov was engaged in a strange science of political science, but he recommends himself to everyone as a historian) does not know that Prince Dmitry Ivanovich Donskoy was canonized in June 1988, during the celebration of the 1000th anniversary of Christianity in Russia. For information (Y. Pivovarova and others): at that time the interference of the "Central Committee of the CPSU" in the affairs of the Russian Orthodox Church was simply impossible. So here our Yu. Pivovarov manifests himself as an ignoramus and at the same time slanders - which is "not comme il faut" for a historian.

Yu Pivovarov about Russian national heroes

Our historian is consistent, he has few saints, he and other Russian national heroes inherit from him. In particular: “The real Kutuzov has nothing to do with us, and the fictional one (by L. Tolstoy in the novel“ War and Peace ”- SB) is the embodiment of the deep Russian spirit. But Kutuzov was a lazy man, an intriguer, an erotomaniac, who adored fashionable French actresses and read French pornographic novels. This is how the academician characterizes desperately a brave warrior who made his career not on the floor in St. Petersburg, but in bloody battles, where he was seriously wounded three times .

In the battle near Alushta on 7/23/1774, Kutuzov, commanding a grenadier battalion of the Moscow legion, was the first to break into the fortified village of Shuma, while pursuing a fleeing enemy he was seriously wounded by a bullet in the temple. For this feat, the 29-year-old captain was awarded the Order of St. George, 4th degree. During the 2nd Turkish war, during the siege of Ochakov, Kutuzov was twice seriously wounded (1788). Note that he received these wounds, being a general, that is, a "lazy and erotomaniac" M. Kutuzov did not hide behind the backs of his soldiers. In 1790, participating under the command of Suvorov in the storming of Izmail, Kutuzov, at the head of a column, seized the bastion and was the first to break into the city. This is how Suvorov assessed his subordinate: « Major General and Cavalier Golenishchev-Kutuzov showed new experiences of his art and courage ... he, serving as an example of courage, held his place, overcame a strong enemy, established himself in the fortress and continued to defeat enemies ". Kutuzov was promoted to lieutenant general and appointed commandant of Izmail. Then there was participation in the war in Poland, diplomatic and administrative work, and in the final - the most active participation in the victorious war with Napoleon. Or are they myths?

Suffice it to say that Field Marshal M.I. Kutuzov is Full Knight of the Order of St. George. There were such in the history of the Russian Empire only four (!)... A significant part of Mikhail Illarionovich's military service was spent on the battlefields, in the most difficult conditions. War is, first of all, hard work, wear and tear and the highest responsibility for the lives of subordinates and the Fatherland. Later, this stress and numerous wounds did their job: the body was completely worn out, the field marshal did not live to be seventy years old.

Why does Y. Pivovarov think that M. Kutuzov has nothing to do with us (probably the Russians)? Maybe because foreign languages ​​were very easy for him, and he knew a lot of them. Or because there was a gentle father and husband ? He had six children. The only son died in infancy. There are five daughters left. Lisa, the ugliest and most beloved, was married to an officer in his army, a war hero. When his beloved son-in-law died on the battlefield, Kutuzov sobbed like a child. "Well, why are you so killed, you've seen so many deaths!" - they told him. He replied: "Then I was a commander, and now I am an inconsolable father." For a month he hid from Liza that she was already a widow.

Or was M. Kutuzov not Russian because he was the greatest strategist who surpassed Napoleon himself? The field marshal was against the campaign against Paris and the liberation of Europe, hostile to Russia, from Napoleon. He saw for many years to come and, in the end, he was right. Brothers Alexander and Nikolay "the first" fought on their own head against the revolutionary infection in Europe, and she responded with aggression (war of 1854-1856) .

So, is Kutuzov too good or is he still bad for the Russians? What does Yu. Pivovarov mean when he says: "The real Kutuzov has nothing to do with us"?

Yu Pivovarov several years ago discovered, by his own admission, “a completely astonishing ... historical fact”: “In 1612, when Kuzma Minin was gathering a militia to drive the Poles out of Moscow, he sold part of the population of Nizhny Novgorod into slavery. And with this money he formed a militia for Prince Pozharsky. " This was reported in a notable place - in the Gorbachev Foundation, at a round table "Formation of democracy in modern Russia: from Gorbachev to Putin" with the participation of titled foreign colleagues.

What does Kuzma Minin have to do with it, if our academician was invited to speak about Gorbachev, about Putin? But what has it to do with: “Russia,” explains Yuri Sergeevich, as if drawing a line from Kuzma Minin’s slave-owning habits to today's plundering of national wealth by those in power, “has always used its natural resources. Once upon a time these were people "...

The materials of the round table were published. And now V. Rezunkov, presenter of the radio station Radio Liberty (also funded by the US Department of State), on November 4, that is, on the day of the celebration of the Kazan Icon of the Mother of God, as well as on the Day of National Unity, boldly broadcasts throughout the country: “Known Russian scientist ( !? - S.B.), the historian Yuri Pivovarov discovered an amazing historical fact. In 1612, when Kuzma Minin was gathering a militia to drive the Poles out of Moscow, he sold part of the population of Nizhny Novgorod into slavery and with this money formed a militia for Prince Pozharsky. "

To be continued…

This can be left without comment at all. Monstrous sloppiness, and maybe criminal intent, caused this fire - I really hope that the investigation will sort it out. I have already stated. However, after that I did not leave the topic and continued to study the media and other open sources. And I found out various extremely interesting things. They are interesting in the sense that they show the level of the brewery "management" of the institute and suggest that problems with the fire system could well have been!

See for yourself.

“The latest fire safety audit at the Institute for Scientific Information for the Social Sciences (INION) library, conducted in March 2014, identified seven violations. The institution was then fined 70 thousand rubles. Emergencies Ministry officials ordered to eliminate the deficiencies by January 30, 2015 ... In February, rescuers had to conduct an unscheduled check in the library ”(). The question arises - who was responsible for the installation of fire-prevention systems and, accordingly, should have eliminated violations (and in fact should not have allowed them!)? And this is what they write about this: “It is known that several companies were involved in organizing fire safety at INION at once. The last one who carried out work there was a certain company LLC "Technical Center Garant", about which you can only learn from the Web that it was organized in 2012, but for some reason it has successfully won all tenders over the past few years. The company itself is registered in an ordinary residential building, in an ordinary apartment, without any signs of activity. The company is owned by Inna Glebova and Vladimir Gorbunov. An attempt to find out from the director of INION about the technical center "Garant" ended with the answer: "Guys, this is a provocative question."

The Izvestia newspaper conducted its own investigation on the same topic. And some of the nuances came to light ... “In 2013, for INION, Garant only repaired the communication infrastructure - the company won contracts for the maintenance of telephone communication systems and burglar alarms in the amount of 555 thousand rubles. In 2014, active work began to ensure the fire safety of the building. Since March, every three months Garant has won a tender for the maintenance or repair of the book storage fire systems. Moreover, with almost the same frequency, Garant won tenders for providing a fire evacuation system, maintaining security systems and repairing telephone systems. In total, in 2014, Garant received 2.78 million from INION for various works. " This unknown company regularly won tenders for the equipment of such a building ??

But that's not all. "Maintenance of ventilation, heat supply, pipeline and sewerage communications was carried out by the company" OVK-stroy ", which is managed and owned by entrepreneur Boris Demidov. Since 2006," OVK-stroy "has completed 25 contracts for INION worth more than 12 million rubles. In 2014, OVK-Stroy received over 4 million rubles from INION through various tenders. One of the last contracts executed by "OVK-Stroy" for INION was the repair of the pipeline for the fire extinguishing system for 679 thousand rubles, completed in November 2014 ".

And here's another strange company: “In 2014, INION's electrical equipment and wiring was serviced by Slavyansky Construction Holding Company, which is owned by Yuri Volodin. In 2014, the company won 14 orders from INION for the amount of 1.69 million rubles. Basically, this company won tenders for services, "for carrying out fire-prevention measures related to the maintenance of property", as well as maintenance of electrical equipment INION ". It was this company that was engaged in the repair of the electric lighting system on the 3rd floor of the building - and according to the preliminary version of the investigation, the fire in INION occurred due to a violation of the insulation of the electrical wiring on the 3rd floor ...

I also found extremely interesting interview with Mikhail Delyagin, which tells about the mess reigning in INION and complete devastation. “The chief engineer and chief electrician fled a few years ago with the wording:“ We will work in this cut and will not be responsible for the consequences, ”says Delyagin. “If the entire fire-fighting system was paid for and installed,” he continues, “the question arises: who stole the money? If the fire system, any system, is paid for and does not work, then either the one who ordered it calmly sawed everything, and when it came time to report, it became clear that the check would reveal the absence and inoperability, he himself brought the match. It was reported that the fire occurred on the eve of an inspection that FANO was supposed to carry out. Or the customer of the work is a completely brainless clown and, accordingly, the supplier deceived him. " This is exactly what it is! And more importantly: “The building was in a state of ruin, the pool was dry, it was a drainage system, it was standing on swampy soil, the flooding of the lower floors began, which was why the library was moved to the third floor” - that is, you know what I mean ?! Management started the building to such an extent that the unique library stock was already suffering and had to be relocated!

However, many people talk about the devastation in INION. Just after the fire broke out, a post from 2013 was actively discussed in LJ, about how one LJ user, a civil servant, visited the INION library. “As you already know, the academicians have come to terms with the fact that the central entrance to INION is walled up and the building looks inoperative. All those hungry for knowledge are launched through a small side entrance, after which you find yourself in long narrow empty dark corridors. They save light in the building, so you have to move about by groping. Probably, darkness and silence brings peace to the INION staff, but the newcomer becomes creepy ”- and so on. The post paints an extremely colorful picture of the world that reigned in INION in recent years ... This is not even the last century, but almost the century before last. And it would be funny if it weren't so awful.

“Olga Zinovieva, a philosopher and widow of the great philosopher Alexander Zinoviev, often visited the reading rooms with her husband and is well acquainted with the state of affairs. "In the last 20 years it was strange there," she admits. "Groups of people had access to archives, they pushed other people aside. There were commercial structures that took money. Of course, the Pivovarov is to blame for this." In this - it is in the fire. In the fact that INION fell into a deep coma and did not develop, in the fact that in the end everything turned out the way it happened.

Olga Zinovieva

Even the official website of INION has not been updated since the end of 2011. There is no information on the execution of the budget there. That is, Pivovarov did not even bother to do something at least for the sake of appearance - supposedly there is life in the institute headed by him. Another thing is that the public, especially the scientific one, did not notice or did not want to notice the gloominess of the INION building with dried-up pools at the entrance, and the absence of any activity of the Institute itself. Olga Zinovieva says the same thing: “Where are the representatives of our public? They all crumbled. When you meet with such a reaction, a completely natural question arises: guys, why are you silent, what have you taken in your mouth. This is a disregard for the values ​​that fell under the responsibility of Mr. Pivovarov. It is a terrible coincidence that the funds were not digitized, the catalog was not digitized, "said Olga Zinovieva, head of the A. A. Zinoviev International Scientific and Educational Center at Moscow State University."

I sincerely do not understand what Mr. Pivovarov was doing at the time when he was supposed to perform the duties of the director of INION. I do not understand this at all. True, he is an interesting gentleman - I’m about his personality, and about his views on history - the canonization of Dmitry Donskoy on the recommendation of the Central Committee of the CPSU, and about his views on today's Russia - “Russia alone will not cope with the management of a huge treasury - Siberia and the Far East” , and so on and so forth ... He is a versatile personality. So he could do anything at all. Rumor has it, for example, that Yuri Pivovarov previously personally received money in American structures - the Open Society Institute (D. Soros) and the Carnegie Foundation. Probably, at the same time you don't really think about the institute entrusted to you.

Or maybe Yuri Sergeevich organized some circles instead of work - like that circle at MGIMO, where student Pivovarov and his comrades were preparing the assassination of Brezhnev. Anything can be. And besides, he was involved in other organizations, besides INION. It is known, for example, that Yuri Sergeevich Pivovarov is listed as the founder of the All-Russian Public Organization "Russian Association of Political Science" (RAPN). There are three founders there - apart from Pivovarov, they are Yuri Sergeevich Ilyin and Alexander Lvovich Shatalov. LLC RAPN has subsidiaries:

1) ANO "CENTER FOR DEVELOPMENT OF POLITICAL SCIENCE AND CONSTITUTIONAL LAW". Head - Elena Yurievna Meleshkina, founders - RAPN and INION. (!!)

2) Non-profit organization scientific institution (NONU) "Center for Political and International Studies". Its leader is Aleksandr Ivanovich Nikitin, former president of the RAPN. The former founder is Oleg Edmundovich Pavlov. Current founders: Nikitin, RAPN and the organization with the pretentious name Russian Peace Committee. At the same time, Oleg Pavlov worked as the first deputy chairman of this Committee, Alexei Klishin, who, together with the fugitive oligarch Vladimir Gusinsky, is the founder of the MOST group. Until 2009, Klishin himself was a senator from the Kirov region. Are you confused yet? It's no wonder, as always - RAS academicians know how to weave into such networks ...

The same Oleg Pavlov is the founder of the National Anti-Criminal and Anti-Terrorist Fund (!!!), a non-profit organization, and the East-West Center for Humanitarian Research and Projects, a regional public organization. In the last ROO, a famous person is indicated as a co-founder - the former deputy head of the Presidential Administration (Yeltsin and the first years of Putin) Jahan Pollyeva.

One more fact. Pavlov is a native of Leningrad, a companion of the political strategist Alexei Koshmarov in the NOVOKOM fund - a muddy and strange organization, a separate investigation should be organized about it.

Yuri Pivovarov

And finally, the third "daughter" of the RAPN - the Autonomous Non-Profit Organization "Politservice". Former head of ANO Politservice - Andrey Sergeevich Akhremenko. As you know, Yuri Pivovarov is the head of the Department of Comparative Political Science of the Faculty of Political Science. So, in 2013, Moscow State University signed 4 contracts with the individual entrepreneur Akhremenko for a total of more than half a million rubles. The subject of contact is "political science". Do you believe in coincidences?

The current head of ANO Politservice is the vice-president of the RPA, political scientist Rostislav Feliksovich Turovsky. Together with the already mentioned Oleg Pavlov, Turovsky owns the Aris Fund LLC, in Aris LLC the same Oleg Pavlov is the general director. Turovsky is one of the founders of the Information Policy Foundation, the other co-founder is the former assistant to President Yeltsin Georgy Satarov, president of the Indem Foundation. Before the arrest of Mikhail Khodorkovsky, during his imprisonment and after his release, Satarov was closely associated with the former shareholders of Yukos Oil Company.

These are, I'm not afraid of this word, odious personalities in one way or another connected with the RAPN, and it turns out that Yuri Pivovarov, albeit indirectly, is somehow connected with these personalities. What he did or does with them - I do not know and I will not argue anything, but it is obvious that Pivovarov, being the director of INION, performed anything except his direct duties. That is why it turned out what we now have.

The Investigative Committee accused "historian" Pivovarov of fraud as part of an organized group March 31st, 2017

When the notorious ex-director of the INION RAS, Yuri Pivovarov, appeared on TV screens (before that he temporarily calmed down), there was no limit to bewilderment. Hrenase! After the so-called "fire", the individual must sit, it is a fact, but the pseudo-historian exudes calmness and confidence in his own well-being.

The music did not last long. Against Yuri Sergeevich a new a criminal case under part 4 of article 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (fraud as part of an organized group).

"The investigators informed me about the initiation of a criminal case; today they came to my apartment with a search. My passport was seized and samples of my handwriting were taken", - Pivovarov told Interfax.
Also, he added, searches were carried out at other addresses."I accidentally heard that my deputy, Professor Parkhalina was taken from work and taken home, and this lady has nothing to do with financial issues, she was only engaged in science all her life", - stressed Pivovarov.

The Investigative Committee scrupulously checks the financial activities of INION RAS. The searches are ongoing.

According to Pivovarov, " this is(his criminal prosecution - approx.) - Kafka absolute", and " total arbitrariness and violation of the presumption of innocence". "I was initially held in charge of the fire for two years. ... Then, when it became clear that I was not responsible, they began to look for something else. This is absolute political bullying... Why, I don’t know - I’m not Navalny, not Nemtsov, but a modest scientist and teacher, I’ve never been either a politician or a public figure", - he said.

Pivovarov Yuri Sergeevich, 66 years old, Muscovite. In his own words, among the direct ancestors were the Decembrists and the Bolshevik-Trotskyists who were repressed under Stalin. In his youth, he was detained by the state security authorities for distributing NTS's anti-Soviet propaganda leaflets, which did not prevent him from graduating from MGIMO and postgraduate studies at IMEMO. He is considered "the most prominent Russian political scientist, one of the most famous Russian historians", "the father of Russian political science", "the author of a new concept of the history of Russia." Doctor of Political Science, Professor, AcademicianRussian Academy of Sciences, scientific advisor, ex-director and head of the department of political science and jurisprudenceINION RAS, Deputy HeadHistory Section of the Department of Historical and Philological Sciences of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Bureau member Information and Library Council of the Russian Academy of Sciences, vice-chairmanScientific Council on Political Science at the Department of Social Sciences of the Russian Academy of Sciences, member Bureau of the RAS Council for Work with Compatriot Scientists Living Abroad, honorary presidentRussian Association of Political Science(RAPN), head of the section "Scientific and cultural policy, education"Expert Council under the Chairman of the Federation Council, member Scientific Council at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation, one of the leaders international project "European Information Network on International Relations and Regional Studies", teacher MSU, MGIMO and RSUH , laureate Rockan Prize 2015 (awarded "to outstanding social scientists for their contribution to the development of scientific research methods and for obtaining important scientific results"). The son is a functionary of the Ministry of Economic Development of the Russian Federation, the daughter is a businesswoman, a citizen of the Czech Republic, the nephew is a journalist, the former head of the NTV evening news programs, liberal oppositionist Aleksey Pivovarov.

Character about yourself:
"... At the age of seven or eight, I was an unconditional anti-Stalinist, a person who understood a lot. And what else was very important for me, oddly enough, when I was sent to kindergarten, the whole group of us was taken to the plant. And when I saw the plant, I said to myself - I was six years old, I was sent to kindergarten late, - I said to myself that I would never work here.
... of course, as a child I was taught music, a teacher came to my house. My sister studied at a music school, but the teacher just came to me and I studied the piano. And the language teacher came, and then, having matured, I began to go to classes myself. Of course, I had a happy childhood, which not every Soviet child had, since all her regalia were returned to my grandmother. It was a well-to-do Soviet family in a large apartment, and so on.
... my grandmother was a completely unrestrained person, and it was she who raised me more, because my parents worked. The grandmother was quick on the tongue and did not know how to hide anything. But for all that, she was a communist. That is, it was not a Stalinist spill, but rather a Leninist, cultural one.
... It became a habit for me (in the USSR, in 1967!) - I got into the habit of reading foreign magazines and newspapers, which I do to this day.
... I got into science by chance, because after graduating from MGIMO I was hired for military-diplomatic work, but not at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, but as a military attaché in Potsdam, since my first language was German. ... But I did not want to do any military-diplomatic work, and went to graduate school. It was a way to go somewhere on the sidelines, to be free, to do nothing.
... I wrote my first work at the age of 22: "The philosophy of the history of Chaadaev." Of course, this is not scientific work, this is nonsense, but this is the first touch on what I am doing. And at the same time, which was also very important for me - already at 18-19 I was an absolute anti-Soviet, anti-communist, although until the age of 18 I still loved Lenin, my grandmother raised me like that. We at MGIMO created underground circles, prepared the assassination of Brezhnev, but I was not supposed to kill.
... once they seized the MGIMO radio station, it was in my second year, and I turned to students and teachers with a stormy speech. We were not kicked out, oddly enough, they left us. And then, in my fifth year, I was arrested for the first time. In 1972, I was arrested with a suitcase of samizdat at the Yaroslavl station. I was summoned for interrogation by the KGB, I thought I would be imprisoned, but not only was I allowed to graduate from the institute, but I was also hired for diplomatic work.
... I was a parasite, and for that I could simply be jailed. Thank God my parents could feed me ...
... I didn’t think about any science at that time, I was thinking about literature, about dissidence, several times went with a friend to see the camps in the northern circumpolar Urals, and I realized that I was frightened. I was afraid that I could not stand it physically. We went in winter and summer to see how the convicts live. It seemed like hunting, fishing, but in fact they wanted to watch and talked with the convoyed convicts, and I got scared. Simply because I did not want to go to the camp, to prison, I was physically afraid of all this, I was afraid. It all seemed awful to me.
... As a matter of fact, in a sense, I have never been involved in science either, because, for example, a historian does not consider me a historian, because I don’t sit in the archives, I simply don’t know some things, since they didn’t teach at MGIMO ... But I was elected to the Academy of Sciences with a degree in History and a degree in Russian History, first as a corresponding member, then as an academician. But I don’t think I wrote something classically historical.
... in fact, it’s impossible to get much help from me - I don’t know how to do anything.
... I don't go to the theater, or to the cinema - nowhere.
... I have no hearing, I think I'm pretty dumb about music ...
... I have no professional interests, in the literal sense of the word.
... My son works at the Ministry of Economic Development in Moscow. He is not interested in politics, he is interested in the state, Russia and so on, because he is not an intellectual at all. ... By the way, I don't force my son to read books, he doesn't know anything, he never read any poetry, he doesn't need it - and for God's sake.
... I am an absolutely tolerant person, but I am not tolerant of people who preach racism, Hitlerism, Stalinism - there can be no convention here, with me, in any case"

Pivovarov's statement in the "Judgment of Time" program:
" God-loathing Stalin created the disgusting cult of Alexander Nevsky"

From Pivovarov's book "Complete death in earnest":
" The essence of Russian life is unchanged: contempt for the individual, in one form or another, violence against a person and his - ultimately - enslavement, theft, the ability to self-organize only for an evil deed"

From a conversation between Pivovarov and the staff of the Polis magazine:
« Yu.P.... In a sense, Comrade Kant's idea of ​​a world government is actually being implemented today. And if someone is an opponent of the said structure, then I personally have nothing against it. Because I don’t care about any Russian-non-Russian systems: it’s important for me that people live like human beings, and if the world government will contribute to this, then please. In addition, in Kant's reasoning about world government, as we remember, there is one very important thought: Kant said that Russia will not be able to rule Siberia. This is very close to me. I am convinced that Russia will leave Siberia in the next half century: depopulation processes will be so strong that Russia will geographically narrow down to the Urals ...
Russia needs to lose ... Siberia and the Far East. As long as we have mineral resources, as long as there is something to eat up, for now ... salaries are issued as follows: oil prices have risen - they have given out, nothing will change ...
The question is, who will control Siberia and the Far East? Here for the Russians there is a chance in the future, a great chance to profitably dispose of this territory - after all, the Russians lived and live there, the Russians know it better than others, etc. Let the Canadians and Norwegians come and try to manage these territories together with the Russians. ... If Russia abandons Siberia and the Far East, Russia will turn out to be comparable to Europe, then in the distant future one can count on integration into some Western European structures. Although in terms of territory we will remain large - but not so large. As for the population, all demographers say: now we have 140 million, minus 700,000 every year. It will reach 100 million, up to 90-80 ... In Germany - 80 million, comparable ... "