Factors of Russian inversions “from above” and “from below”

Abstract

Explanation of Russian inversions faces conceptual problems. The traditionally used con­ceptual apparatus, throwing a theoretical mesh onto reality, seems to not “catch” this real­ity, at best, tries to describe it. Nature and mechanisms that lie in the peculiarities of Rus­sian society and its dynamics are not captured. Hence the conclusions about pathology, rut, constant matrix and other hopelessness to reproduce the “predetermined” characteris­tics of social life.

Expanding the conceptual apparatus with a constructive approach, combined with a spe­cific historical approach, makes it possible to single out not one actor of modernization processes (political elite associated with state power), but at least two – power and soci­ety, and, constructively, not connected. From this point of view, the inverse nature of Rus­sian modernization has two reasons. One is social, associated with the peculiarities of Russian society, dominated in it by the imperious will of the underdeveloped social forces, for the formation of which there are not enough conditions. The second is related to modernization attempts based on someone else's historical experience. However, due to the first reason, these attempts turn out to be hasty and ill-conceived, giving rise to new stresses and strains of society. Both reasons are complementary and intertwined.

At the same time, general civilizational processes, such as urbanization, the formation of a mass society, change the character of Russian society, realizing its being drawn into modernization processes, including the formation of a civil national identity. This creates prerequisites for the qualitatively new character of the development of society. If the main factors of inversion “from above” are haste and borrowing, then “from below” this is the slow development of the bourgeoisie, which, nevertheless, creates the conditions for real medialization.

The Russian invers analysis reveals special possibilities in terms of methodological re­flection and revealing the prospects for constructivist and historical approaches.