The very occurrence of post-Soviet Russia necessarily dictates the need to study ideological foundations of its existence. What are they? How did they influence and continue to influence the social well-being of the country: do they corrupt or contribute to the unity of society; do they strengthen Russians in pondering over the historical path of the country's development, or, on the contrary, bring confusion into the souls of people and prophesy trouble? The purpose of the paper is to study the (...) language of everyday life as a kind of mirror reflecting the social well-being of the post-Soviet Russian Federation. The authors conclude that this social value is associated with the prosperity of both individuals and society as a whole, but of primary importance is the preservation of cultural and civilizational identity, sovereignty of the country, and solidarity. In modern conditions, cohesion seems to be the first step to social well-being of the country. (shrink)

This commentary offers a concise description of the structure revealed in the discourse about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but that also serves as a condition of the possibility for such events to happen. The points of view that this structure provides are relational, interdependent, and mutually constructed, and they are labeled as the Citizens, the Authorities, and the People. All these positions are structured in such a way that provides their subjects with a source of enjoyment. The positions can be (...) described as follows: fetishism of the Citizens, who almost invent their guilt without being held responsible; sadism of the Authorities, whose urge to make more and more atrocious decisions demand to repeatedly dismiss or shift the blame; masochism of the People, who accept their responsibility for anything without having a clear idea about the contents of decisions that were made in their name. In regards to communal guilt, it is crucial to take this level of enjoyment into account, in order to refuse sinking into emotions and avoiding using the language of guilt and shame. However, to simply switch to the language of understanding and responsibility instead is not enough. The language we need to seek is the one that would allow us to directly address the inadequacy of this distorted political arrangement—not some kind of metalanguage, but, on the contrary, a common language. (shrink)

This is the Q&A portion of the roundtable that focuses on the crucial issues of individual and collective guilt of the intellectual class in the face of war. The participants address the stratification of Russian society, possibilities and obstacles of dissent, and the eschatological tendencies of history by engaging with each other’s claims and ideas and seeking answers to direct questions.