The collection includes articles on the struggle and the interaction of two ideas, state sovereignty and the right of nations to self-determination. It reviews the evolution of political systems and different forms of nationalism, as well as their modern transformations, to identify common development trends, regional characteristics and vital outlook of the nation state. The authors explore the history and the formation of the basic concepts of national statehood and nationalism, especially in Europe, Asia, and Africa of the 20th and early 21st century.

This book is intended for specialists in history, political science, sociology, students and teachers of humanitarian institutions, as well as for anyone interested in issues of state sovereignty and the right of nations to self-determination.

The book, for the first time in the Russian scholarly tradition, attempts to analyze the information provided by Russian and Western travelers about statehood and law of the Central Asia countries, regions and nations in 18th to early 20th century. Diplomats, explorers, spies, merchants, sometimes tourists and even captives had opportunities to observe the functioning of power structures and legal regulation in the Central Asia states, not so rarely being participants of this kind of relations. In the book the memoirs and accounts of over 200 travelers summarizing and reflecting their experience in Central Asia have been analyzed. The systematization of this information has allowed to shape a rather detailed picture of the state mechanisms and legal regulation in the Central Asia states and domains observed through the prism of European legal systems thus making political and legal reality of Central Asia understandable for the representatives of Russian and Western cultures.
This book is designed for specialists in history of state and law, comparative law studies, legal anthropology, Russian history, Eastern studies, historiography and source studies, political science and ethnic studies, as well as for students majoring in the aforementioned specialties.

The book is dedicated to a philosophical reflection on the concepts and practices of citizenship in the modern world. The paper examines the major problems of the theory of citizenship and the reasons why they cause intense debate in the world of philosophy and the scientific community, as well as basic characteristics of these debates. The architectonics of the book is subjected to the task of unveiling the polemical tensions in the modern discourse on citizenship. The book includes a landmark essay of Thomas Humphrey Marshall, which was the starting point of contemporary debates about citizenship. The key aspects of these debates are revealed to the reader in an extensive introduction written by Vladimir Malakhov, which is very “critical” to two other texts that make up this book.

This book is addressed to philosophers, political scientists, sociologists, and historians.

The nature of Russia’s political and social system sparks animated debates among scholars and experts, while the Soviet past remains a matter of equally passionate research and discussions. Sociologist Alexander Bikbov has made an original contribution to these debates with this new book. In this fundamental study of Russian and Soviet societies, Bikbov has based his research on a pioneering method, the historical sociology of concepts. Analysis of large-scale social change is articulated here with a meticulous study of the conceptual apparatus that provides different historical periods with their public vocabulary.  The book thus provides a new and a more profound view of Russian society over the last twenty years, including the transformations of its public sphere, its political and academic structures, and struggles around the concepts of middle class, democracy, Russian science, and the Russian nation. The book likewise introduces a revolutionary approach to the Soviet period, reconstructing the hidden social and political dimensions of such concepts as scientific progress, the well-rounded individual, socialist humanism, and the social problem. Special attention has been paid to the role of academic expertise in investing the political regime with meaning, a matter rarely addressed in historical studies of the Soviet era. Chronologically, the book spans the period from the social upheavals of the late nineteenth century to the 2011–2012 protest movement. A look at the similarities and differences in Russian and international (primarily French) social history gives the study particular vividness and depth. With its theoretical ingenuity, innovative research techniques, clarity, and brilliant systematization of extensive factual material, the book will be of great interest to historians, sociologists, political scientists, social linguists, philosophers, and students of Russian society, as well as the wider public of educated and critically thinking readers.

The nature of Russia’s political and social system sparks animated debates among scholars and experts, while the Soviet past remains a matter of equally passionate research and discussions. Sociologist Alexander Bikbov has made an original contribution to these debates with this new book. In this fundamental study of Russian and Soviet societies, Bikbov has based his research on a pioneering method, the historical sociology of concepts. Analysis of large-scale social change is articulated here with a meticulous study of the conceptual apparatus that provides different historical periods with their public vocabulary.

The book thus provides a new and a more profound view of Russian society over the last twenty years, including the transformations of its public sphere, its political and academic structures, and struggles around the concepts of middle class, democracy, Russian science, and the Russian nation. The book likewise introduces a revolutionary approach to the Soviet period, reconstructing the hidden social and political dimensions of such concepts as scientific progress, the well-rounded individual, socialist humanism, and the social problem. Special attention has been paid to the role of academic expertise in investing the political regime with meaning, a matter rarely addressed in historical studies of the Sovietera.

Chronologically, the book spans the period from the social upheavals of the late nineteenth century to the 2011–2012 protest movement. A look at the similarities and differences in Russian and international (primarily French) social history gives the study particular vividness and depth.

With its theoretical ingenuity, innovative research techniques, clarity, and brilliant systematization of extensive factual material, the book will be of great interest to historians, sociologists, political scientists, social linguists, philosophers, and students of Russian society, as well as the wider public of educated and critically thinking readers.

Winner of the 2013–2014 Public Thought Award, the All-Russian Competition for Publications in Social Science and Political Journalism, in “Best Domestic Publication in Social Science”.

Hexameter is the meter of Homeric poems and hymns by Callimachus. Theocritus’ Idylls and several less known poems written in course of late antiquity are also examples of hexametric texts. This monograph is a description of Greek hexameter since VIII c. BC till V c. CE from phonetical and metrical point of view. The beginning gives a detailed account of extensive hexametric texts which form the material of the book. The minute description of formal peculiarities begins with general information and proceeds to the previously unpublished results of the author’s research. Statistical data show the development of basic phonetical and metrical features of the hexameter throughout its history and is supplemented with several case studies that are aimed to demonstrate possibilities of this approach.

The book studies the influence of personal factors on Russian legislative politics in Central Asia from 18th to early 20th century. The leaders of Russian imperial regional administration as well as the representatives of national elites in Kazakhstan and Central Asia usually played the key role in regional political and legislative development, and their personal likes and dislikes, together with the extent of one’s closeness to the imperial court, could determine the politics of a wide range of regions of both the Russian empire and neighbouring states. Personality traits of a representative of either the imperial administration or a national elite could affect to what extent the regional politics corresponded or not to the imperial political and legislative ideology in regard to the region in question. In the framework of political and legislative situation in Kazakhstan and Central Asia, the book examines how Russian imminent statesmen such as V. Tatischev, I. Neplyuev, M. Speransky, V. Perovsky etc., as well as Kazakh leaders and Central Asian monarchs influenced the imperial legislative politics in Central Asia.

The book is designed for historians of Russian state and law, orientalists, specialists in political science and political anthropology, as well as students in these fields of study.