Запад как феномен культуры в социальной философии А. А. Зиновьева

Вестник Санкт-Петербургского университета. Философия и конфликтология. 2025. Т. 41. № 1. С. 4–16.

Богатырёв Дмитрий К., Polyakov L.

Alexander Zinoviev has gained worldwide recognition for his critical analysis of ‘real communism’
and was deservedly awarded with the Alexis de Tocqueville Prize, equivalent to the
Nobel Prize in the field of social philosophy. But for the present day, Zinoviev’s concept of
the West as a unique socio-cultural phenomenon is of primary importance. The purpose of
the article is to identify the heuristic and prognostic potential of Zinoviev’s doctrine by correlating
Zinoviev’s theoretical and methodological self-positioning and his actual place on
the conceptual map of contemporary social philosophy. The perception of Zinoviev’s theory
requires a broad cultural and historiosophical context. That presupposes a comparison of formational
and civilizational models. Although Zinoviev did not identify himself as a cultural
studies scholar, we believe that he actually acted as one, building a kind of phenomenology of
culture, similar to Berdyaev or Karsavin, whom he, however, did not favor. In fact, Zinoviev
became the founder of his own version of alter-globalism. Zinoviev analyzes the West at the
“cellular” and macro-levels. He introduces the concepts of zapadnizm and zapadnoid, exposing
the myths about the moral advantages of capitalism and democracy. Democracy is the
facade of Western societies, the stage, on which political performances are played out. This
form is organic for national bourgeois states of the Modern Age. In modern times, it degenerates,
and when imposed from the outside, it turns into “colonialist democracy”. After the Cold
War, the West claims leadership in the globalization processes, moving towards a “super-society”.
Zinoviev’s warning that the West needs the entire planet sounds ominous. Unfortunately,
Zinoviev’s warnings were not heard by Russian society, as in the cases of Fyodor Dostoevsky
and Alexander Solzhenitsyn.

Keywords: Запад, West, деловое поведение, communality, коммунальность, zapadnoid, businesslike behavior, zapadnism, западнизм, западоид