Africa and Russia as subjects of cultural development

Abstract

The article argues that the West and the East have distinct trajectories of historical dynamics (evolution). Understanding such dynamics as a socio-cultural process, the author sees the reason of these distinctions in different roles of “society” and “culture”. If societal development of the West is characterized by “society” generating new cultural forms (economic, political, legal), cultural development is characterized by these forms being borrowed by the East to make traditional society to conform to them. Therefore subjects of the cultural development demonstrate a lot of similarities despite substantial differences of their traditional cultures. This idea is illustrated by the author on the example of Russia and Africa. To create a new evolutionary theory of the East it is necessary to return to the idea of the “colonial society” stated by D. A. Olderogge which basic characteristics are defined by internal contradictions inherent to a traditional society.

Keywords:

evolution of the East, the society, traditional society