Russia and Multiculturalism
Mikhail Epstein
Much
to the surprise of those who are trying to protect Russia from the destructive
influence of the West, and who consider themselves martyrs and warriors for the
Russian national idea, corroboration of their ideas has come from the West
itself. I am speaking here of the concept of multiculturalism, which has been a
subject of academic discussion in the West for over twenty years now. It is a
fairly simple concept: every racial, national, sexual and age group, every
social and ethnic minority, has the right to its own system of values, and
these values should be accepted as essentially equivalent to the values of the
cultural majority. In practical terms, this means that the civilization of
white heterosexual males, which in the past considered itself the only
civilization worthy of the name, must now acknowledge that it insidiously
usurped the right of self-expression of other groups. It is now time for this
proud "Western" civilization to make way for black Shakespeares,
female Homers, African Copernicus's and homosexual Tolstoys, who, of course,
will be immediately discovered if only Western civilization shows the desire to
find them.
This
concept of multiculturalism, which was the result of Western self-criticism and
repentance, and was largely the creation of white males such as Claude
Lévi-Strauss, Michel Foucault and Jacques Derrida, was rapturously
embraced by marginalized radicals representing every imaginable minority group
— and it has recently been adopted by theoreticians of "the Russian
idea." In early 1994, the monthly magazine "Our Contemporary"
published, over two issues, a programmatic article by Sergey Kara-Murza,
entitled "The Secret Ideology of Perestroika." The author, who is an accomplished scientist and professor of
Chemistry, makes generous use, in his criticism of Eurocentrism, of the
thoughts of European thinkers such as Arnold Toynbee and Claude Lévi-Strauss:
"Let us take Structuralism. Almost any intellectual, hearing this word,
will gaze up to the heavens and say, 'Oh, Lévi-Strauss. What a vast,
brilliant mind.' And yet this brilliant mind criticized Eurocentrism in all his
works."[1] Later in the
article, again in connection with Lévi-Strauss, Kara-Murza tries to show
that Eurocentrism "is the racist ideology of the West, which emerged
together with capitalism from the heart of the Protestant worldview . . . We are today witnessing, under the
banner of Eurocentrism, the conscious and pitiless annihilation of a totally
unique and in many ways remarkable civilization: that of Soviet Russia. Yet it
was Lévi-Strauss himself who spoke of the necessity of preserving, after
a century of wars and colonial devastation, all the surviving civilizations . .
. "[2]
The
question here is the appropriateness of the reference to the West and its
self-criticism in relation to the struggle for Russian national identity and
independence. The spirit informing Kara-Murza's argument is understandable and
in part justified: the West itself, in the form of some of its leading
thinkers, has rejected the idea of Eurocentrism as mechanistic,
individualistic, and leading the world to the brink of catastrophe; then why
should Russia, itself reduced to a catastrophic condition because of a
Western—Marxist—theory, continue to use these theories as a basis for its own
development? Is it not absurd to turn to the West if the West itself no longer
considers itself the center of the world, proposing instead a polycentric,
multicultural model?
One
can, however, doubt the solidity of this logic. For one, does not the use of
anti-Western ideas emanating from the West return us to the vicious circle of
imitation of the West? The weapon used in the battle with the West is slavishly
borrowed from the enemy's own hand. Ultimately, Marxism itself was born of a
process of intense Western self-criticism (of capitalism, individualism, etc.)
— but, transported to Russia, this theory, which is as Western as it is
anti-Western, failed to bring happiness to Russia.
There
is still another contradiction in the logic of these enlightened populists.
While dreaming of a "great Russia," they simultaneously make use of
arguments that were first applied to sexual minorities and primitive peoples.
For example, the arguments of Lévi-Strauss, which are so
enthusiastically quoted by Kara-Murza, were developed basically to account for
preliterate Indian tribes of the lower Amazon basin. The same goes for
Toynbee's arguments, which Kara-Murza introduces in defense of Russian
originality: Toynbee applied them to nomadic tribes inhabiting the steppes.
According to Toynbee, these tribes made a significant contribution to the
development of civilization, no smaller than the contribution made by
agricultural peoples.
But
what does this have to do with contemporary Russia? It would seem that the idea
here is that, in order to raise Russia in its own eyes, it must first be
lowered to the status of ethnographic material. Having been reduced to this
small scale, like that of a nomadic tribe, it can then be extolled beyond all
measure. Thus the grandiose "Russian idea," using multiculturalism as
its model, can only exalt its object by reducing its scale beforehand. Yes,
Russia turns out to be a giant among marginalized cultures, one that is being
belatedly granted the right to promote its own values and geniuses. But does it
really befit Russia to judge its own greatness by such a degrading standard?
Must Russia immediately come up with its own, original, and "Russian"
versions of Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, and Tchaikovsky, different than the ones that
the other Russia gave the world?
As
in the United States, in Russia the concept of multiculturalism is most
productively applied to minority and small ethnic groups, such as the native
peoples of Siberia, whose fate has much in common with that of American Indian
tribes in the nineteenth century — the same system of reservations, the same
suffering and extinction, except that in Siberia the economic and ecological
conditions are considerably worse than in the U.S. The fact that advocates of
the idea of Russian originality apply the concept of multiculturalism to Russia
is evidence of a condition that combines an inferiority complex with megalomania.
According to this logic, what Russia gains in originality, it loses in overall
significance; what it gains in worth, it loses in criteria of judging this
worth. The greatness of Russia is not to be found in its specifically
"Russian" characteristics; rather it is in its ability to have shared
its historical fate with the fates of other peoples, both European and Asiatic;
to have made its language available to the genius and creativity of both
Russian and non-Russian peoples. What makes Russia a multicultural nation is
its not its ability to puff its feathers about its local particularity, as if
it were one more interesting, underappreciated ethnic group, to be added to the
Eskimo, Chuckchi, and other such groups; rather it is Russia's
"meta-national" dimension, its ability to go beyond the limits of a
unitary ethnic identity.
There
is another aspect to this problem, one that is simultaneously moral and
methodological. If the West, beating its breast, accuses itself of having
committed mortal sins against other traditions and cultures, this in no way
gives the "suffering minorities" themselves the right to get in a few
licks. Repentance entails not only confession but absolution. Indeed these
spasms of renunciation and self-redefinition are the best evidence we have of
the vitality of contemporary Western culture. As the source of its
self-criticism, this "white" layer of Western culture is also its
eternally seeking leaven; for the essence of this culture is not egocentrism
but longing for the Other, a striving to see and understand the other, whether
it be in the form of Japanese ritual theater or Russian icons. The critique of
Eurocentrism emanates from Europe itself; indeed the essence of Europeanism is
expressed in this very critique, in its ability to embrace other traditions and
to incorporate them into the world-wide expanse of Europe.
To
condemn Europe's with its own words, to turn Europe's repentance against
itself: this is a false morality and a false methodology — false because once
the subject of self-criticism is not identical to its object, it becomes other
in relation to itself. Using the ideas of Toynbee and Lévi-Strauss to
criticize Eurocentrism, we must not forget that they are Europe.
Moreover,
as our condemnation of Europe follows in the footsteps of the Europeans
themselves, we are doing nothing more than agreeing with Europe, accepting it;
and this, according to Sergey Kara-Murza's understanding, is itself an
unconsciously Eurocentric act, even if it consciously denounces Eurocentrism.
What is crucial here is that one can remain European even in criticizing
Europe, for self-criticism is part of the European idea itself. Thus when
criticizing aspects of Algerian, Azerbaijaini, or alas, even Russian culture,
one is easily tagged with the label of "interloper,"
"cosmopolitan," or simply "European."
Perhaps
this is the most important characteristic of Europeanism: the ability to
overcome Eurocentrism, to seek an understanding of the value of African, Asian,
Japanese, or Slavic cultures. If Russia, in spite of the efforts of its
national patriots, is capable of adopting this wider view, if it can assimilate
the values of other cultures, then this "world-wide responsiveness"
is what is truly European about Russia. Perhaps we can say that Europeanism, as
an idea, is this ability to transcend the limits of Europeaness, the ability to
make room for other cultures within the European community. This is why London
and Paris have in our day become multinational megalopolises, composed of the
faces, customs and languages of Europe, America, Asia, and Africa. Europeanism
has given rise to a kind of meta-Europe, of which Russia is a part.
As
a result of centuries of self-criticism and analysis, the historical West is no
longer identical to the geographical West: European culture can no longer be
reduced to the European continent. The West is now a meeting grounds for
non-Western cultures, it is the space within which the dialogue between East
and West itself becomes possible. For example, the value of Old Russian
iconography was only discovered two centuries after Russia, as a result of
Peter the Great's reforms, embarked on a Western model of development; and this
discovery was made by Russian artists and art historians, such as Pavel Muratov
and Igor Grabar, who had received training in Western Europe. Just like
physical objects in quantum mechanics, whose behavior is affected by
observation itself, the meaning and value of non-Western cultures is in large
measure defined by the conditions and mere fact of their reception in the West.
In
connection with this, I would like to quote the cultural and political
commentator Leonid Batkin, who made the following acute observation:
"Those who look upon the West and Europeanism as something once cherished
and even holy but now obsolete, existing only to herald the radiant future of
other, non-European, "barbarously fresh" values, are wrong. On the
contrary, 'Eurocentrism' . . . has become obsolete only in the sense that it
has spread everywhere, becoming polycentrism. Europe has had a whiff of all the
world's dynamic societies. Indeed old Europe has, so to speak, taken some
lessons in meta-Europeanism from every corner of the earth."[3]
It
is true that the West can not be "surpassed" by competing with it,
because the West is constantly trying to surpass itself: this is the essence of
the West. Multiculturalism is but another stage in the development of the West
beyond its own boundaries, toward an understanding of the Other. However, from
inside the West, this paradox often goes unnoticed. Western thinkers,
preoccupied with the relentless critique of "the prevailing canon of the
white majority," tend to forget that this critique is an inseparable part
of the canon itself. And perhaps the best response from Russia would be to
remind the West of it. This would be a lesson in meta-Europeanism that Russia
could deliver to Europe.
March
1994
Transl.
Thomas Epstein