Meanings of History as Permanent Self-Tests
of Groups and Societies:
Philosophy and Social Sciences Versus Ideology
Report for the XXII World Congress of Philosophy , Seoul, June 28 –
July 5, 2008
Abstract. The
analytical and self-critical bias of modern philosophy lets ideology expand to
most significant world-view and value areas. Hence, philosophy of history escapes
such problems as meaning of history, course of history, and self-identification in history. Ideology
aggressively grasps these ideas and transforms them into its own primitive
dogmas that usually serve as symbolical tools for political struggle or for legitimating
ruling elites. This paper shows how it is possible for philosophy, in
cooperation with the social sciences (especially historical macrosociology), to
retrieve these problems of crucial world-view significance. A universal model
of historical dynamics and the concept of values of general significance are
described and integrated within a general frame for historical meanings:
permanent self-test of human communities.
The Problem of
Meaning of History Revives
History always was and evidently will be one of the main fields in the struggle
between various political, religious, ethnic, class, gender, and other
ideologies. History is the human past, that’s why a definite
interpretation of historical events forms some special evaluation,
self-identity, structures of loyalty and solidarity – the bases for
political mobilization in wide sense.
In the modern ideological struggle mostly PR-technologies are used. Here
history serves as a cards pack in hands of a professional player. The religious
vision of the world and history was rather adequate for an illiterate
population before transit to secularization and mass education. Now one can
expect that mass higher education in developed countries leads to some new
social and intellectual situation when previous primitive PR-technologies
including falsification and misinterpretation of history are discredited. New
forms of more critical, more intellectual, more valid historical discourse will
emerge. It means appearance of new forms of debates on meaning, role and
evaluation of various historical events (wars, revolutions, secessions,
alliances, victories and failures). The discredited and almost forgotten
problem of meaning of history comes back.
Between
Dogmatism and Negativism
There are two dominant poles in modern comprehension of meaning of
history: dogmatic and negativist ones. According to dogmatic view there is some
unique absolute and true meaning of history which is already known (say,
presented or covered in a sacred Book) or can be revealed once and forever.
Nowadays much more popular is the negativistic (= constructivist and
relativist) position: there is an endless diversity of subjective opinions on
meaning of history none of which have any validity or objectivity. Beyond these
free floating games of mind there is nothing.
Via media that I try to develop here is for the first glance more close
to the second — negativist view. The meaning of history is by no means
any objective platonic idea (logos, substance, thought, symbol, praphenomenon,
concept, principle, etc.) intrinsically and immanently hidden in the very
historical reality.
Generally the meaning of history is (as any meaning) a mental
construction of some ‘observer’[1]
(Fuchs 2001). The point is to reveal the nature of this construction, its
needed features, and to know who this observer is.
The last question is the clearest one. According to general liberal and
democratic principles of open society (compare with Habermas’s ideals of
free equal communication) the set of possible ‘observers’
(=creators) of meaning of history must not be restricted anyhow but it involves
potentially any community, group or individual who gives some impact into
discourse about comprehension of history (universal, national, ethnic,
provincial history, etc.).
This freedom to propose own ‘meanings of history’ leads to
competition between interpretations and necessarily raises the issue of standards
and criteria. Here we can see the double role of philosophers of history:
formal and material (in terms of German, Kantian philosophical tradition).
‘Formally’ a philosopher of history elaborates epistemologically
prescriptive rules, criteria, and standards of intellectual competition
(compare with norms of correct and meaningful propositions, clear concepts and
strict logic in the Vienna Circle and following
analytical philosophy), criticizes ideological falsifications of history, can accept
the role of a discussion moderator and an arbiter in intellectual conflicts.
‘Materially’ a philosopher of history is responsible more
than others to reveal (create) meanings of history. In this case he (or she)
acts already not as an arbiter but as one of main players in the discursive
arena (compare with intellectual impacts of Herder, Kant, Hegel, Marx,
Spengler, Teillard de Charden, etc.).
The status of the following ideas is intermediate. I do not try to
propose standards for any
interpretations of history (that is probably impossible). I do not also suggest
some new precise formula — what should be meaning of history for everybody.
Instead I try to provide some conceptual frames and methodological means that
make possible any community to create some distinct, rational meanings of own history.
These meanings as cognitive constructions should be comparable, falsifiable and
justified in some degree.
Historical
Self-identification as a Trial:
the Conceptual Frame
The adequacy and validity of historical interpretations depend both on
subjective values and worldviews (that are diverse and always can be questioned),
and on the knowledge of objective deep historical trends and regularities that
can be tested by theoretical history and historical macrosociology (that are
based on standard scientific justification)[2].
According to value-loaded approach
the general frame for historical self-identification can be defined as a test
or a trial (more precisely, a self-test, a self-trial) of some group,
community, society to survive and to accomplish its basic values and goals in given
historical circumstances. The main frame of such historical trial includes:
a) some human community (a group, an ethnos, a society like
nation-state, a civilization, the international community, the humanity as a
whole);
b) conscious world-views, values, and goals of this community;
c) goals - a state and qualities of social system that are objectively
necessary for accomplishment values (b);
d) deep transformations, relevant laws and regularities which are
necessary and sufficient for this accomplishment (c); possibilities for action;
e) real actions, interactions, events and their results;
f) assessment by the community (a) of the actions and events (e) from
the viewpoint of the values (b), the goals (c), and the regularities (d).
The Universal
Model of Historical Dynamics
For conceptualizing conditions and actions the universal model of
historical dynamics is used. The model consists of several phases which form
three main loops (fig.1). Each loop begins from the phase of social stability - an organic system of
effective regimes that allows influential groups to achieve their values and
goals. Stability is disturbed by so called basic
factors of historical dynamics (demographic, ecological, resource, social
and cultural ones). Critical force of disturbance leads to a challenge – strong discomfort of
influential groups which now must give a response i.e. must change essentially
everyday behavior and/or organize some large-scale mobilization activity. The
phase of response is the main point
of divergence (bifurcation) where according to type of response one of main loops
evolves.
The first loop just returns to
the phase of stability. The response in this case is adequate and compensator one. New stability minimally differs from
previous by minimal amelioration of some functions, institutions, regimes that
temporally softens or neutralizes the destructive effect of historical dynamics
factors. This is the path of step-by-step
evolution (L.White, R.Carneiro).
The second loop is the most
dramatic one. The non-adequate response usually leads to conflicts and enforcement of challenge. If inadequacy of the response
prolongs escalation of conflicts and destruction leads to a crisis. If no fresh effective response
appears, this loop proceeds “working” as a self-destructive way to a
social abyss. Conceptually it is a special kind of positive cycle where each
destructive trend leads to next destructive trend and all they enforce each
other. Such structure was called the megatrend
“Well” (or “Abyss”). If the social system is an
empire or a state, this megatrend leads to a social revolution, state breakdown and territorial
fragmentation.
Fig.1. The Universal
Model of Historical Dynamics.
Breakdowns of Ancient and Medieval empires, of old regimes in modern
social revolutions, recent Soviet collapse can serve as examples of such a
historical pattern (J.Tainter, Th.Skocpol, J.Goldstone, R.Collins).
The third loop is the effect
of series of adequate and prospective
responses (here the model is rather close to the Toynbean original
explanation of growth of “cultures” – local civilizations). How
long such social resonance can continue? It depends on the given resource basis
and ability of new cooperative community to find new sources, i.e. to give new
adequate responses for new deficiency challenges. If new mobilizing community
is successful in providing necessary resource basis for more than 1-2
generations, the specific historical phenomenon evolves – dynamic strategies[3]. Here it means a bunch
of cooperative activities with general objective direction that prolongs for
two and more generations and uses each significant result as a base for new
movement in the same direction. Seven main groups of dynamic strategies include
coercive, commercial, technological, resource-transit, socio-engineer,
demographic, and cultural ones.
Usually effective strategies are connected also into bunches. In cases
of resource abundance and new effective responses to deficiency challenges they
form a megatrend “Lift” (or “Escalator”
- a positive cycle of factors but now factors of rise, growth and
development). Such megatrend always includes significant institutional reforms
that open new space for effective regimes development. These structural changes
lead to a system transformation —
the irreversible ongoing transit to some new social stage. Sic! Here historical dynamics is connected with
crucial shifts of social evolution[4](K.Marx, M.Weber,
W.Rostow, I.Wallerstein, E.Jones, S.Sanderson, I.Diakonoff, etc.). Sooner or
later some new balance establishes and this new stage becomes a new social
stability (the beginning of all three loops within the model).
Status of the
Model —
the Ontological Paradigm for Theories of Dynamics
What is methodological status of the presented model? Let’s
consider the classical discussion on objectivity and interpretation.
“Naturalists” defend full objectivity of their statements while
“constructivists” (also adherents of hermeneutics, phenomenology,
relativism, postmodernism, etc.) insist on inevitability of interpretations. It
is true that all general propositions on history, historical phenomena,
processes, and trends are interpretations (“the truth of constructivism”).
But not all interpretations are equal in adequacy and validity. Some of them
can be justified by various empirical methods and logical means (the systematic
comparison of historical cases, formulating and testing hypotheses, statistics,
etc.) and can be considered as objective theoretical knowledge (“the
truth of naturalism”). Also there is a wide range of helpful preliminary
ontological, conceptual, logical, and methodological concepts and propositions
that can not be tested and proved
directly but serve as a necessary intellectual basis for theoretical and
empirical research.
In these terms the following description of the universal model of
historical dynamics has the status of the
ontological paradigm for various theories of historical change. As far as the theories of step-by-step
evolution (L.White, R.Carneiro), collapses, state-breakdowns and revolutions (J.Tainter,
B.Moore, Th.Skocpol, J.Goldstone, R.Collins), mass mobilization, dynamic
strategies (Ch.Tilly, G.Snooks), systemic transformations and modernizations
(K.Marx, M.Weber, W.Rostow, I.Wallerstein, E.Jones, S.Sanderson, I.Diakonoff, A.Przeworski,
etc.) and other dynamic theories can be tested and proved — they
all support this covering ontological
model.
I admit that justification of any social
ontology (including our universal model of historical dynamics) belongs to the second-order
context (Gorman 2007, p.41-49)[5]
and is directly depends on capacity of this ontology to serve as a basis for
‘good’ explanatory theories. Are theories ‘good’ or not
is a matter of justification within the first-order context. (I showed
elsewhere[6].
that in spite of all bulk of analytical sophistication, almost all contemporary
theoretical knowledge including ethnology, experimental psychology, political
sciences and historical sociology successfully apply standards of the Popper-Hempelian
tradition especially in the version of research programs by Imre Lakatos. So
the second-order justification of these standards is also based on the
wide and blossoming practice of theoretical research[7].
The majority of historians (with seldom exclusion of several great ones such as
F.Braudel and W.McNeill) practicize traditional empirical research of some
narrow field. They are usually fully incompetent in the very theoretical
approach. They do not know and even don’t want to know what is a general
hypothesis and how it is possible to test it by systemic comparison of
historical cases. That’s why their constant idiosyncrasy towards
Hempelian standards of historical explanation still proceeds to confuse
analytical philosophers of history who restricted themselves from beginning and
forever to a subordinate analysis of only traditional empirical
historiography).
The
model of historical dynamics presented above is not just a mere
‘interpretation’ (a
voluntary one among dozens of others) but a general cognitive scheme which both
incorporates previous dynamic theories with some range of objectivity (justification,
validity etc.) and serves as an heuristics for further formulations of
hypotheses and theories.
From Self-trial and Universal
Model
to the Meaning of History
How the presented model can be used? The meaning of history occurs to be
a rather complicate cognitive construction that integrates two conceptual
frames (historical self-identification and the universal model), empirical data
to fill cells in these frames, and the relevant theories of historical
dynamics.
For some community to reveal (= to establish) the historical meaning of
self-existence is:
1) to identify its actual position on the basis of an empirical data as
a phase in the universal model of historical dynamics (stability, challenge,
crisis, conflicts, social resonance, dynamic strategies, transformation,);
2) to explicate own values and goals;
3) to know what deep objective changes are relevant to these values and
goals taking into account the known theories of historical dynamics;
4) to reveal what activities, responses, strategies correspond to these
changes;
5) to establish (both discover and construct) the historical meaning of
self-existence as a specific trial to reach the values (2) by the strategies
(4) in the specific conditions (1) and according to theories of historical
dynamics and regularities (3).
6) to reveal the meaning of past relevant history as a series of trials
in the context of objective social changes and subjective changes of the values
and beliefs.
This construction integrated both the descriptive elements (1 and
theories in 3-5), the pure prescriptive elements (2) and the prescriptive
elements based on both prescriptive and descriptive ones (3-6).
The viewpoint of global
international community should take into account real and potential
conflictness of goals of nation-states
(especially neighbors and competitors). Here the social stability is treated as the international stable peace and
cooperation. Conflicts, crises and megatrends “Well” are considered
as a slip to wars, in extreme cases – world wars.
Are there any invariant values and goals that can serve as normative
standards? Yes, there are so called the
minimal values, or the values
of general significance (VGS) which include human life, non-violence,
freedom, human rights, justice, etc.[8]
From this viewpoint the Meaning of
World History is a permanent global
trial for all communities (groups, societies, international alliances): if they
manage or do not manage (in what degree and how) to accomplish the values of
general significance while solving their own problems, giving responses to their
own challenges.
Presented above universal model of historical dynamics and approach to
comprehension of historical meanings can serve as conceptual and methodological
base for new highly intellectualized debates on history. These debates will
still be actual and significant for ideological struggle but they will be based
already not on PR‑tricks and cheating but on systematic philosophical
analysis of value-ethical, ontological, and epistemological problems, testable
theories of historical dynamics and social evolution, supported by valid
empirical research.
[1]
Fuchs, Stephan. Against Essentialism. A Theory of Culture and Society.
[2]
Hempel, Carl. The Function of Universal Laws in History // Journal of
Philosophy, vol.39 (1942). Stinchcombe, Arthur. Constructing Social Theories.
The
[3] Snooks Graeme. The Dynamic Society: Exploring the
Sources of Global Change. L.-N.-Y., Routledge, 1996.
[4] Sanderson, Stephen. Social Transformations: A General
Theory of Historical Deverlopment. Blackwell, 1995.
[5] Gorman, Jonathan. Historical Judgment. Acumen. 2007.
[6] Rozov, Nikolai S. An Apologia for Theoretical History
// History and Theory, 1997. Vol. 36, N 3.
[7] Collins, Randall. The Golden Age of Macrohistorical
Sociology. An Introduction in his: Macrohistory: Essays in Sociology of the
Long Run. Stanford Univ.Press. 1999.
[8] Rozov, Nikolai S. Constructive Axiology and
Intellectual Culture in the Future // Studia Humanistica. Vol. 1. N 2, Praha,
1990. P. 55 - 72. Rozov, Nikolai S. Values in the Problematic World:
Philosophical Foundations and Social Applications of Constructive Axiology. (In
Russian, English Summary),