Abstract: The article tackles the questions of social capital transformation in developed countries. The author considers the role played by human rights in this process, form several points of view, including the influence of the human rights on traditional interpersonal forms and institutions of social capital (family, kin, neighbors…), as well as the role of human rights in broad forms (national, universal) of social capital transformation. The author does not limit his thinking to – almost ubiquitously admitted in social sciences – questions of depletion (deterioration) of social capital but also considers the less accepted issues of reconstruction of social capital. Several conclusions are drawn. First, the human rights, among other factors, have contributed to the deterioration of social capital (especially the traditional forms and institutions of interpersonal social capital). Second, human rights have also contributed to construction of social capital, especially the broad (national and universal) forms of social capital. Moreover, the author advances the idea that if the traditional interpersonal forms of social capital were depleted under the influence of several factors (human rights among them), the human rights played almost exclusive role in construction of broad forms of social capital.

Keywords: social solidarity, unity, family, relatives, liberal values, human rights, social capital, fundamental rights and freedoms, citizen, individualism

Abstract:   The rapid modernization of Kazakhstani society at the turn of the XX and XXI centuries became the cause for the unique “religious renaissance”. However, the spiritual resurgence emphasized the issues that Kazakhstan had not faced before. The article examines the peculiarities of the resurgence of religiosity in the Republic of Kazakhstan during the period of 1990-2000’s , attempts to analyze the reasons of extensive desecularization, unprecedented increase in the amount of followers of one or another confessions (including the new religious movements), as well as identify the challenges of statehood in this regard. The use of comparative method alongside the empirical and theoretical analysis, allows clarifying relatively to the phenomenon of high dynamic of the resurgence of religiosity, considering such incidents as the civic religiosity and construction of religiosity. The attention is also given to the problem of impact of the competent government authorities upon the confessions in the context of the declared separation of church and state, as well as measures taken by the government to establish the system of state-confessional relations that is able to counter the current challenges, under the circumstances of growing religiosity of population and broad polycultural field.  

Keywords: faith, religious conflicts, religious confessions, state-confessional relations, tolerance, resurgence of religiosity, desecularization, Kazakhstan, interconfessional relations, interfaith dialogue

Abstract: The subject of this article is the problematic role of historical memory in the formation of Russian national identity. The author examines in detail the phenomenon of historical memory, distinguishing its social kinds (individual, collective, and cultural memory) and discursive forms (living, objectified, and organized memory). Using the material of survey of Don students (in comparison with the data of similar surveys conducted by Public Opinion Foundation and the Levada Center), the author analyzes the students' evaluation of the key and controversial events of the Soviet past, such as the October Revolution, industrialization and collectivization, collapse of the Soviet Union, and others. Moreover, the article discusses the role of the aforementioned evaluations with regards to students’ attitude to the «Crimean Spring» and the unrecognized Donbass republics. The theoretical-methodological basis of this research lies is the constructivist concept of historical memory developed in Russian and foreign science. The empirical basis is provided by the results of survey conducted in 2014-2016 by the research organization of Southern Federal University and Southern Scientific Center of the Russian Academy of Sciences within the framework of academic project dedicated to examination of far-right ideologemes in the consciousness of student youth of Rostov Region. The scientific novelty of this study implies the systematization of various types and forms of historical memory. The author constructively applies the difference between the «cold» and «hot» strategies of historical memory in order to assess the politics of memory in post-Soviet Russia. In this regard, the author criticizes the postmodern absolutization of the myth in the construction of national memory, as well as indicates the need for implementing the strategy for “processing the difficult past”. The article provides new arguments favoring the thesis that the Russian society (including student youth) has a request for a stronger rehabilitation of the Soviet period of Russian history than the current official politics of memory. The materials and results of this research can be valuable for optimization of the indicated politics.

Keywords: processing of difficult past, cold strategy, hot strategy, politics of memory, cultural memory, live memory, historical memory, Soviet past, Bolshevik leaders, Crimean Spring

Abstract: This article examines the psychological phenomenon of the hope for immortality of an individual consciousness (soul) of a person and humanity in the context of the most recent experimental research of magical thinking. The universe exists million times longer than humanity, thus it irrelevant to make any forecasts with regards to the fate of humanity, Earth, and universe outside the boundaries of several millennia. Then why do the renowned scholars or even research organizations examine the questions that seemingly do not carry practical sense, such as the future of Earth and universe thousands and billons years from now, study of objects that exists in hundreds of millions light years from our galaxy, fate of humanity over the cosmic time intervals of million years? Possible answer lies in the contemporary research of magical thinking and psychology. These studies demonstrated that the belief in supernatural is common not only to children and superstitious people, but also the majority of educated adults who consider themselves as non-believers in magic or god. This implicit belief feeds our hope for immortality of a person’s mind. The scientific novelty consists in the following: (1) For the first time the phenomenon of hope for immortality of human soul is discussed in the context of recent experimental studies on magical  thinking; (2) the forms, in which the hope for immortality is endued in science, quasi-scientific literature and philosophy, are being analyzed; (3) the article is first to examine the problems of human individual consciousness in the context of recent memory theories. The author concludes that despite the incommensurability of time scales of existence of the universe and humanity, the extensive financial resources are spent on the research of problems associated with the origin of the universe, future of Earth and humanity in millions and billions years from now, and objects that are situated on the edge of the observable universe. Psychological studies of recent decades demonstrated a modern educated individual, while consciously denying faith in magic or in god, subconsciously maintains the belief in supernatural. The data from particle physics and cosmology supports an ancient hypothesis of the unbreakable link between the universe and human consciousness, but does not guarantee the immortality of consciousness. Despite the lack of reliable evidence, the subconscious faith of a modern individual does exist, as well as originates the phenomenon of hope for immortality of consciousness of human and humanity.

Keywords: Platonism, memory, participation, anthropic principle, hope for immortality, magical thinking, belief in supernatural, anamnesis theory, morphogenetic field, paranormal phenomena

Abstract: The subject of this article is the national auto-stereotypes of Russians. Perestroika and the subsequent social transformation significantly influenced the collective representation, touching upon the system of ethnic identity, the structure of which includes the ethnic auto-stereotypes. The need for examine the direction of transformation of the Russian ethnic stereotype defined the subject of this article. The authors conduct a theoretical and empirical analysis of the semantic content of auto-stereotypes of the Russians. The empirical study contained the two methods of collecting information: projective drawing and survey. The scientific novelty is first and foremost determined by the combination of methods, which allowed examining not only the conscious auto-stereotypical representations, but also the unconscious that are difficult to verbalize. The acquired result confirmed the appropriateness of such approach, having demonstrated the considerable variations between the conscious and unconscious auto-stereotypes of the Russians. While according to the data from surveys the respondents describe their countrymen as positive overall, the processing of projective drawings illustrate that the unconscious auto-stereotypes of the Russian rather have an extensive number of negative connotations.

Keywords: self-identification of Russians, ethnic self-identification, national self-identification, ethnic mentality, mentality, conscious auto-stereotypes, unconscious auto-stereotypes, examination of auto-stereotypes, auto-stereotypes of Russians, auto-stereotypes

Abstract: The subject of this article is the historical evolution of the three world religions – Buddhism, Christianity, and Islam. The author analyzes the development of these religions based on the model of religious cycle, which is common to the majority of historical religions, in other words, the religious systems formed after the invention of writing. According to the author’s concept, each of the indicated religions has undergone the six stages of development – initial, orthodox, classical, reformist, critical, and post-critical. Throughout their evolution, the religions experiences the two type of crises – structural and systemic. The main conclusion of the conducted research lies in the statement about the functional identity of historical development of Buddhism, Christianity, and Islam regardless of their doctrine and ritual practice. The author’s special contribution consists in formulation of the abstract model of religious cycle, which he applies to evolution of the aforementioned religions.  

Keywords: Christianity, Buddhism, systemic crisis, structural crisis, sacred tradition, scripture, religious cycle, evolution of religion, Islam, comparativist studies