MOSCOW, April 22 (RIA Novosti), Daria Chernyshova — A national idea uniting the Russians is needed to boost the country’s development, said Sergei Karaganov, Member of the Valdai Club Advisory Board and Dean of the Faculty of World Economy and International Affairs at the Higher School of Economics.
“Russia cannot develop unless it understands what it is, what is its identity, unaware of the goal of its development,” Karaganov said at the presentation of Valdai Club’s recent report “National Identity and Russia’s Future” on Tuesday.
This urgent need is the reason behind the report, Karaganov said. “The nation has rejected the Soviet identity and never did reconnect to the pre-revolutionary one,” he wrote in the foreword to the report. “Neither the society, nor the intellectual class has found an idea that would bring the country together and assure its progress,” he continued.
The authors of the report, young Russian scholars - Anastasia Likhacheva and Igor Makarov of the Higher School of Economics, attempt to answer the most fundamental of questions: who are the Russians, and what the future holds for them.
They found that at the moment culture, based on the Russian language is the only cultural bond uniting Russians. The authors suggest that emphasis should be on the human capital.
“The future if Russia is the future of the people who populate it,” Anastasia Likhacheva said at the presentation of the report. The study suggests socialization, support for creativity, strengthening Russian culture, new large-scale projects and symbols of the country – could help bring people together and boost their sense of belonging to a state or a nation.
Russian President Vladimir Putin repeatedly outlined Russia’s urgent need for a united national idea in order to succeed in a global environment.
The Valdai International Discussion Club unites leading Russian and international experts in the history, politics, economics and international relations. Established in 2004, the Club seeks to foster a global dialogue about Russia and to provide an independent, unbiased, scholarly analysis of political, economic and social processes in Russia and the world.
