What will happen next?

One character of the novel by Viktor Pelevin "Chapaev and Void" said to another: you still need to be able to get into a certain future - maybe you will fall into the future where you will not be (the quote is not accurate). It’s not so easy for us to get there, because it’s hard to even agree on what future “we” want. Everything is vague here - who are these "we"? And why is that the image of the future? And for whom is this “this” future - not its own, and most likely, will be completely unacceptable? These are simple questions. It is especially interesting to think about this before the presidential elections in Russia - the candidates are mainly dispensed with without a clear description of their “image of the future”. And in general, without any detailed political programs. However, if there was a massive request for such programs, perhaps they would not have cost. And such a request is not felt, probably, just because the “future” is not very interested in voters. So this is the lack of noticeable interest - characteristic of current times.

It is clear that the scenario that is expressed by a famousree “if only there was no war,” this is not the image of the future. And "let it be as it is" - this is also not an image of the future. We know almost nothing about the future, but we know for sure that it will be different. The future is not a prolonged present. Talking about the "future" is worth it, if it is different, otherwise why does it need it at all?

To discuss the image of the future means to talk about what will happen to all of us, and this is the most important part of politics. That is, it is impossible to live a civilian life and not argue about what kind of future the "we" want to be. When, finally, the uncertainty of “our” future will again become not only a rhetorical figure in various stupid skirmishes on the anger of the day, but also the central problem of more serious and responsible discussions?

For their absence, we can all pay the same thing: to be in the future in which there will be no "us". More precisely, physically, of course, we will get there. But this verb "to get" has in modern Russian the meaning to be where it did not plan to be and would not want to be. I would like to enter the future, and not "get."

In this column, we are talking, of course, by default about the future primarily Siberia. But in order to discuss the future of Siberia, it is necessary to “hold” several contexts at the same time in which this future is “invested” as it were. And now I will list them:

1. The context of the current and future transformation of the entire Russian state. What actually happens to what the modern state consists of - its institutions and infrastructures? How does it change in space? (As the geographer Vladimir Kagansky likes to say , "Russia is an unknown country.") The Greater Siberia region with its institutions and infrastructures is built into the Russian state, and what is happening and will happen to him, is happening and will happen to all Siberians. This is clear.

The world enters the period of the next industrial revolution. Siberia with all its institutions, infrastructures, fossils and other resources, including the working population, will also be in this future, this is inevitable

2. The context of the transformation of the "night state". We are talking about a critical opposition of the state that cannot exist without power - and "power", acting in itself, in its own interests and enjoying this state in order to satisfy these interests. The very young Pushkin in his textbook appeal to Chaadaev contrasted the "Fatherland" and "autocracy". In modern Russia, this “second power”, not equal to the state, but using it with various secret-activity and simply criminal methods in its own needs, is directly striking. This is real autocracy, that is, arbitrariness. The researcher of hidden political economic processes Konstantin Haaza calls it a "night state", contrasting it with an ordinary state-a daytime, with it at least poorly working, but still working in public interests, institutions and infrastructures. It is easy to guess that the “image of the future” of those who enter the “night power” of representatives is very different from what we, ordinary citizens, could build ourselves for. Their image of the future is precisely the future where there will be no "us" - although we, like chickens in the chisel, will fall.

3. The context of the formation of state ideology. Called state ideology is formed relatively recently. The decisive role in this was played by the annexation of Crimea, which started the anti -Ukrainian company in mass media and the general tendency to inhibition of public changes - a “conservative turn”, as some researchers were immediately called this trend. The general features of this state ideology have already been drawn to the wave - it is enough to visit (directly or even virtually) one of the many exhibitions called the Historical Park "Russia. My History" (in Novosibirsk, the Siberian Lights of the oldest issue of the Siberian Lights, which was dedicated to it, was just outlined, there is very clearly outlined). What place in the future given by this ideology is Siberia and its inhabitants? The same as all other residents of the whole large country: insignificant.

4. The context of global economic transformations. The world enters the period of the next industrial revolution. Siberia with all its institutions, infrastructures, fossils and other resources, including the working population, will also be in this future, this is inevitable. New industries are formed relatively quickly - like new professions, which we now have only very vague ideas about; new sources of capitalization; New methods of communication of people. Not only Siberia, the whole world enters into the unknown, but at least it is necessary to realize that world industry quickly becomes different. Those countries and regions that will not be able to cope with this novelty, they are without someone’s evil intent, and, as it were, the very “power of things” will be in an extremely unenviable position. In the twentieth century, this position was called the "Third World", but as if not to be at all in the "fourth".

5. The context of public self -organization and lower projects. The key word here is self -organization. In self -organization, it is decided who is “we”, creating their own image of the future, rebuilding it as much as possible and defend in confrontation with other “we”. This confrontation is called politics in the full sense of the word. Who are the "we" about which the future "we" are talking? In the modern world, this “we” includes, of course, not only and not so much those who physically live in Siberia, but first of all, those who are able to participate in self -organization.

Many of the phenomena and images listed here are in conflict with each other: the "night state" uses an ordinary state to combat the self -organization of citizens, while imputing a certain image of the future through a new ideology. Everything that happens in Siberia is dramatized by the world industrial revolution. In general, all the complexity of what is happening today is difficult to even imagine. But in order to at least try to be in your future, and not to “get” into someone else, nowhere to go, you will have to represent, think and discuss it.

Mikhail Germans - philosopher

The "Opinion" expressed in the heading of the point of view may not coincide with the position of the editorial office