Dear friends,

Together with you, we are embarking on the second year of the journal’s work and are pleased to present the first issue of the second volume of Patria. As expected, this issue is devoted to traditional values and their place in the lives of different societies.

The issue opens with works that demonstrate the limitations of understanding social life solely through individualistic theories, which ignore the complex balance between the interests of the individual and society as a whole in the modern era.

Nikolai Afanasov (Institute of Philosophy, Russian Academy of Sciences), in his article "Time and Place for Modern Collectivism," addresses the problem of preserving, supporting, and developing collectivism as a traditional spiritual and moral value. The author shows that in modern society, where the normative foundation has become the pursuit of self-interest rather than the interests of the group, collectivism as a phenomenon and concept has come to be understood as historical. However, this perception does not correspond to reality, since collectivism and individualism are not independent of each other—there is a certain balance between them that corresponds to the adaptive needs of a particular society at a particular time. Nikolai Afanasov systematically examines three themes: the relationship between the concepts of collectivism and individualism from the perspective of social theory in the second half of the 20th century; the foundations of capitalist individualism; and, finally, the time and place for conscious collectivism that emerges from the imbalance between collectivism and individualism.

This same theme is developed by Konstantin Arshin (Center for Theoretical and Applied Political Science, Institute of Social Sciences, RANEPA) in his article "Justice as a Pillar of Nationalism," which analyzes the significance of the concept of justice in constructing nationalism as one of the fundamental practices of developed industrial society. Using examples from the social thought of Ancient Egypt, Babylonia, Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and the Modern Era, the author demonstrates that reflections on the meaning of "justice" and the desire to implement it in practice have accompanied humanity throughout its history. In the Modern Era, within the framework of industrial society, the concept of justice acquired special significance, becoming the foundation that ensures the connection and balance between the values of liberal ideology (based on the idea of the free individual) and nationalism (postulating the values of collectivism), which became the basis of the modern democratic social order. However, the gradual abandonment of the welfare state since the 1980s serves as a visible sign of the erosion of the modern social order, caused by the disruption of the balance between liberalism (transformed into neoliberalism) and nationalism. Such a loss leads to an as-yet-unrecognized but no less significant atomization of societies, their disintegration into conglomerates of disparate parts.

The subsequent articles offer various perspectives for understanding traditional values within social theory.

Dmitry Davydov (Institute of Philosophy and Law, Ural Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences), in his article "Progressive Elites, Conservative Workers. Traditional Values from the Position of Class Analysis," shows that although Marxism and class analysis are today usually associated with modernity and everything opposed to traditional social foundations, this association primarily characterizes various variations of Western neo- and post-Marxism, as well as leftist concepts influenced by Western Marxism. At the same time, there is growing reason to believe that Western leftist agendas, involving systematic attacks on traditional values, are promoted mainly by representatives of new elites—the professional or educated class. Conversely, traditional values are either more often shared by representatives of the social "masses" or are a crucial factor in their economic well-being. In this regard, the author reinterprets class analysis as a tool for constructively understanding, rather than criticizing, traditional values.

The article "Social Norm as a Functional Foundation of Sociality: The Problem of Formation and Maintenance of Traditions" by Igor Baklanov and Olga Baklanova (North Caucasus Federal University) is devoted to the problem of tradition formation in the space of sociality through the functional potential and possibilities of social norms. The authors note that "tradition" and "sociality" are categories that reflect the structural organization of social reality, while "social norms" are associated with the dynamic and functional aspects of social reality. Tradition is grounded and rooted in the space of the social through the normative systems of society: it is interconnected with sociality and grows from it. The authors propose reducing the diversity of social norms to a triad of normative systems ("religious norms," "moral norms," "legal norms"), emphasizing that the relationships between them differ significantly in different historical eras and in various configurations of sociality, which leaves its mark on the systems of traditional values and forms of traditional, commonly accepted practices in societies and civilizations.

Oleg Agapov (Kazan Innovative University named after V.G. Timiryasov), in his article "Struggle for Tradition as a Form of Social-Anthropological Practice," demonstrates the potential of Sergei Khoruzhy’s synergetic anthropology for understanding the topic outlined in the article’s title. The author examines three methodological strategies for approaching tradition—fundamentalism, liberal post-traditionalism, and traditionalism—which reconfigure, at a new level, the debates about the historical perspective of Russia as a sovereign state-civilizational existence in a polycentric world. Within reflexive traditionalism, an approach the author develops based on the concepts of Sergei Khoruzhy, Alexander Panarin, Oleg Genisaretsky, and Alexander Shchipkov, a socio-anthropological approach to the phenomenon of traditions is proposed. Each tradition consists of personalities or subjects of history (state-civilizations, peoples, strata, classes) that testify to themselves through the form, content, and style of their lives. Thus, the world of traditions is a rich, interactive, intersubjective, interpretive, fundamentally dialogical sphere that allows a person to preserve and multiply practices of resilience and viability.

The research section concludes with an article by Ellina Suslova (Beijing Language and Culture University, China), "Traditional Values in the Upbringing of Chinese Children: Challenges and Adaptations in Modern Chinese Society." Although historically Chinese parents emphasized collectivism, filial piety, and academic success, in recent years, societal changes such as the rise of individualism, globalization, and progress in gender equality have led to shifts in child-rearing approaches. Despite the fact that women have achieved success in education and careers, traditional gender roles in the family persist—especially regarding household responsibilities. Women must balance professional success with domestic work, which indicates the preservation of previous cultural values. The article explores these contradictions and the ongoing adaptation of parenting practices in the context of social development.

In the "Practicum" section, we present Konstantin Zhigadlo’s (National Research University Higher School of Economics) text "Traditional Russian Spiritual and Moral Values in the Context of the School Social Studies Course," in which the author justifies the need for high school students to study traditional Russian spiritual and moral values based on current Russian legislation. The article compares the content of old and new versions of social studies textbooks for 9th graders and provides a detailed description of the author’s empirical experience teaching social studies in 10th–11th grades at the HSE Lyceum, involving discussions with students about traditional Russian values. The author describes the connection between topics introduced into the new version of the social studies curriculum and the list of content elements tested in the Unified State Exam (USE). The experience of teaching social studies and preparing students for the USE in the context of current legislation leads to conclusions about the potential for further integration of the value aspect into the school social studies course.

The "Criticism and Reviews" section features Alexander Pisarev’s (Institute of Philosophy, Russian Academy of Sciences) response to Boris Groys’s monograph "Philosophy of Care" (Moscow, 2024). The review examines the main points as well as the strengths and weaknesses of the monograph.

We dare to hope that this issue will contribute to a productive discussion of the problem of traditional values and an understanding of their role in society, continuing and developing the debates and research initiated by the journal last year. Happy reading!

Alexander Pavlov