The humanities and social science

This article focuses on the public policy in the field of charity in Russia in the 19th — ealry 20th century and lists state awards for charity handed out to charity departments under the auspicious of the emperor’s family — the Department of Institutions of Empress Maria and the Emperor's Philanthropic Association. The author examines state orders and medals, ranks and uniforms used as social and class motives for charity.

This article considers the common and the unique in the views and beliefs of A. I. Herzen (1812—1870) and Christian — both Russian and Western — conservatives. The author emphasizes that the attraction and repulsion between the freedom-loving supporter of revolutionary changes, Herzen, and sincere advocates of spiritual freedom — free conservatives — were only natural.

This article is an attempt to identify the role of peasant affairs institutions in the governmental system of post-reform Russia. The subject of the research is the public policy towards peasant affairs agencies during the second half of the 19th century. Special attention is paid to the change of the legal status and authority of these institutions and their relations with local authorities and population.

This article, based on archival materials, is devoted to the educational activity of the senior research fellow of the Museum of the City, Ye. A. Polyakova. Her works are dedicated not only to gardening and park facilities of past eras, but also to new trends in public landscape facilities of the 1920s—1930s.

This article is devoted to the activities of the Russian patriotic anti-Soviet organization All-Russian Social-Christian Union for the Liberation of the People, which operated in the Soviet Union in the 1960s. The author examines the ideological basis, program, composition, and structure of the Union and describes the role of the organization in Russian national-patriotic opposition in the USSR.

English-Russian state-to-state relations in the second half of the 19th/ beginning of the 20th century are distinguished by complex character and dramatic shifts from cooperation to confrontation and vice versa. Different circumstances and factors, including the level of trade and economic contacts, affected the condition of English-Russian relations. The author analyses the principal stages of the evolution of trade and economic contacts between Great Britain and Russia from the Crimean war to the agreement of 1907 and identifies their role and influence on the political English-Russian relations of that period.

This article considers the vicissitudes of the Lithuanian — RSFSR negotiations in Moscow in the spring-summer of 1920. The author analyses the circumstances of the signing of the Moscow Peace Treaty between Lithuania and Soviet Russia on July 12, 1920 and focuses on the international response to it. The author pays special attention to the question of the character of Lithuania’s neutrality in the Soviet-Polish war in August-September 1920.

This article analyzes the origins of the contemporary conflict generating Polish-Lithuanian relations. The authors consider the features of the Polonization of Lithuania and ensuing Russification in the second half of the 19th century, the problems of Polish-Russian relations during the interbellum (1918—1939) and the period of the post-war development of the two states. The authors come to a conclusion that the modern conflict between Poland and Lithuania has a historical and national basis and its rapid resolution, despite common political objectives, can hardly be expected.

This article focuses on the formation and implementation of the programmе of development of US fleet during World War II for providing military and economic support to the anti-Hitler coalition — Great Britain and the USSR. The author considers the most typical projects of marine transport vessels built at US shipyards, the main routes of travel from the USA and Great Britain to the USSR in the framework of the end-lease programme.

This article considers the literary career of the famous East Prussian poet Simon Dach in connection with the history of Koenigsberg University. With the support of the ruling house of the Electorate of Branderburg and Prussia, Dach managed to obtain the position of a professor of poetry at the university, with which both his work and life are closely connected. One of Dach’s university works is the poetic composition “Prussiarchus” dedicated to the centenary of Albertina (1644). This work is a poetical-allegorical depiction and
interpretation of the history of the Prussian land in the time of duke Albrecht, the founder of the university.

The author focuses on the historical events of the late war period and the first post-war years, which resulted in the loss of the pedigree livestock and sorted seeds created by East Prussian stock-breeders and plant-breeders. The article describes the variety of breeding conditions of the first years in the Kaliningrad region.

This article analyses the major ideological campaigns of 1946—1953 on the basis of earlier unknown materials from the archival funds of Kaliningrad kolkhozes. The author considers the influence of campaigns on the mass consciousness of peasants and their social behaviour from the perspective of «everyday history». Special attention is paid to the ideas of rural residents about themselves and the word, and their reaction to major social and political events. The author comes to a conclusion that, in the post-war years, Soviet propaganda was of rather formal nature, which, however, did not downplay its paramount importance for maintaining power by party and state nomenklatura. The study will help identify the features of social development of postwar Soviet countryside and contribute to understanding regional history.

This article analyses different aspects of bilateral ties between the Kaliningrad region and the Polish Olsztyn and Elblag voivodeships in the mid-70s-early 19 80s. The author pays special attention to the problems of ideological interaction and emphasizes the crucial role of the economic development issues.

Berdayev’s works The New Middle Ages, The Meaning of History, The Crisis of Art help reveal the essence of the eschatological consciousness of the 20th century. The principal feature of New Middle Ages in European culture is proved to be the polarization of consciousness, which is most vividly manifested, according to Berdyaev, in the structure of Russian soul (the apocalyptic and nihilistic type), as well as the divergent trends of contemporary art (synthetism and analytism).

This article considers the possibility of the use of Polish concentration camp prose as a primary source. Its features are analysed on the basis of its genre and subject characteristics. The works of a prominent representative of this literary trend help demonstrate the potential of concentration camp short stories as primary sources.

This article presents a historiographical review of the restoration of Lithuanian independence in the 1980s-early 1990s and the establishment of Lithuania-Russian interstate relations in the early post-Soviet years. The topic of the article serves as a context for the analysis of the sources and general trends characteristic of Russian and foreign historians.

This article analyses the features of the modern Russian society from the perspective of synergetic concept of social development. The author maintains that the type of rationality formed by synergetics can become the basis for practical activities in the 21st century Russia thus contributing to the solutions to acute socioeconomic problems.

This article focuses on the specific features of N. O. Lossky’s interpretation of certain logical themes. The author shows that it is determined by the ideal-realistic position of the thinker. “Intuitionistic” logic is presented as a philosophical interpretation of traditional logic in the framework of ideal-realistic teaching. N. O. Lossky relates the rationality of thinking to logic. The article reconstructs certain features of rationality in N. O. Lossky’s philosophical-logical concept.

Certain historical facts relating to the history of discussions on the nature of analytic and synthetic propositions in logic are used to demonstrates that the interpretation of their states largely depend on the accepted image of logic.

This article is dedicated to the historiosophic concept of G. P. Fedotov and considers the content of the concept of culture and analyses its general philosophical and author’s typology.

This article considers services as a sphere of social and economic interac- tion with features of game, which makes it possible to approach the analysis of ethic and aesthetic properties of the game taking place in the space of service. The author attempts to define the term “game modality” as a condition for symbolic interactions.

This paper considers the problem of European identity in the conditions of the current European crisis. European identity developed over a long time on the moral and political grounds. The author arrives at a conclusion about the need to reconsider the concept of European identity in the EU crisis conditions. European identity cannot develop in an institutional crisis. The concept of European identity requires structural reconstruction, new foundations, since the old ones are, to a great degree, an extension of earlier political discourses.
The author forecasts that the change in discourses around European identity will lead to a shift in the paradigm and the perception of this phenomenon in political theory.