День: 12.04.2018

Russia and America - Saving the planet - the Mission has to be complete

"Russia and America: Reloaded. From the Conflict of Interests to the Consensus of the Elites"

Russia and the United States of America has entered into a new phase of political relations. The degree of mutual claims gets higher and higher. The entire world is observing the situation around Syria with great fear and even greater hope. It’s now up to the leaders of head states: will we completely bury the world completely, or will we be able to save and preserve our planet?

Modern world-scale politics has a prevailing aspiration for political, economic, and ideological domination which causes numerous issues resulting in political and military conflicts. Global transnational elites pursue their own narrow transnational corporate interests and goals, not paying any special attention for true spiritual mankind’s needs. The character of modern politics, including international, inevitably influences the way modern elite is generated and reproduced. Unfortunately, the higher circles in politics and diplomacy are represented by the harshest, most ambitious, unscrupulous and less intelligent personalities whose only «merit» is the ability to disregard universal spiritual values and focus on the acquisition of skills needed to multiply and strengthen their own authority.

The nature of modern politics perfectly manifests itself in the relations between United States and Russia. The political, military, and economic rivalry between USSR and USA had been strong throughout the entire 20th century. This factor has largely determined the path of further development of mankind. A nuclear threat reality forced American and Soviet (later Russian) political elites to hold back from explicit confrontation, preferring to settle disputes and cases through so-called “proxy technologies” in “third-world” countries of Asia, Africa, and South America. Both Russia and USA are great nations with enormous potential. This fact should be taken into account by diplomats and politicians while building relations between these two countries. USA are vastly experienced in worldwide political expansion in the form of «puppet democracies», though having numerous inner problems, from huge external debt to unresolved religious, racial, gender and social tensions. Russia has enormous natural resources but also suffers from low standards of life, low mortality, alcoholism, and drug addiction of it’s population. Russia’s commodity-based economy impedes the development of manufacturing activities and cutting-edge technologies. Of course, the situation shouldn’t be dramatized to the desperation degree. Everybody is quite aware of the fact that many prominent futurologists and scientists didn’t question the colossal reserves of Russia’s political and spiritual strength. American science fiction writer and futurologist Ray Bardbury would mention a great historical mission of Russia due to its humanistic and spiritual potential. In 2013, financial expert Jim Rogers also estimated that in future, Russia had quite good chances. There are more American scientists and even prophets, such as Edgar Cayce and Dannion Brinkley that also believe that Russia might gain back its powerful positions in the post-Soviet world.

Of course, Russians can learn a bit from Americans. First and foremost, it's economic rationalism and the "open door" policy, as well as the promotion of talents from around the world. Both Russia and US are the states tending towards expansion, which is why with all the differences, Russian and American mentalities have something common. Residents of great states can always easily understand each other as they are free from numerous complexes inherent to national minorities and small nations. Therefore, with all their differences, Americans and Russians do not pathologically hate each other, which makes it possible to have a relatively good dialogue in future and probably even seek solutions to common issues together.

It's needless to say that currently, Russia and the US need a more productive bilateral dialogue. Our countries have many common issues, so we need to move away from ambitions, political voluntarism and look for consensus. There are neither historical grounds (such as Poland's historical grudges against Russia or the memory of war against Germany) nor practical necessity for any tough conflict between Russia and the US. If the two great nations of the world manage to reach an agreement, it will benefit mankind as a whole. But this dialogue will be possible only when both Russian and American elite give up the language of sanctions and violence and adopt the language of mutually beneficial partnership for the sake of universal prosperity and sustainable development.  To do this, diplomats who are responsible for bilateral relations should acquire the competencies needed to understand their opponents, seek compromises to resolve conflicts and problems, and most importantly, see a proper perspective.

The global elites can reach a consensus through the meetings of initiative groups that represent most varied segments of the society, from economics to art. The use of bilateral experience including certain cultural and social borrowings will help us find an optimal model of collaboration that will benefit all. The United States could borrow Russia's experience of friendly attitude and assistance to other countries and nations in solving their problems. Even now we need to launch the practical dialogue tools that will lead to the consensus of the elite for the benefit of mankind as a whole.

Sergey Dvoryanov - doctor of philosophy, President of the international diplomatic club "Amicability"