Slavophile Philosophy and the Subjective School in Sociology: An Experience of Comparative Analysis

Abstract

This article problematizes the relationship between the sociological and philosophical traditions of Russian social thought based on the material of the subjective school and of Slavophilism. The absence of direct ideological and conceptual continuity between these avenues is shown, albeit they do share common mental and world-view prerequisites. Slavophilism and the subjective school are compared along three lines — epistemological, social, and historiosophical. The distinguishing features that reveal the correspondence between the aforementioned schools are as follows: the orientation towards a holistic view of reality, unifying life and cognition; the ethical dominant of epistemological views and the inclination towards a practical and transformative attitude towards reality; anthropocentrism and personalism; a romantically ecstatic formulation of the popular/commoner issue; missionary and messianic motives of historiosophical quests, and journalism as a genre of theoretical reflection. It is suggested that the cultural codes of the national social mentality are reflected in the outlined worldview complex.

Keywords

• slavophilism
• subjective school in sociology
• i.v. kireevsky
• a.s. khomyakov
• p.l. lavrov
• n.k. mikhailovsky
• mentality
• epistemology of integral knowledge
• ethicism
• voluntarism
• popular/commoner issue
• missionism
• messianism