SPIEF was not without ideological discussions

The St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF), which ended this weekend, was not without political discussions. The main speakers of one of the sessions were political scientists Alexander Dugin and Alexei Chadayev, who shared their doubts about the achievements of Western science and their experience of understanding Russian civilization. United Russia organized a discussion of the role of women in politics. And the governors again demonstrated optimism, proving that the sanctions do not hinder the development of the regions. The forum also discussed the informational confrontation with the Western world, although, as Kommersant was convinced, it was too early to give up everything foreign to Russia: even with friendly Arab guests, representatives of the regions had to communicate in “unfriendly” English.

“I was offered to speak, but I still refused. The forum is economic, but I’m not an economist,” one of the guests working in the field of domestic politics told Kommersant on the sidelines of the SPIEF. However, the lack of an economic background confused not all speakers.

So, at the section “Horizon-2040: Russia on the world map”, two experts spoke at once, who would probably describe themselves as political philosophers: the ideologist of the Eurasian movement Alexander Dugin and political scientist Alexei Chadayev, well-known in domestic political circles. Dmitry Peskov, the presidential special envoy for digital and technological development, who acted as a moderator, immediately warned viewers that if they left too early, it might seem to them that it was “thrash”, but those who remained until the end would definitely be enriched with new ideas.

Mr. Dugin lived up to the moderator’s expectations by saying right off the bat that Russia has three options: capitulation to the West, import substitution, and building a Russian (Eurasian) world. The best option, in his opinion, is, of course, the third one. However, the author of this concept describes it more theoretically than practically. “We recognize that Russia as a sovereign civilization is a separate historical phenomenon that has its own path, its own goals. There is no normativity and obligatory nature of Western values… This includes democracy, the market, liberalism, human rights, Greta Thunberg, Soros, an open society – all this can be easily called into question. It doesn’t mean that it is rejected, it just becomes optional,” Mr. Dugin explained, calling for questioning all the achievements of the West, including scientific ones, both in sociology and in the natural sciences. “We refuse to recognize gravity, because it is an Anglo-Saxon invention, and we remember that Aristotle also had levitation,” the thinker gave an example of how to free the Russian “scientific imagination.”

Alexey Chadaev supplemented his colleague with a story about his lecture, in which he enlightened the officers of a tank regiment about the theory of Immanuel Kant. And just in case, I recalled the main postulates of this philosopher of the 18th century in an interpretation suitable for modern military men: an a priori judgment is an assumption about the actions of the enemy, based on one’s own considerations; a posteriori – a judgment based on intelligence data; and transcendental dialectics is the ability to quickly accept that the opponent is not acting as expected. Moving from the past to the present, the speakers said that Russians should not become addicted to gadgets, dehumanization is underway in the West, and Russia is ready to accept as agents of influence all those who want to remain human. From practical proposals, the idea was to evaluate the success of business projects by how they contribute to the development of the “empire” and the “land”.

United Russia (ER) this time organized a discussion at SPIEF not on its “People’s Program” (as it was last year), but on the problems of women in politics. Deputy Secretary of the General Council of the party, Daria Lantratova, who is in charge of the ER women’s movement, did not forget to clarify that the party members are not at all for Western feminism and in general there are no large-scale gender problems in Russia. But when women go into politics, they face certain stereotypes and a psychological barrier, which EP helps them overcome, Ms. Lantratova noted. INSOMAR representative Viktor Poturemsky, in turn, said that, according to male focus groups, women are now coping with problems even better than men. “And women say that smiling men on the streets playing sports will be a marker of a positive state of society for them,” the sociologist added.

For the governors at the SPIEF, they built their own “living room” for the second time. It was decorated in the ancient Greek style with white columns, the inscriptions “Governor’s club” were visible on the walls, and only heads of regions were allowed there, who, according to the observations of the Kommersant correspondent, were very optimistic in their assessments – as, by the way, last year . So, Novgorod Governor Andrei Nikitin said that his region has become a leader in the training of specialists in electronic warfare. His Ivanovo colleague, Stanislav Voskresensky, said that Russian entrepreneurs were “strong”, and Russians have a growing interest in their traditions and history. “The stronger the pressure is on us, the stronger we rally, fight back and become stronger and stronger,” assured the head of the Kirov region, ex-employee of the presidential administration Alexander Sokolov.

The forum did not go without discussing the information war of the “collective West” against Russia. At one of the sections, Senator Alexei Pushkov said that the world is fighting for the semantic content of digital platforms and some countries, such as China, prefer to isolate themselves from the global network. Russia, on the other hand, is “in the middle between China and Europe,” and it should not fence itself off (otherwise there will be stagnation and regression), but develop digital sovereignty, the senator assured. Washington is moving towards the goal of establishing a digital dictatorship, but “our task is to balance: no closure, locking and blocking,” Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova echoed him.

Last year at SPIEF, especially high activity was observed at the stands of the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics (DPR and LPR). This time for them, as well as the Kherson and Zaporozhye regions, in fact, one stand was allocated. The first three expositions were so crowded that the Kommersant correspondent could not even immediately find the space of the LPR, cruising between the territories of the DPR and Kherson. But Zaporozhye’s booth turned out to be on the other side and looked downright huge. There, in particular, the actor Ivan Okhlobystin was awarded and cherries were handed out: more than a ton was brought to St. Petersburg, Andrey Kozenko, vice-premier of the region for economics, shared with journalists.

However, despite the ideological rationale for “complete sovereignization”, it is still too early for Russians to give up everything Western. The Kommersant correspondent was convinced of this thanks to one of the Arab guests, who became interested in the stand of Kalmykia with rice, dried meat and a bath cap. “English, please,” he addressed the representatives of the republic. At first, this baffled the latter, but then, including with the help of a Kommersant correspondent, they still managed to defend the honor of the region by telling a foreigner about their products in “unfriendly” English.

Andrey Vinokurov, Elena Rozhkova