NEW COLLECTIVE. WHAT IS THE POTENTIAL FOR COMMUNITY AFTER COMMUNISM?
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ESPAC ESSAY IANA KOZAK NEW COLLECTIVE WHAT IS THE POTENTIAL FOR COMMUNITY AFTER COMMUNISM?
The word combination "new collective" throws me back into confusion and, to be honest, a certain degree of rejection. This phrase brings back to communism, which had being built for three generations by Soviet people: voluntary-compulsory communities, communal apartments, community work days; and demonstrations and strikes, alienation and vacuumness caused by the collapse of the Socialist order. I do not understand why all those had been self for a long time: self courtyard , self street, self city, self country, suddenly, almost instantly became their? And here we come to the dialectical categories "self — other" which are closely related to the theory of social identity and popularized concept of in-group and out-group by Henry Tayfel. Self is the identity, group that a person considers him/herself to be a part of (in-group). By contrast, other is identity, group which is not part of the in-group. Self is very substantial category defining our attitude to milieu, acceptance, advocacy, struggle or rejection. What is the effect of these concepts on the formation of communities? What does it mean by " self — other" almost one century years ago, how did this understanding change after the collapse of the Soviet Union? And, finally, what is the future of the post-Soviet society in terms of new self ? The represented forms of opposition "self — other", such as Red revolution, communes, the struggle against capitalism, the Cold War, the atomization of the post-Soviet society, pit strikes, concludes that these models look superficially analogous action to protect their territory from encroachment of individuals, not belonging to the group. It can be described in terms of following tradition, the origin of which is deeper than society itself, because the mechanism of discrimination on the basis of belonging to a certain community was formed in the course of evolution, from the earliest stages of it. The term community is derived from the Latin communitas: the prefix "com" signifies " together " and munis, which derives from munire, meaning "to defend". Original communes sprang up as communities in attempt to defend their values and confront a hostile social environment. In this case self was extended to the whole life of the commune, self means, self food, and even carried to the point of absurdity self wives etc.
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NEW COLLECTIVE. WHAT IS THE POTENTIAL FOR COMMUNITY AFTER COMMUNISM?
In the 1920th, the idea of house - communes borrowed from the concept of "phalanstery" — a new form of housing where people would be able to accustom themselves to collectivism. They would be released from the burdens of domestic work, family ties and all petty and private. It was picked up by the Young Communist League and aimed to create a "new mass person". The newspaper "North Komsomolets", March 2, 1924 wrote: "Young people rather than anyone must and can do away with the traditions of a dying society ... Proletarian youth collectivism could only be cultivated when labor and life of young people are collective. The best guide of such collectivism can be the dormitory commune of young workers. First of all, what is necessary for the education of the person is common canteen, community of living conditions". However, the collective reached the point of absurdity, sending its expansion inwards infringed upon moral, ethical and family foundations.
In the 1960th residential district became a symbol of a new Socialistic space. Microrayon was planned as an ideal place for getting private space along with open space for socialization. "Self " extended up to the immense scale from self courtyard, self city to self country. After the victory in the Great Patriotic War, "other" was left somewhere far away and was almost imperceptible. The state undertook organization of the communities within enterprises, institutions, clubs, committees. The main goal was right to merge Soviet people in communist ideology through collective in different spheres of life. It is appropriate to mention the fragment from the novel by M. Bulgakov 's "Master and Margarita", when the head of the city's spectacular branch "... had to organize Lermontov study group, chess and checkers, ping - pong and riding circles during the year. By summer he threatened with a boat racing circle on fresh water and mountaineering circle". As the state had the collective in charge it was taken as a matter of course.
NEW COLLECTIVE. WHAT IS THE POTENTIAL FOR COMMUNITY AFTER COMMUNISM?
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After the collapse of the Soviet Union, total atomization, migration , loss of trust to the state and loss of ideology led to the alienation of citizens: other begins out of doors. An areal of "self" shrank to the borders of "private": apartments, cars, dachas, business; because to possess self is more safe than possess unreliable other . As a result, person moves in other space to get quickly from "self" to "self". In the morning, he or she wakes up in self room, leaves self apartment, takes self car, drives to self office, in the evening returns to self home again; on the weekend it is better to go to self dacha.
As the consequence, a sense of belonging to the courtyard, city, country has practically disappeared. Let's look at this in detail. Communist ideology was carrying features such as integration, mobilizing and orientation. But the main mistake was made by emphasizing on the economy and the sphere of consumption and distribution of goods. Incorrect conclusion consisted in the assumption that economic model is the key factor to determine the level of development of society and civilization. In fact, the main determinant of the development of civilization and human society is to change the system of values. The collapse of the Soviet Union just showed underdevelopment of values lowered from the top down, that is, passive consumption and replication — everybody is for himself. Traditions and foundations carried more formal bureaucratic character and were so connected with the economic sphere. Then the system collapsed, it caused the collapse of socio -cultural bureaucratic skeleton locating person in society. An individual suddenly lost his place, and was forced to fight, often violating rights, law and morality. This trend is clearly seen on graph of crime rating recorded from 198 5 to 2011. registered crimes, thousands registered crimes per 100.000 people theft,% of total number of crimes crimes related to drugs,%
Reported crime statistics in RSSR/ Russsinan federation.1985-2011
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NEW COLLECTIVE. WHAT IS THE POTENTIAL FOR COMMUNITY AFTER COMMUNISM?
On the other hand, physical urban space with the prevailing standard of microrayon structure of urban environment to some extent exacerbated the degree of alienation. In reality, we find ourselves in a desert macro-space, often passing yard. It brings down a person to micro-scale. Recollecting myself, hard to position yourself in such neighborhood: where "self" and where "other". Further degradation of public spaces of neighborhood — sports, playgrounds, places of communication — because of its draw, has driven us in a comfort zone of our apartment. In addition to this, people having lost their "self" or being dissatisfied with its quality formed gangs, opposition groups splashed aggression or stole new "self".
Desperately ignoring uncomfortable public space residents put a lot of effort on furnishing their lives and personal space: life is in the interior. Private space is to be important existed "for themselves", or for escaping between the walls and things, "Fortress of life". Demonstrative in respect of this is super-developed repair industry: put armored door, lattices at windows, set up repair in "European" style etc. However, by the effort focused on supplying security of "self" world, there were provided basic safeguards that, by default, were taken by the state.
And what is now? Now we often see fenced off courtyards: narrow corridors between the plots. Residents shut oneself off forming a kind of "Gated community". Another option is having enough money to buy or build a private house in a gated suburban settlement. But here we face double "Gated community": the permit system regulates access to the territory of the settlement, but the residents continue to mark "self" fences. This situation leads to segregation, division of society and inaccessibility. At the same time, people adapt built environment by visualizing the boundaries of "self". That is all that goes into these boundaries is not foreign, subconsciously causes no danger, and consequently a sense of tension is relaxing. Another point, it is a voluntary collective decision of the people meaning the beginning of an interaction. Any person being in my comfort zone is not of concern, because we made "self" space together, I can say hello, smile , exchange a few words .... that is already a dialogue.
NEW COLLECTIVE. WHAT IS THE POTENTIAL FOR COMMUNITY AFTER COMMUNISM?
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Further development of "self — other" goes beyond the isolation of local communities but through design implemented via brand strategy. For instance, I open my laptop, check the news, subscribe to the upcoming events in social networks, join groups, debate, share self experiences, etc. This is precisely the expansion of self far beyond my private. Such virtual now increasingly translates into tangible positive interventions such as restaurant day, park(ing) day, partizanning. Of course, the simplicity of virtual communication can be directed to the aggressive form. But just the whole trick is to promote human friendly brands as much as possible. What will happen to the community? To see the world in a pink color is not peculiar to me. But when I see this still weak, but developing community, it makes me smile. Being positive, I clearly see a picture of how the local community by spreading farther "self" and interfering with others "self" interact at the intersection of interests and values. The Internet is a mediator between different groups. Firstly, it maps various groups, activities: makes them visible. It initially promotes interaction virtually: the virtual is less of concern. Secondly, it gives an opportunity to interact. For instance, being a member of some Facebook group, few more I might be interested in are usually suggested. Then physical interaction comes as meetings, events, workshops, social projects: step by step contaminating the city. So, the need for fences and gates will go with the lapse of time. However, there is another scenario. Building of trust and tolerance depends on the position of the authorities. If the authorities are indulging cultural, ethnic inequality, in this case, the virtual solidarity can lead to conflicts within society, and sometimes against the government itself. Conflicts in turn undermine confidence and reduce the level of security in the physical space. So, it is quite fragile and unstable mechanism: it all depends on the charge that we will transmit.
Community comes not from the conventional idea of the city as a totality — as a single substance which is then divided by the corresponding parts — but from continuum of different situations. For the last century society have passed through different levels of Self : from defence to contamination, from self = private o self=common, which influenced on the forming of collective I believe that we do not need the 4th century to remove fences and walls. The most important thing is not to forcibly break down the physical boundaries yet. It is easy to destroy, but to build trust again much more difficult.