Today we talk about Light and Shadows of the Cultural-Civilizational Conflict, a book by Stanislav Ovcharenko published with our publishing house Europe Books.
Europe Books had the pleasure of interviewing the author Stanislav Ovcharenkoto get to know him better, the moment that brought him to write his book Light and Shadows of the Cultural-Civilizational Conflict, as well as how he chose the title of his book.
Below you can find our interview. Take a seat and enjoy your reading!!!
- Is there a particular moment in your life that led you to the writing of your book? What was it?
There were many such “moments” that prompted me to write this and other books. First of all, life itself in a Post communist country and my course of lectures on the theory and history of culture, which I taught at universities in Ukraine. As a result, a certain holistic cultural concept arose – which is set forth in my FULL version of the book under the same title – but in a much larger volume. The printed version takes up only one-sixth of the total work. Five-sixths of this volume remained unpublished – but I was glad that even if one-sixth of this work was pub-lished because the previous publisher has written: “We are a bit concerned – we are reading news of people dying “accidentally” … and we are concerned about this book..” The main thing here is that post-communist society is, in principle, not a democratic society, but only a continuation of the communist regime – and it could not be other-wise. The post-Soviet era has shown that peaceful “color revolutions” are impossible in principle. Because no peaceful elections, no ballots can overthrow the criminal regime. Oligarchic regimes in the world, in order to survive, have switched to external ex-pansion against the West as a whole, resorting to unprincipled commercial temptations. The post-communist population, upon leaving communism, turned out to be incredibly weakened, which is what I am trying to analyze. In my conclusions, I prove that it is necessary not to defend ourselves, but to struggle against barbarism – but for this, the West must rethink and reflect on itself.
- What would you like to hear from your readers?
First of all, I would like to find readers who would greet with understanding my attempt to reveal the challenges to the West from the aggressive archaic elites of the Lagging World, who are unsuccessfully trying to create a split in Western societies. These archaic elites of the Lagging World influence the disoriented masses of “ordinary people” who are losing their previous stable status due to rapid scientific and technological progress, which is happening FASTER than the mentality of the bulk of the population is changing. To do this, people must understand that changes in the cultural and technological structure are inevitable, but modern adaptation difficulties are temporary and can be overcome. The second negative factor in the West itself is those politicians who THEMSELVES want to become all-powerful oligarchs – relying on the “ordinary people” of the West itself – these are politicians like Orban or Trump who want to become dictators similar to Xi Jingping, Vladimir Putin. I would like readers to pay attention to this. I would like readers to see that in the context of the confrontation between the West and the Lagging World, an irreconcilable confrontation between culture and barbarism can be traced. This is in order to create chaos in the West and its repeated barbarization for the sake of perpetuating the power of archaic elites in the Lagging World.
- Is there a book you are particularly attached to and that has taught you something?
Here we should talk not about a separate book – but about outstanding, from my point of view, authors with their books, of course. Since childhood, a portrait of Karl Marx hung above my desk…I would especially like to mention Ayn Rand, who experienced first-hand the emergence of a closed society as the world entered a period of communist dictatorship. I, who was born in the Soviet Union, experienced the liberating spiritual influence of the West in the context of the collapse of the classical communist regime. Simply put – Ayn Rand was “at the entrance” to such a regime – I am at the exit from it! Therefore, I have a positive attitude towards her work, although I am critical of it. Of course, I was favorably influenced by the works of Arnold Toynbee, Samuel Huntington, Karl Popper, Milton Friedman, and Hayek. I would like to recall Boris Bazhanov’s work “Notes of Stalin’s Secretary” with his very attractive and instructive style of presentation for me. It is clear that this is not a complete list of authors. Suffice it to recall the Russian historian Leonid Vasiliev. In general, there is no ONE book that could teach me everything, but there are books that captivated me with their sincerity and talent in searching for the truth about the nature of man and society. Indeed, with the complication of the scientific and technological structure, in the purely social sphere, a strong desire arises to simplify the overall picture of the world – in order to avoid fear of the future.
- How did you choose the title of your book?
This was easy enough to do – due to the acute awareness of the irreconcilability of culture and barbarism. With each step in the development of Culture, the aggressiveness of barbarism and Anti-Culture steadily increases. The brighter the light, the deeper the shadow. Behind all political, economic, national and religious confrontations is the conflict of societies with free people – and societies where the state has dominated the life, property and freedom of the individual for many centuries. Milton Friedman somewhere says that Western society exists historically RECENTLY, in a limited area and covers only one-seventh or even one-eighth of all humanity. But the West tends to focus on itself, dismissing the rest of the world. Under these conditions, Western countries allow themselves to pursue a policy of national isolationism, “in order to become great.” In the title, I noted the principled, and not random, nature of the confrontation – to say that we need not only national, but also a unique cultural and civilizational patriotism. The archaic elites are aware of hostility towards the West, but they mistakenly believe that all people outside of it are the same, only “slightly different.” No – people raised in despotic societies are COMPLETELY different, and this must be realized in time for the sake of their own safety. But first you need to realize yourself AGAIN.
- Are you working on a new writing project you can tell us about?
Yes, sure. After all, even in the full text of my book the topic is not exhausted – especially since we are faced with many questions that arise from:
- a) the existence of the so-called “digital concentration camp” – and
- b) “monkey with a grenade” problems – i.e. inadequate individuals, in whose hands increasingly destructive instruments of influence on others fall. With the growing number of free hours, not only the problems of the so-called “common man” arise, but also the possibility of overcoming the social status and cultural code of the “common man”. After all, it becomes a problematic obstacle to a free society. But he can grow to the level of a holistic creative person. How to overcome fear or simply reluctance to solve more complex problems of human life? What conflicts arise in interpersonal relationships? How to maintain a safe distance between people and communities? To fence ourselves off from inadequate people and societies – or, conversely, to fence them off? How to instill self-confidence in the weakened people of the post-communist world? Where is the measure and role of self-education and what is the role of inevitable coercion towards inadequate people and societies? At what point can a weak, even broken person gain self-confidence? In my works I strive to predict the direction of constructive human efforts, if they can be realized IN TIME.
Europe Books thanks the author Stanislav Ovcharenko once again for taking the time and answering our questions. We are really pleased to have walked alongside him on the editorial path that led to the publication of his book Light and Shadows of the Cultural-Civilizational Conflict. We wish him the best of luck for his book and for his future works.
To you, my dear reader, I hope that through this sincere and honest book you will understand that changes in the cultural and technological structure are inevitable; that it will make you reflect on the comparison between the West and the Lagging World, often and unfortunately with difficulties of conciliation.
So, my dear reader, all I have to say is to enjoy your reading!
Your editor!