Eurasianism

The article deals with the problems of Eurasianism, its origins, genesis, and ways of development. We have noted that the original feature of Eurasianism is a special emphasis on the Asian component of Russia, and proposed to revise the traditional view of the Tatar-Mongol yoke. The role of Russia as a European power was denied, the West was subjected to accusations of selfishness, assertion of sovereign individual rights, and Ancient Rus was idealized. At the same time there were critics of Eurasianism’s ideas. Many well-known Russian intellectuals asserted that Europeanism and the Asian beginning are two constituent parts of Russia, that the rapprochement of the last with the West saved Russian culture from complete stagnation: without the impulses of the West, the cultural achievements of nineteenth-century Russia would be unthinkable. We analyzed the attitude of the representatives of Eurasianism to the revolution, Bolshevism, and socialist construction and revealed the causes of the Eurasian movement collapse, which are rooted in the triumph of totalitarian dictatorships and Great Russian chauvinism. In conclusion, it was noted that, contrary to the expectations of Eurasianists, post-revolutionary Russia culturally appealed not to the East, but to the values borrowed in Western culture.