NATIONAL PATRIOTISM IN RUSSIA

Grey River Argus, 3 June 1942, Page 7

NATIONAL PATRIOTISM IN RUSSIA

■i (PART 2). The expression “patriotism” and “nationalism,” are used extensively in everyday speech, but they are used to define forces which the ordinary man cannot explain. Professor Ramsay Muir writes: “Nationality, then, is an elusive idea, difficult to define. It cannot be tested or analysed by formula. Least of all must 4\- be. interpreted by the brutal and childish doctrine of racialism. Its essence is a sentiment, and in the. last resort, we can only say that a nation is a nation because its members passionately and unanimously believe it to be so. But they can only, believe it to be so if there .exist among them real and strong affinities; if they are not divided by any artificially maintained separation between the mixed races from which they are sprung; if they, share a common basis of fundamental moral ideas.”

This explanation is by no means sufficient, but it does recognise one essential fact; that the essence of nationality is a sentiment, and this sentiment can only exist under certain conditions. The sentiment must be such that the individual feels himself to be part of the nation as a whole, and every act and deed of the nation must be reflected in the personality of the individual. In other words when his country is at war, the individual will conceive it to be his own personal struggle; If there is social injustice inside the nation, then he feels that it is partly, his own responsibility; he identifies the aims of his country with his own. If these conditions exist amongst the highest type of individual in a country, and are accepted by the majority, then alone can a true national patriotism exist.

There is one other condition that is highly important. The organisation of the mental life must be such that it will render the nation capable of collective deliberation and collective volition, and this collective mental life is only possible if the people are aware of themselves as a whole and have an appreciation of their significance as a complete' unit.

“The essence of collective volition is, then, not merely the wills of all to the same end, but the motivation of the wills of all members of a group by impulse awakened within’ the comman sentiment for the whole of which they are parts; It is the extension of the self-regarding, sentiment of each member of the group to the group as a whole that binds the group together and.renders it a collective individual capable of collective volition.” This collective volition is fully demonstrated by the ■will to fight shown by the British, Russian, German and J'apanese people, and it is a process which completely overshadows individual. desires. In the battle of France this collective volition was sadly lacking amongst the French people and many unsatisfactory attempts have since been made to explain the confusion and lack of national integration in the French national life.

It is national self-consciousness, however, which is the dominant factor in the lives of nations, and it is clearly observable as a rising tide in the modern world. China is showing an increasing national consciousness; Poland, Hungary, Finland, Ireland and even India have shown it in various degrees. The Boers showed a rudimentary consciousness of themselves as a national whole, without which the Boer War may not have occurred. “A nation is real and vig-. orous in proportion as its consciousness of itself is full and clear. In fact national progress and power and success depend chiefly upon the fullness and extension, the depth and width of this self-consciousness.”

In its highest sense a nation is, as Fouillee, the French sociologist and historian says, “an organism which realises itself in conceiving and whiling its own existence. Any collection of men becomes a society in the only true sense of the word, when all the men conceive more or less clearly the type of organic whole which they can form by uniting themselves and when they ef-

fectively unite themselves under the determining influences of this conception.” This is only imperfectly realised in our great modern nations, but it has been one of the chief factors by which the Russians have overcame the seemingly impossible task of achieving full national realisation. I will refer to this later.

When the above conditions are absent, there can be no real group in the nation as a whole or in any major organisation within the nation; an army for instance. In Czarist Russia, these conditions were noticeably absent. The array was composed of men conscripted from various parts of the Russian Empire, having little or no sentiment with regard to the army itself and no consciousness of themselves as effective links in the nation. They would have a sentiment for their own district perhaps, as shown by the Don .Cossacks, but this was a sentiment more egoistical than altruistic and could not be confused with a national sentiment.

Sir lan Hamilton, a competent observer remarks on the vast difference between the Russian and Japanese soldiers in the Russo-Japanese war. The Japanese, inspired by tne desire for a common goal, always went into action ready and willing to die for the glory of his country. He adds that it was not fanaticism which inspired the Japanese, but a strong national- consciousness. Th f Russian armies on the other harm, obeying their commanders-in-fchiet in virtue of custom, habit and coilective suggestion, lacked the chief psychological condition for successful offensive action, namely, a common end desired individually and collectively. This was apparent in all Russian armies up until the time of the Great War.

It. would be wrong to infer th at the Russian soldiers were individually inferior to their opponents, me ■'armies of Czarist Russia showed a I noticeable peculiarity. Although | lamentably weak in attack, they j showed the utmost bravery on defence. This can be explained by the fact that in defence, each man’s actions become truly volitional. He was fighting to preserve his own life which to him was an eminently desirable end, and under these circumstances the true fighting qualities of the Russian soldier were better demonstrated.

The Russian armies obviously showed no signs of a collective will, and all their campaigns have shown that they fought well only when they had something to defend —their own immediate district or their lives and the lives of their kinfolk. It was not national consciousness which actuated them. They were not fighting for their country even althougn fighting in the army of their country.

The explanation for the lack of ■collective consciousness in the Czarist armies derives from the lack of national consciousness among the masses in Czarist Russia. The social organisation was such that the people were never permitted the free development of their natural tendencies and abilities in the sphere of collective action. McDougall lucidly describes the position. ‘Such was Russia when the Varegs, the conquering Northmen, imposed on the almost unorganised mass of Slavs their rule and a national organisation; and such •it remained up to the outbreak of the Great War, a’ mass of men in whom national consciousness was only just beginning to glimmer here and there, crudely organised by the bureaucratic power of a few. Even in the minds of these few., the national consciousness and purpose was but little developed. Individual purpose and individual self _ consciousness predominated. Hence Russia had no capacity for thought and action; and when ideas stirred the masses to action, their actions were those of the unorganised crowds, impulsive and ineffective; the ends were but vaguely conceived, the means were not deliberately" chosen, or, if so chosen, found no executive organisation for the effective expression of the collective purpose.”

The organisation of Czarist Rus-* sia was created by a small governing class merely to serve the purpose of that class, and not for the creation of a national mind and the expression of public opinion. The organisation existed chiefly for the gathering of taxes and the formation of an army, the army being used to enforce the authority of the governing few. Any conditions which might lead to the formation of a national self-consciousness were looked upon as dangerous, and were rigorously suppressed. Education being one of these conditions, it is not surprising to find that in 1914, seventy-two per cent', of the Russian people were illiterate, a situation caused in a great degree by the deliberate curtailment and suppression of education amongst the people.

(To be continued)