The Concept of Nation: the Main Tends of Genesis in the 18th – early 20th Centuries in the Discourse of non-Marxist Paradigms
The Concept of Nation: the Main Tends of Genesis in the 18th – early 20th Centuries in the Discourse of non-Marxist Paradigms

Summary/Abstract: In contrast to the approaches presented in the scientific literature, the article, based on a complex of methods (systematic, comparative, discursive and content analysis, prescriptions of scientism and the principle of historicism) of the humanities and social sciences, suggests the results of a system-oriented analysis of the evolution and transformations of the most influential meanings and senses of the concept “nation” used throughout the history of Europe and the world, which were theoretically developed in the philosophical and political thought, human sciences and political doctrines of the 18th – early 20th centuries for cognition, as well as ideological, legal and mental/psychological support of the two main ways of nation genesis and national-state building, in particular “from nation to state” and “from state to nation.” Historically, a large-scale scientific approach allowed to define the main stages and dominant trends in the development of interpretations of such national communities as cultural (ethnic) social groups and political (civil) communities, thus revealing their relationship with concepts, mythologems, and ideologems, such as “the people,” “national revival,” “the sovereignty of the people,” “national state,” “nationalism” and “patriotism.” Another scientific novelty of the article is the generalized presentation and theoretical evaluation in the context of the centuries-old genesis of the theoretical ideas about the nations, specifics of the Austro-Marxist approach of the early twentieth century. The material of the article may be particularly relevant for a scientifically balanced, ideologically unbiased, adequate understanding of the processes of development of philosophical, social, and political thought both in the Western world and in modern Ukraine since independence.

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