“The Meaning of War” by Vladimir Solovyov and Russian Society

Abstract

The article tells about ideological premises and circumstances of appearance of the famous article The Meaning of War by Wl. Solovyev published in 1895. It states, that this article which was later included into the Wl. Solovyev’s trea­tise The Justification of Good as a special chapter, reflected not only the devel­oping conflict of the thinker with religious and ethical views of Leo Tolstoy but also the increasing alienation of Wl. Solovyev from his liberal circle. It points out the reasons by which the Wl. Solovyev’s justification of war was not adopted by Russian liberals who didn’t want to come into polemics with Tolstoy’s ideas which were popular in the populist camp. The article pays special attention to the significance of the phenomenon of intellectual class and to the factor of increas­ing of its role in society for the proper understanding of the rise of pacifism in Russian society in the 1890-s. It brings out a close connection between the so­cio-political views of Wl. Solovyev in 1890-s and the views of his father, the prominent Russian historian Sergey Solovyev, and in particular, his conception of war between the West and the East as the leitmotif of the world history. It puts forward the thesis that the main task of Wl. Solovyev as a social philosopher and public figure was the rebirth of the complex of ideas which was symptomatic for the 1840-s in Russia. That complex included a statesmanship tinged with roman­ticism, belief in the positive role of Russian empire in the history and the percep­tion of Russia as a keeper of European unity.