Conquering the slave in ourselves

The events taking place in Ukraine cannot even remotely be reduced to a struggle between Yulia Tymoshenko’s bloc (BYuT) and the supporters of the current coalition. Nor can it be viewed as a struggle between the exponents of strong presidential rule against the “liquidators,” those who uphold the idea of curbing the powers vested in the president, including the nullification of the presidency in Ukraine. The meaning of what is happening in Ukraine must be sought on a considerably deeper level. It lies in the fact that for the first time in the short history of independent Ukraine an open, implacable, and even furious confrontation has emerged in the highest echelons of power. Clashes between the positions of the Orange people and the White-and-Blues are not the only confrontations. There are confrontations within the Orange camp itself, and similar conflicts cannot be ruled out in the coalition camp. Against the backdrop of the behind-the-scenes political wheeling and dealing of previous years, all this presents a rather exotic sight.

One can understand the irritation felt by rank-and-file citizens during the many months of those constant reshufflings of the coalitions in parliament, all those sickeningly familiar scenes of fraternization and oaths of lasting allegiance, followed by scampering from one camp to the next. But another fact must be recognized. Freedom — real freedom, not a fictitious political freedom — is being born in this open clash of positions in the epicenter of a pitched conflict, amidst the foul language and fistfights, in the torments of birth and afterbirth. Freedom is a capricious lady. She cannot abide when anyone claims a monopoly on her. In Ukraine, the monopolist exponent of freedom cannot be the Party of Regions, BYuT, Our Ukraine, Communists, or Socialists. It is only in the epicenter of this confrontation involving a certain number of political forces forming a certain circle (and even outside this circle) that real freedom can be born and grow stronger. The road to genuine Ukrainian democracy can be paved within such a system of rigid and uncompromising restraints and counterweights. I can anticipate an irritated reader’s question: “Is it worth discussing freedom against the backdrop of all our chaos? There are more important things than freedom.”

I will dare to contradict this statement. No other topic is more important. What’s more, it is becoming global in nature.

The state of social consciousness in the world can be summed up as neurotically alarming. Morbid predictions about a possible speedy end of world civilization are proliferating. There are soothsayers, who see in today’s local wars the beginning of another world war for a redistribution of the planet’s resources. Others associate the future catastrophe with a possible collapse of the world’s currency and financial system.

Others sense the approaching catastrophe in conjunction with the rebirth of primeval aggressive man, when evil monsters, like those emerging from the movie Night Guard, will draw crazed mankind into their dark vortex. Other observers believe that some sort of “Shadow Community” or “Antihumanity” has risen over today’s states and governments, slowly but surely dragging mankind over the cliff.

Valentyn Ponomarenko, a noted Ukrainian alarmist, sees the main reason in man’s greed, his overwhelming desire to consume all things consumable. He has diagnosed this disease as “growth mania.”

Ponomarenko sees mankind behaving like an epidemic; this process will not stop until the human race has destroyed itself, after exhausting the fuel resources that are ruining the atmosphere. The end result will be a ruthless alternative; unless mankind can somehow curb the birth rate and excessive consumption of natural resources, it will be stopped by nature, and man will simply be swept off the face of the earth.

Ponomarenko believes that the quick process of destroying the existing civilization (within a few years) will take all of us completely by surprise. What people will not have destroyed by then will be done by indifferent nature. Famines, epidemics, and wars will restore the disordered balance between mankind and a new living environment, and the latter will be much worse compared to the conditions preceding the industrial revolution.

What is the way out?

Today there is a strong temptation to reject freedom as an ideology of development. Despite all the lip service paid to “democratic freedoms,” many of our leaders have a markedly cautious attitude to individual freedom in which they see a source of instability, unpredictability, and confrontation.

Our “domestic” social and psychological situation is exacerbated by the unfavorable state of affairs in the world. A number of analysts believe that the 21st century is marked by the complete exhaustion of the traditional liberal concepts of freedom. These concepts failed to protect mankind against the totalitarian regimes in the 20th century and obviously will not protect us from the disastrous events of the 21st century.

Today, discussions of such topics as the need for a “firm hand” and the immediate curtailment of liberties in favor of instituting an “ironclad order” are growing increasingly frequent. There are even more exotic slogans, like “Away with Freedom, Back to the New Middle Ages!” Current predictions of global upheavals may beget either new (“technotronic”) totalitarianism, or a new non-liberal but creative kind of freedom.

The staggering scope of the tasks aimed at preserving world civilization and discovering new paths of progress requires equally grand insight into the idea of freedom. The well known biblical thesis about man being created in the image of God is especially topical for us and our contemporaries. Contemplating human destinies, Dostoevsky believed that man had a likeness to the Creator and to prove his point he indicated two great human traits: the ability to be a creator and the ability to be a free individual.

Rooted here is a revised concept of freedom from the standpoint of the 21st century. In place of the passive freedom of choosing between various patterns of daily conduct imposed on man (by the government, administration, oligarchic groups, the market, advertising, the entertainment industry, etc.) should come an active kind of freedom that creates. An individual invited to play a certain role in society should be replaced by one who creates and transforms such roles and games.

Many of today’s philosophers regard Dostoyevsky as the great tragedian of freedom. They are probably right, because Dostoyevsky opposes any kind of coercion, even world harmony if it is forceful. Freedom cannot be accepted as a gift from a coercive system. The road to genuine order, harmony, and unity of people can only lie through the great ordeals of freedom.

Dostoyevsky does not accept the notion of a social paradise where freedom of the human spirit is still impossible — the kind of paradise promised by all manner of Dostoyevsky’s socialist revolutionary contemporaries (his attitude to them was extremely negative). He is also resolutely opposed to the idea of a social paradise in which freedom is already impossible. Here he foresaw the emergence of a technocratic paradise of the current era, where different kinds of oligarchic groups are inventing newer and newer kinds of “happy drugs” for the all-consuming mob.

Under different conditions and with fresh inspiration this topic was seized upon by the noted Russian and Ukrainian philosopher Nikolai Berdiaev. He was thoroughly convinced that a way out of the civilizational dead-end into which mankind had driven itself was possible only through a personalized global revolution. Such a revolution, without bloodshed and ruined economies, would take place practically undetected because it would be hidden deeply in every man’s consciousness. It would finally liberate man and allow him to surpass the bounds imposed on him by the powerful of the world and lead the individual into a vast creative realm.

Shortly before Berdiaev’s death, when he was surveying his experiences of war and all sorts of revolutions, and recalling his hopes and disillusionments, he wrote that a pure and free human spirit would emerge. He believed that one day this free human spirit would overcome historical catastrophes and reign supreme over the forces of nature and society.

It is fall 2006. I am observing all the zigzagging conduct of Ukrainian politicians. I watch scenes of friendships being struck and dissolved acrimoniously, and all the rhetorical verbiage of the main political players. I smile skeptically but nevertheless I believe. I believe that in this conflict-ridden world the first glimpse of real freedom has appeared — the freedom to assess everything ourselves without waiting for the next political “master,” to judge everything and act independently; to “squeeze the slave out of ourselves drop by drop,” and to move in the right direction, so that the great culture of freedom will supplant the clever technologies of manipulation.