The director of the Institute of EurAsEC, Vladimir Lepekhin, told Vestnik Kavkaza what values can oppose the ideas of Islamic State. According to him, the right set of values is being cultivated in Russia, but unfortunately it is not translated into educational and upbringing programs.
"That strategic line, which was established in the educational process in the Soviet era, on the one hand, has been stopped, changed in favor of other values. Today, there is an understanding that the values, the so-called universal values, do not justify the expectations among the population. In particular, a sense of patriotism is suffering. Now there is a return to patriotism. Still, this sense is abstract. That means that you can love the motherland, but you need to understand what is behind this specifically, what kind of imperatives," Vladimir Lepekhin thinks.
According to him, "so there is a situation in the world today that, on the one hand, there are very specific values, which are expressed in terms such as freedom, democracy, human rights and so on, what the West calls its own, European, Western or Euro-American values. When there is a question about what values are cultivated in the former Soviet Union, there are a lot of questions. You can say that they are the same as in the world, in the West – freedom, democracy, human rights are crucial. Someone says no. Somehow, justice is forgotten, which in Soviet times was one of the main patterns … Because the population has quite a large trust in this sense of justice, and they cannot find it in the West, because it is not a priority, they are looking for it in the other parts of the world such as the Middle East, in Asia, where there is Islam or, in particular, radical Islamism. This suggests that they are raising this value, justice, on their banner."
Lepekhin thinks that "you can agree with that or not, but at least that's what the media is telling. And so the need for justice occurs, when young people see it in the East, they go there. Then they are being cheated, but nevertheless, there is a trend. Therefore, the problem lies precisely in this, you need to clearly understand what human being society wants to see what exactly is a patriotism, what is a national interest. These values must be stated as a priority for our country, for our civilization, Eurasia. They should go through the whole process of education. Unfortunately, there is none of it. Too much attention is paid to pluralism, freedom of opinion, etc. It turns out that with all this freedom a young man cannot hold onto anything."
"Obviously, it is great that there is a choice, but the state should pursue some line and tell us, from the point of survival, Russian civilization needs this set of priorities. Specifically, for example, justice, sovereignty, the creativity of our economy, our way of life, solidarity, I mean the constructive interaction between society and the state. The set of values is more or less clear, but unfortunately, in the education procces it is not clearly formulated and translated into specific educational programs," the expert believes.
In addition, Vladimir Lepekhin considers any religious culture as an element of national culture or civilization: "Since Russia is a core of a group of cultures, religious, national, a unity of diversity. Therefore, when there is a popularization of Orthodox culture, Islamic, which are traditional religions, it is quite normal and natural. Another thing is some kind of non-traditional cultures, which in my view can play a destructive role, because they are an alien element."
