"Dialogue of Cultures in the context of globalization" under this motto, the XI International Likhachev Scientific Readings were held in St. Petersburg on May 12-13, 2011. Prominent representatives of science, culture and art, public and political figures from Russia and other 26 countries of the world presented more than 230 reports covering the topic of globalization, its dynamics, contradictory impact on the economy, socio-cultural relations, the entire complex of international relations and the principles of the world order.

The readings have been held annually since 1993 at the Saint Petersburg University for the Humanities of Trade Unions and have now become one of the world's largest platforms for scientific discussions on a wide range of humanitarian issues. Their initiator at one time was Academician D. S. Likhachev, who actively collaborated with St. Petersburg. State Unitary Enterprise and developed the "Declaration of Cultural Rights" with a group of university scientists. In 2001, by Decree of the President of the Russian Federation V. V. Putin, the readings acquired the state status and the name of a great scientist and citizen. The founders of this forum are the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Russian Academy of Education, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation and the Humanitarian University of Trade Unions.

This year, 38 members of state academies of sciences, representatives of 24 academic institutes and 73 universities participated in the readings. Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, Governor of St. Petersburg Vladimir Matvienko, Vice-President of the Russian Academy of Sciences A.D. Nekipelov, President of the Russian Academy of Education N. D. Nikandrov, writer D. A. Granin, academicians A. A. Huseynov, O. T. Bogomolov, M. P. Kirpichnikov, V. A. Lektorsky, V. L. Makarov, V. S. Stepin, V. A. Chereshnev, A. O. Chubaryan, choreographer B. Ya. Eifman, Chairman of the Central Election Commission V. E. Churov, President of the European Academy of Sciences and Arts F. V. Chuvashov. Unger, lawyer G. M. Reznik, adviser to the President of the Russian Federation M. A. Fedotov and many other famous figures of science, culture, art, state and public figures. Greetings to the participants of the readings were sent by Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.

Much attention was paid to the countries of the East, its place in the present and future world in the context of intensive global communications and exchanges, migration flows. It should be noted that the forum was attended by well-known Oriental scientists: Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Director of the State Hermitage M. B. Piotrovsky, Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Director of the Institute of the Far East of the Russian Academy of Sciences M. L. Titarenko, Director of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences V. V. Naumkin, representatives of the scientific and cultural elite and statesmen of a number of Asian and African countries.

The participants of the readings looked at the dialectic of rapidly ongoing and large-scale modernization processes, which shows the crystallization of new centers of power against the background of a declining role of the West. These are China, India, Southeast Asian countries, and the Islamic world. It was noted that Mir Vostoka no longer remains a passive object of westernization, but offers its own version of the synthesis of traditions and innovations, development models. According to Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Director of the Institute of Europe of the Russian Academy of Sciences N. P. Shmelev (Moscow), by the middle of the XXI century, the United States will be forced to give up its primacy on the world stage to China. In the future, if this situation continues, and if China establishes partnership relations with another Asian giant - India, then we can predict not only the "decline of Europe", but also the beginning of the decline of the entire Euro-Atlantic civilization, said Academician M. L. Titarenko. This is another illustration of the fact that the Western model is not necessarily universal. It is impossible to build a single democracy

models for China and Japan, Sweden and France, and the Islamic world, was noted in the report of Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Editor-in-chief of the journal Voprosy Ekonomiki [Voprosy Ekonomiki].

The discussion about the impact of globalization and the scientific and technological revolution on the cultural space in both the East and the West was very rich and multifaceted. The result of globalization is unification, Westernization (primarily Americanization) and, consequently, the loss of diversity, said the director of the Luxembourg Institute for European and International Studies, Dr. A. Kless. This often provokes a rollback to nationalism. A. Kless expressed alarm at the growth of various phobias, in particular Islamophobia in Western Europe. Until recently, most of the countries here were traditionally mono-confessional and mono-ethnic, but now, due to the flow of immigrants of the Islamic denomination from Asia and Africa, the Muslim diaspora has expanded to 24 million people, said the director of the MGIMO Center for Partnership of CivilizationsMinistry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary V. V. Popov. According to other sources, the number of Muslims in Europe (including those living on the Balkan Peninsula) reaches 40 million. This gives rise to various reactions in society, including concerns about the prospect of" Islamization " of Europe. One such example was the book "Self-Destruction of Germany" by Thil Saracin, published in September 2010. In it, the author states the fact of an increase in the Muslim population, mainly due to the arrival of Turks, which, in his opinion, threatens to turn Germans into a minority in Germany and the decline of European culture. According to M. Scheuer, Director of the UN Alliance of Civilizations Secretariat, cultural differences, whether genuine or contrived, are often wrongly considered a cause of tension. Excessive "culturalization" of tensions and conflicts, he stressed, can disorient people. M. Scheuer called for deepening intercultural dialogue in the European Mediterranean region, along the "West-Muslim world" axis.

The Permanent Representative of Egypt to UNESCO, M. Al-Zahabi, expressed skepticism about the phrase "global village"that has entered the political vocabulary. Currently, 80% of the world's people are excluded from global information networks. Only less than 4% of Africans use them. Globalization, according to the speaker, is fragmenting the world, and long-standing strife and religious intolerance have never been more acute. A. Yao-Yao, Permanent Representative of the Republic of Côte d'Ivoire to UNESCO, expressed solidarity with him. Under the pressure of globalization, the cultural riches, traditions and symbols of the African continent are increasingly being eroded by imitation of Western models, she said. At the same time, both recognized that, thanks to globalization and the dissemination of information, the world has become more aware of the multicolored cultures and the interdependence of all people. Ambassador M. Y. Katagum, Permanent Representative of the Federal Republic of Nigeria to UNESCO, spoke about the attitude of Nigerian society towards various aspects of globalization. Multiculturalism and pluralism have already emerged as its positive products and have proven themselves in Nigeria.

Speakers at the forum noted that globalization challenges generate resistance, a defensive reaction in order to preserve the religious and linguistic identity of different ethnic groups. In the current Arab discourse, the strengthening of myths about the distant past is seen as a form of manifestation of identity, as a consequence of the crisis intensified by globalization, the editor-in-chief of the Personality magazine noted. Culture. Society " O. N. Astafieva. On the African continent, on the one hand, there is a situation in which the rights of the ethno-cultural majority and minority are already taken for granted. But on the other hand, under the pressure of an external factor, contradictions that have not come to the surface for many years are exposed.

One of the topics discussed at the readings was the possibility of a dialogue of cultures within one multinational country, as well as between different countries in a multicultural and multi-confessional world.

H. Bonnenberg, a member of the German Society for Foreign Policy, discussed the relationship between the values of civil society and Islam. According to him, approximately 80% of the world's population lives in accordance with the values of civil society and approximately 20% of humanity profess the values of Islam. To prevent various kinds of conflicts, it is necessary to combine the regulatory norms of these two systems in a single complex called "the conscience of the world" in a peaceful way.

S. Farah, a foreign member of the Russian Academy of Education, professor at the Lebanese State University, listed seven principles that, in his opinion, should be followed when conducting a dialogue of civilizations, and eight obstacles that stand in this way. If the progressive movement of globalism with technological and informative progress-

If som is a real and predetermined fact, then preserving a healthy axiological core in the cultural identity of peoples is a moral human duty for the strong and weak, for the boss and subordinate, for the elites and for the masses, the Lebanese scientist noted.

Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation G. M. Gatilov drew the attention of the audience to the importance of interreligious dialogue as an element of the dialogue of cultures. He informed the audience about Russia's efforts to establish an Advisory Council of Religions under the auspices of the United Nations, whose task will be to establish a broad dialogue between faiths and international organizations. So far, this step has not received the full support of the UN member States. But the Russian Federation has taken the initiative to create a high-level Group on Interreligious dialogue within UNESCO.

The idea of a dialogue between Christian and Muslim civilizations in the modern world was supported by V. Y. Zorin, Deputy Director of the Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology of the Russian Academy of Sciences (Moscow). In modern ethno-political conflicts, the religious factor is often not the cause, but the background, which can either complicate the conflict, or, on the contrary, reduce its intensity, he said. V. Y. Zorin believes that, despite the external revival of interest in religion, it turns from a symbol of faith more into a cultural phenomenon, and many see it as a cultural phenomenon. it is mainly a symbol of one's ethnic identity.

B. V. Aksyumov, Associate Professor of Stavropol State University, spoke in this key about the correlation between socio-economic and cultural-ideological prerequisites in the conflict situation in the North Caucasus. The Caucasian culture today acts as a kind of combination of traditionalism and Islam. These local cultural and civilizational differences, according to the scientist, can not become a direct source of conflict tension, but create the ground for its occurrence. In such an atmosphere, socio-economic reasons, problems with employment, etc. can become a catalyst for the outbreak of conflicts. According to B. V. Aksyumov, today the integration of the region into the all-Russian cultural and civilizational space is in great demand.

Director of the Center for Partnership of Civilizations at Moscow State University(U)expressed support for the idea of a dialogue between Christian and Muslim civilizationsMinistry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation V. V. Popov. Russia, where from time immemorial adherents of Islam and Christianity have lived together as part of a single state, can make a positive contribution to the cause of interfaith harmony and prevent the danger of a rift along civilizational lines, he noted.

Member of the Parliament of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Professor of the University of Tehran M. Sanaei expressed the opinion that in the dialogue of cultures, Islamic Iranian culture can emphasize common values. The roots of the dialogue of cultures can be traced not only in Western rationalism, but also in Eastern philosophies and religions. A complex form of dialogue at various levels, according to him, is represented in the teachings of Buddha, Zoroaster, Jesus, the Prophet of Islam and others before Leo Tolstoy and Gandhi. The Qur'an promises numerous gifts to all followers of monotheistic religions (Islam, Christianity, Judaism) and advises them to acquire the talent to hear each other, Sanai said. The events of September 11 and other terrorist attacks not only failed to force us to abandon the dialogue of cultures, but also proved that a person needs a constructive and constant dialogue of cultures, which helps to solve many problems, the scientist concluded.

A. F. Asadullin, Director of the Scientific and Educational Center "Al-Vasatyya", member of the Public Chamber of the Russian Federation, turned his research attention to the concept of knowledge in Islam in the context of the dialogue of cultures. The rich intellectual heritage of Islam, sometimes ignored or simply forgotten in the mass (especially in the Western) consciousness, today needs, on the one hand, an impulse of interest in it, and on the other, its popularization among Muslims themselves. They often reduce Islam only to a formal ceremonial religion. A. F. Asadullin concluded that the most promising position is that of Muslim intellectuals, who strive to harmoniously combine their faith with the world around them from the point of view of the freedom of choice of each individual, where reason, not violence, dominates. "There is no compulsion in religion "(2: 257) and" call to your Lord with a wise word and a good admonition " (15: 126), the speaker quoted lines from the holy Quran.

The director of the New York University Dialogue Center, Tunisian diplomat M. Tilili, reflected on the prospect of building a common Mediterranean space based on democratic values and interests shared by many people. The Mediterranean space, he said, is home to 475 million people. people: 272 million Europeans, including 20 million European Muslims, almost 200 million Arabs and 6 million Jews. Speaker

He noted that during the turbulent events of the "Arab Spring" that began, the masses in Tunisia and Egypt demolished their tyrants. He expressed the hope that, as they belong to the same Mediterranean family, they will reject extremism of any kind and continue to offer the Palestinians and Israelis a panacea. It has long been sought by both peoples; the dying old Arab order has failed to provide a solution.

V. V. Naumkin noted that the Middle East has entered an era of serious socio-political transformation. This process affects and will continue to affect the system of relations between various parts of the global globalizing civilization, including relations between the West and the Islamic world. The speaker called what is happening a new type of movement - the revolution of educated youth, caused primarily by social causes. The speaker rejected the emerging interpretations of the Middle East events in the Russian expert and media environment, imbued with the spirit of conspiracy. According to one of these conspiracy scenarios, they were inspired and even organized by some Western (primarily American) circles via the Internet (Facebook, Twitter, etc.), on the other - they are the work of Muslim fundamentalist forces. For some Russian conspiracy theorists, both theories have merged. Reality, on the contrary, suggests that the initiative of the protest from the Islamists (by the way, not united at all) in this case was intercepted by other players. The Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt (as it has already happened in Jordan, with its sister party Islah in Yemen and the Hamas movement in Palestine) in the near future, he stressed. V. Naumkin, they will certainly turn into a legal parliamentary party. In Russia, he noted, they are included in the" black list " of extremist organizations, which, of course, will complicate our interaction with the new Egyptian regime.

The violent events of the "Arab Spring", which are now taking place in a number of countries in the Middle East and North Africa, some called the Facebook revolution or Twitter revolution, said Zh. Sampaiyou (Portugal). However, they ignored the fact that social media is based on public trust, and technology only helps to consolidate this trust. The speaker urged to pay maximum attention to understanding the importance of modern social networks. These institutions, in his opinion, are designed to become pillars of trust and guarantors of political aspirations of societies on their way to a better future.

With the opinion of Zh. The sampaya was shared by a number of forum participants who devoted their speeches to the role of information flows, the impact of the "internetization" of life on the processes of modernization and transformation of different cultures and the removal of barriers between them. A. A. Serebryakov, Dean of Stavropol State University, emphasized that global news networks operating in a highly competitive environment attract maximum audiences in times of acute international crisis situations. The dependence on ratings determines their noticeable orientation to negative, "extreme" news. He complained that optimal, universal strategies for ensuring a global dialogue of cultures in such an information environment have not yet been proposed.

V. K. Mamontov, President of Izvestia newspaper Editorial Board, noted that the media have recently been playing an increasingly sinister role in acute events and are waging an information war in the interests of one side. He referred to the example of Libya, where, according to him, the fictional bombing of Benghazi became the reason for real bombings and attacks from the NATO air. M. Gaddafi lost first of all in the information war. In the same vein, speeches were made that linked space television with the potential for interference in the internal affairs of sovereign states, provoking interethnic and other conflicts in Asia and Africa.

M. B. Piotrovsky reflected bitterly on the misadventures of the great museums: the Iraqi Museum in Baghdad and the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. The first one was looted during the US army's invasion of Iraq in 2003. The second one was at the epicenter of the rallies that raged in Cairo's At-Tahrir Square in January 2011, and suffered from looters. Museums, M. B. Piotrovsky emphasized, are a kind of repository of the DNA of the nation and humanity, and they should be protected in every possible way from various excesses and dangers of an external or internal nature.

XI Likhachev readings were distinguished by a free discussion, a wide range of opinions, a fruitful discussion of the problems of the East, various aspects and trends of its development in the light of globalization. They became the most authoritative humanitarian social and scientific event in the country and were held in line with the tradition that the truth is most reliably obtained at the junction of sciences or scientific disciplines.

As Vladimir Putin noted in his address to the participants of the readings, this forum is an extraordinary and significant event in international scientific and cultural life. It is important that the theme of the readings always reflects the most urgent and acute problems, the main ones of which are the development of the dialogue of cultures and civilizations in the modern world, strengthening the spiritual and moral foundations of society.

The Humanities University of Trade Unions has already published two volumes of reading materials. The first of them contains reports of participants sent to the organizing committee in advance. The second section contains the texts of discussions that took place directly during the forum. All these materials are also available on the university's website www.lihachev.ru.

The next readings are scheduled for May 17-18, 2012. The XII Readings will continue the theme of the XI, and the organizing committee has already opened a new cycle for accepting applications for participation and texts of reports.

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