Patriotism. Very Brief History of the Idea

Abstract

The article reveals the concept of patriotism and suggests a very brief history of its idea. First, we consider what was meant by patriotism in Antiquity, Ancient Rome (what terms were used to indicate love for fatherland), in the late Middle Ages, in the Renaissance, in the New Ages and up to the French Revolution. The typology of “patriotism” (tribal, local, national, state, class, corporate patriotism) is given, as well as a comparative analysis of patriotism and nationalism, their distinctive characteristics are named in the article. In particular, it is argued that patriotism is a much older phenomenon than nationalism. The article describes how prominent social and political thinkers talked about patriotism – the Stoics, Cicero, Machiavelli, Hobbes, Rousseau, and the American Founding Fathers, in particular Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln. Particular attention is paid to Russian thinkers, whose focus was patriotism. Thus, we are talking about Tolstoy, who considered patriotism a “religion of slaves” and opposed it to true Christianity. Other Russian philosophers were more careful in their statements, distinguishing true and false, useful and harmful patriotism (Berdyaev, Ilyin, Florovsky, and N.S. Trubetskoy, Ustryalov). In addition, the article briefly examines how Lenin and Stalin understood patriotism in a “class sense”.