Progress as a Worldview Maxim: the European Journey of 1870—1873 in the Intellectual Biography of M. Drahomanov
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.15407/uhj2025.04.141Keywords:
M. Drahomanov, intellectual biography, positivism, cosmopolitanism, humanism, concepts of social progress, modernisation, centralism, decentralism, federalism, literary autonomism, Ukrainianness, Old (Stara) Hromada, Europe, Switzerland, Zurich.Abstract
The aim is to highlight and analyse the scholarly, political, cultural, and social influences, circumstances, and course of M. Drahomanov’s travels in light of his formation as an intellectual.
The research methodology is based on a combination of analytical, comparative, and typological strategies with a representation of M. Drahomanov as a historian, public figure, and political thinker. The study is constructed as both a combination and a nuanced interweaving of several angles and dimensions of M. Drahomanov’s intellectual biography. The main conflicts of his journey in 1870—1873 are explored. The concept of progress in M. Drahomanov’s thought and his vision of reforming / modernising the Russian Empire are analysed. His interest in local self-governance and provincial literatures in France, Germany, Italy, and Austria-Hungary is examined. It is shown that M. Drahomanov’s concept of progress emerged in the spirit of cultural patterns of positivism, particularly the ideas of late-Enlightenment rationalism, cosmopolitanism, and humanism.
Scholarly novelty. It is established that M. Drahomanov’s vision of reforming the Russian Empire was based on his concept of progress as a social, cultural, and political evolution. This vision entailed political liberalisation, state decentralisation, the organisation of local self-government, fair judiciary, and public education based on the best European models.
Conclusions. M. Drahomanov’s journey led to important worldview and intellectual shifts, as well as an awareness of a potential turn in his life path — political emigration from the Russian Empire. It is noted that M. Drahomanov’s political conceptualisation accumulated various visions, including those of A. Herzen, P.-J. Proudhon, A. de Tocqueville, É. de Laboulaye, and others. It is argued that M. Drahomanov’s European reflections contributed significantly to the formation of his ideal of state structure, best embodied by the model of Swiss federalism, and to a lesser extent by the constitutional systems of the British Empire and the USA.
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