The Belarusian Radical National Project: Late 1980s – First Half of the 1990s (Zianon Pazniak’s Concept)

On March 17, 2010, at 18:00, the next meeting of the regular research seminar of the Political Sphere Institute will take place in the CSI courtyard.

Topic of the presentation: “The Belarusian Radical National Project: Late 1980s – First Half of the 1990s (Zianon Pazniak’s Concept)”.

Speaker: Siarhei Bohdan.

All interested persons are invited.

For additional information about the venue, please contact [email protected] (https://palityka.org/2010/03/2009/12/16-snezhnya-2009-krytyka-belaruskaj-palitychnaj-analityki-ch-2/[email protected])
Presentation theses:
1.

The radicalization of the national movement in the late 1980s and the creation of the BPF.

The ideological evolution of the BPF.
– Pazniak’s personality and its influence on the formation of the ideology of the national movement.
– Sarmatism as a spiritual tradition and its influence on Pazniak’s ideological preferences.
2.

The motif of “awakening the nation” and anti-colonialism in Z.

Pazniak’s ideology.
– Attitude toward the USSR.

Anti-communism and anti-socialism: global and local aspects.

The legacy of Leninism in Pazniak’s texts.
– Vision of Belarusian history: from the BPR to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.

Demonization of Russia and a positive view of Poland.
– Attitude toward the BSSR, denial of any value to it in the absence of a real alternative.
– “Denationalization” as a disease of the nation. “Revival” and “national revolution”, the origins and evolution of these concepts.
3.

The question of independence.

Views on the political system of an independent country, the vision of independent Belarus, and a program of action.
– Democracy and reservations about its flaws.
– General vision of Belarus’s prospects.
4.

Language and linguocentrism
– Chernobyl, its instrumentalization and the rapid forgetting of the topic.
– Demagogy, conspiracy thinking, and populism.

Images of enemies and danger.
– Religion, its instrumental and politicized vision.

The project of reviving the Uniate Church.
5.

The economy, the question of the market.

The question of the comparative importance of economic, cultural, and political issues.
6.

The influence of the radical national project on the country’s political transformation.

Autonomy from society.

The non-Belarusian context and its strong influence on ideology; attitude toward Western support.