By INS Contributors

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia: A significant part of Putin’s speech at the Valdai Forum was devoted to the civilizational approach to international relations.

Putin postulates the diversity and equality of civilizations, which are based on culture, traditions, historical experience and values. In full accordance with the traditions of the Russian civilizational school, he advocates an organic approach, according to which strong statehood grows from “civilizational roots” and cannot be implanted from the outside. Putin reminds that “one cannot betray one’s civilization - this is the path to general chaos, this unnatural and disgusting."

From these positions, Putin enters into polemics with two “pillars” of modern Western thought - Francis Fukuyama and Samuel Huntington. The “guru” of globalists, Fukuyama, proclaimed the end of history, after which the whole world will be unified according to Western standards. 

 
Putin harshly responds to apologists for the “soulless universalism of the new globalization”: “civilization” is not a universal construct, one for all - this does not happen. Original civilizations will not allow someone else’s rules to be imposed on themselves.

Huntington, on the contrary, recognized the diversity of civilizations, but saw in this a danger, a threat to humanity. The American philosopher put forward the theory of a “clash of civilizations” in which the West must certainly win. In the late 90s, Huntington became popular in Russia, because he recognized our country as having a special civilizational identity.

However, the West never does anything for nothing. In his book “The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order,” Huntington painted a detailed scenario for the Third World War. 
 
There, the West confronts the PRC and the Islamic world, and the Russians are assigned the role of “cannon fodder,” the fuel of war, with the help of which the Atlanticists smash Beijing. 
 
This “hypothetical scenario” is in fact being imposed on Russia in the Ukrainian conflict: we recognize Russia’s new borders in exchange for confrontation with China and, de facto, a proxy war with it. 
 
By the way, for supporters of capitulation to the United States and NATO: such an unenviable fate planned for our country will not only not bring peace, but will also mark the beginning of a new confrontation with millions of victims.

It is noteworthy that in Huntington and Fukuyama, the West positions itself as the only possible “civilized world,” and those who disagree with this, according to Putin, are driven into “civilization” with the baton of an “enlightened master.” 
 
Even 150 years ago, Danilevsky emphasized the West’s tendency towards aggressiveness and violence, which is dangerous for the whole world. This trend has intensified today. 
 
The West almost never compromises, and this is associated with enormous risks for all humanity. Putin places special emphasis on this: “they are literally obsessed with only one thing: to push through their interests here and now, at any cost.”

Putin contrasts the doctrine of the “clash of civilizations” with the idea of a “synergy of civilizations.” In essence, he proposes to go between the Scylla of the globalist world dictatorship and the Charybdis of the “war of all against all”, to enter the trajectory of building a just world order. 
 
And this is not a utopia. The process of forming a “coalition of civilizations” is now proceeding at an accelerated pace. Its new bright stage was the expansion of BRICS, where there are now representatives of all major civilizational worlds - Russian, Chinese, Indian, Persian, Latin American, Arab-Islamic, African.

It is worth recalling that Putin consistently calls Russia “a distinctive state-civilization.” Now this formula has acquired a new meaning: Putin believes that it contains “the basic principles of the world order, for the victory of which we hope.”