Discourse of Politics and Paradoxes of Its Study (Dushenko K.V. “Russophobia” among Other Phobias and Manias: From the History of Political Language. M.: INION, 2024)

The published work represents a reflection on Konstantin Dushenko’s monograph, devoted to the analysis of a range of concepts that in one way or another refer to political “phobias”. After documenting the indisputable advantages of the book, the author focuses on the problem of the description language that is different from the language of politics. He sees this problem in the fact that social science studies, including political science studies, unlike, for example, natural science studies, cannot afford to completely distance themselves from the material being described, since otherwise what is being described will most likely turn into a figment of a researcher’s imagination rather than the true phenomenon. However, if the language of politics and the language of its description are not separated, the description ceases to be scientific, becoming a political act that increases, rather than decreases, the volume of what is to be studied. The critical review convincingly demonstrates that Dushenko has managed to successfully navigate his narrative between Scylla and Charybdis, and examines the tools that allowed him to cope with this task.