Modern concepts of humanism

The paper presents the main trends of discourse on contemporary humanism. The principles of classical humanism were focused on the human being. Various concepts of contemporary humanism express one common feature: refusal from the anthropocentric orientation of classical humanism. New humanism is concerned with the search of an adequate place of the human being in nature. Various interpretations of recent humanism can fit (in a certain extent) into a conceptual frame which includes the following main concepts: technocratic humanism (L. Mamford), communitarian humanism (R. Garodi), democratic humanism (P. Moor), ecological humanism (R. Park), etc. Technocratic humanism creates an alternative to traditional humanism by evaluating the human being as a structural element included in the social process in an auxiliary function. According to E. Fromm, new humanism is possible only when the society of the future is built on humanized technology. Humanist communitarianism requires humanization of planning, consumption, values. An alternative, created by R. Garodi, is concerned with the formation of humanist relations between people on the base of computerization of administration which leads to humanization of production. Representatives of structuralist anthropology support the idea of universal humanism in the form of building a common humankind house. Universal humanism does not exist in the form of ready decisions of human problems, it is rather the aim of anthropology, a crucial life experiment, psychological readiness to accept the Other and to understand the Other through rethinking of the Self. Theorists of academic humanism support the idea of the dual existence of human being: natural and human. This dualism creates the philosophy of new humanism as an alternative to the traditional philosophical naturalism of classical humanism. Search of new humanism creates a variety of alternatives: anthropological doubt (K. Levi-Strauss); conformity to symbolic laws (J. Lacan); episteme or discursive formations (M. Foucault). Profound structures replace the traditional historical structures; unconsciousness replaces consciousness; language replaces the subject. Some theorists define the new stage of humanism as the Renaissance of humanism. K. Levi-Strauss rejected transcendental humanism. He classifies three historical stages of humanism: i) humanism of late Middle Ages and early Renaissance; ii) humanism at the time of Enlightenment; iii) democratic humanism in modern times. Democratic humanism presents an alternative to the previous stages of humanism, because democratic humanism is not humanism for the elite, but for people and, broader, for the humankind. New humanism is oriented against the egoism and egocentric orientation of a civilized human being.

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