Home – Home – Jornals – "Philosophy of Education" 2014 number 5

In the article the phenomenon of ressentiment in the modern social space and the education system as its component is analyzed. The psychological and socio-historical causes and effects of ressentiment are determined. The aspects of modern educational structure promoting spreading of this phenomenon within educational space are revealed. The conditions which exclude the ressentiment-provoking factors are emphasized. The definition of ressentiment given by F. Nietzsche is constructed on a metaphor of opposition of aristocratic morals and the morals of ressentiment, which is a peculiar form of resistance to the psychological discomfort caused by the awareness of one’s own weakness. According to F. Nietzsche, the phenomenon of ressentiment is a manifestation of «will to power» of the «low-class» person. The factor, which sets ressentiment onto a social orbit, is the status economic success. In the new-European society it plays a role of a social ideal. According to M. Scheler, the environment for the formation of ressentiment moods becomes favorable, if everyone has a right to compare him/herself with everyone; the formal democracy aggravates the situation, and ressentiment is fixed as a social phenomenon. In the classical modern system education there are both an external ideal for aspirations (the successful pupil), competition (the bad - good pupil) and equality of rights. There arises a direction of consciousness, which is driven by the desire to surpass the reality as a phase. Thus, the substantive goals appear as “intermediate stations” on the road to a “larger significance”. Such aspiration to signify more than others becomes a steady breeding ground for the development and establishment of ressentiment. In this context, good grades become the main goal in education, whereas knowledge, an accompanying goal in the best case. The progressivist side of the ressentiment morals is considered by M. Scheler as “an overturn in the eternal order of the material ethics of values”. F. Nietzsche calls it «falsification of the value tables». The Gestalt approach assumes that ressentiment does not arise when the «bad-good», «better-worse» comparisons are not used. It is obvious that only on one’s own basis it is possible to build one’s future; it is impossible to construct it on somebody else’s one, though more «profound». Also it is impossible to create reality on the ressentiment basis, which is fictional, made up. M. N. Malinkin, Pak Cher-Ung consider that it is necessary to regard ressentiment as a subject for sociological researches in the field of epistemic-logical approaches and the action theory for weakening the reasons that provoke it, for attenuation of its consequences, which is topical and important for modern education.