Fyodor Vasilyevich Konstantinov (; 21 February 1901 – 8 December 1991) was a

Soviet The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

philosopher Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...

and academician.

Career

Born in to a peasant family, he joined the

Red Army The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army, often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Republic and, from 1922, the Soviet Union. The army was established in January 1918 by a decree of the Council of People ...

after the

October Revolution The October Revolution, also known as the Great October Socialist Revolution (in Historiography in the Soviet Union, Soviet historiography), October coup, Bolshevik coup, or Bolshevik revolution, was the second of Russian Revolution, two r ...

and became a participant of the

Civil War A civil war is a war between organized groups within the same Sovereign state, state (or country). The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies.J ...

Siberia Siberia ( ; , ) is an extensive geographical region comprising all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has formed a part of the sovereign territory of Russia and its predecessor states ...

. After becoming a member of the Communist Party in 1918, he graduated from the

Institute of Red Professors The Institute of Red Professors of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) () was an institute of graduate-level education in the Marxist social sciences located in the Orthodox Convent of the Passion, Moscow. History It was founded in February 1 ...

in 1932 and earned his PhD in Philosophy in 1935. During his career he served as an academic secretary of the Institute of Philosophy of the

Communist Academy The Communist Academy (Russian: Коммунистическая академия, transliterated ''Kommunisticheskaya akademiya'') was a higher educational establishment and research institute based in Moscow. It included scientific institutes of ...

, Professor of Propaganda of the Central Committee, and deputy director of the Institute of Philosophy of the

Academy of Sciences of the Soviet Union The Academy of Sciences of the Soviet Union was the highest scientific institution of the Soviet Union from 1925 to 1991. It united the country's leading scientists and was subordinated directly to the Council of Ministers of the Soviet Union (un ...

. He was editor-in-chief of '' Problems of Philosophy'' (1952–54) and '' Кommunist'' (1958–62). He also acted as head of the Propaganda Department of the CC of the

CPSU The Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU),. Abbreviated in Russian as КПСС, ''KPSS''. at some points known as the Russian Communist Party (RCP), All-Union Communist Party and Bolshevik Party, and sometimes referred to as the Soviet ...

(Отделом пропаганды и агитации ЦК КПСС, 1955–58). He was a main author of the

historical materialism Historical materialism is Karl Marx's theory of history. Marx located historical change in the rise of Class society, class societies and the way humans labor together to make their livelihoods. Karl Marx stated that Productive forces, techno ...

(''Историч матери''ализм, 1951) and the ''Fundamentals of Marxist Philosophy'' (''Основы марксистской философии'', 1958), and chief editor of the ''Philosophical Encyclopedia'' (volumes 1–3, 1960–64). He served as director of the Institute of Philosophy of the Academy of Sciences of the Soviet Union (1962–67). He was the founder and president of the Philosophical Society of the USSR (Философского общества СССР, 1971).

References

1901 births 1991 deaths 20th-century Russian philosophers People from Arzamassky Uyezd Central Committee of the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union Full Members of the USSR Academy of Sciences Head of Propaganda Department of CPSU CC Institute of Red Professors alumni Recipients of the Order of Friendship of Peoples Recipients of the Order of Lenin Recipients of the Order of the Red Banner of Labour Recipients of the Order of the Red Star Academic journal editors Communist writers Soviet philosophers {{Philosopher-stub Burials in Troyekurovskoye Cemetery