CULTURAL AND HISTORICAL IDENTITY IN THE NORTH CAUCASUS IN THE CONTEXT OF PAST AND PRESENT

The purpose of this article is to clarify the possibilities of bringing a single conceptual basis under the historical (retrospective) and current (perspective) analysis of the problems of cultural and historical identity of the peoples of the North Caucasus. This implies a shift in focus from the search for the "principle of order" – features of primordial and stable socio-cultural identity, inevitably closed by the horizon of traditional culture, to the search for the "principle of development" – specific mechanisms of socio-cultural dynamics (changes, transformations), embodying the interaction of endogenous and exogenous development factors that mutually connect the past, present and future in the North Caucasian cultural and historical process.