HUMANITIES AND KNOWLEDGE: PHILOSOPHY, LITERATURE AND LANGUAGE ECOLOGICAL CIVILIZATION: UTOPIA OR THE FUTURE WORLD?* M.T. Stepanyants Main researcher Institute of Philosophy Russian Academy of Sciences Volhonka str., 14/1-5, Moscow, Russia, 119992 The construction of the ecological civilization is a task which could be solved by the contribution on behalf of the peoples representing different cultures. <...> Plurality of axiological orientation makes culture multidimensional, dialogical, allows the latter to transform itself, moving to the periphery that was yesterday dominant in the culture and putting forward that what responds to the needs and demands of the new times. <...> Any utopia, as inversion of an existing society transformed by the author's imagination, not only foretells but also diagnoses the need for the correction of a social order. <...> It opens up new possibilities, offers options for changes. <...> For Daniel Andreev, the Rose of the World is a flower each petal of which is an image of the great world religions and cultures. <...> The construction of ecological civilization is similar to the scheme of growing the ‘Rose of the World’ since the two projects could be brought in the life only by collective efforts. <...> Yet, it is imperative to exert efforts to work out common approaches to the issues which determine the fate of mankind. <...> This urgency results from the actuality: the humanity is truly going on through the processes of globalization and hence there is a certain category of pheno* The paper was submitted to the Second Conference of World Cultural Forum (Taihu, China) — Strengthen International Cooperation to Build an Ecological Civilization (Hangzhou, China, 18th—19th May, 2013) which the author was not able to attend. 6 Stepanyants M.T. Ecological civilization: utopia or the future world? mena that requires worldwide participation. <...> They demand for their solutions collective efforts, which can be undertaken only if certain values are commonly accepted. <...> The construction of the ecological civilization is a task which could be solved only by the contribution on behalf of the peoples representing different cultures. <...> At the first phase, associated with polytheism, human beings were not conscious of Nature as something distinct from them and did not contrast themselves with it. <...> The people had to enter the age of the metropolis in order to experience a longing <...>