President Vladimir Putin has made internet history by becoming the first Russian leader to take part in a live forum on the worldwide web . Following his historic webcast from the Kremlin on March 6 , 2001 , how well do we know Russia ' s leader , Vladimir Putin ?

“ President Putin represents the views of the younger generation of Russians who deal with post -communist reality with a healthy ambition to return to our long -standing traditions of excellence in academia , science , arts , literature , music and the army” says Yevgeni , a 23 old Muscovite . He adds : “We are looking to add to this list guaranteed human rights and a strong economy . Mr Putin , like most Russians , is weary of being haunted by communism fears maintained by the West . His priorities lie with the peaceful , prosperous and dignified future of Russian people .”

Another Russian Drazenka Kovrlija , in U .S .A . says : “Putin knows that dictatorship time is over , it would not work in Russia or in Europe anymore . His mission is to protect democratic rights of every Russian , control the country 's crime and make all of us believe in Russia again . He is the man of discipline . I believe he would do it .” But Richard , an American , has a different view when he claims : No one person can be the "saviour " of Russia or anyplace else . Mr . Putin is young and energetic and that works in his favor . But the fact that he finds redeeming features in Russia 's communist past is disturbing . Communism killed millions of Russians and its neighbors , and poisoned relations with neighboring nations for generations .
Yet , because it appears that no one can yet pronounce a final word about him , the question still arises : Is Putin a man of the past or a man of the future ? Does he belong to the Communist leadership or to a Democratic leadership ? Will he bring a peace to the world or is his Russian nationalism a treat to world peace ? Some hails him as the answer to Russian problems , while the others look at him with reserved suspicion . One says this the others say that about his leadership character . But what do we really know about him at this point . Can we state an objective conclusion about his character and leadership ? No , that remains unanswered , unresolved issue . The Western observers may have an objective description of him . But can we say about him a final word without listening to Russians who understand their history from their experience . What we have to do is listening from each other whether it represents one’s subjective perspective or objective view .

As we have seen our previous discussions , the dichotomy of subjective and objective knowledge is nonsense . Since Descartes , the Western culture has been dominated by the idea of a kind of knowledge that cannot be doubted . The unquestionable certainties of mathematics were to provide the paradigm of real knowledge . This has resulted in the kind of epistemology that claims for the knowledge that is totally impersonal, that involves no commitment on the part of the knower. Yet, knowing demands personal commitment.

And this is what our illustration above reflects. Note how knowing is reflected as personal commitment when the Russian young man Yevgeni employs this expression , “We are looking to add to this list guaranteed human rights and a strong economy ,” and the other Russian Drazenka Kovrlija says , “I believe he would do it .” With them , knowing involves subjectivity . In contrast to this view , Richard from America concentrates on the objective fact when he states , “But the fact that he finds redeeming features in Russia 's communist past is disturbing .” Thus , with him knowing is more a matter of objectivity .

In this dichotomy of subjectivity and objectivity , the fundamental issue is epistemological : It is the question about how we can come to know the truth , how we can know what is real . What Lesslie Newbigin observes is the breakdown of the connection between the objective and the subjective poles of our knowing . All knowing is an accomplishment of the knower ; it requires and involves a personal commitment to the enterprise of trying to know and to understand . It has an essential subjective pole . But equally it has an objective pole . It “latches on” to some reality outside the knower . Otherwise it is not knowing at all . Its grasp may be limited and faulty , but nevertheless it is a grasping at something that is there , objectively .

To the casual observer , Shalbourne looks like any other rural commuter village in England . But the mixture of professionals and more traditional agriculture - oriented population are , like other rural villages , facing a common problem . Among the pretty thatched cottages , the slew of warning signs reveal that Shalbourne is in the shadow of foot - and - mouth disease .

Although the disease has not been found in the village , Shalbourne is less than two miles from Stype , the site of a confirmed case of foot - and - mouth , and falls within the " exclusion zone ". One family living within this zone rendered housebound for a week , because of a suspected case of foot - and - mouth . Mrs Dedden , a teacher , says , " Nothing is allowed to leave or enter . We can ' t even post letters , that is how severe it is . ” Villagers were unable to worship as the local church , near fields containing livestock , was closed after the outbreak ( BBC 15 March, 2001) .

The Food -and -mouth is a highly infectious viral disease that may even be transmitted through dust particles in the air and can prove fatal in pigs , cattle sheep and goats . Infected animals ' hooves and mouths become blistered causing lameness , increased salivation and loss of appetite . They rapidly lose weight and produce less milk . The unhappy reality is that people have accumulated knowledge to grow cattle fast only to slaughter and destroy them .

Bacon said , “Knowledge is power .” But after accumulating knowledge for farming science for hundred years , the problem of food -and -mouth disease is ignorance . Calling on the farmer’s support to stamp out the virus , a British government official admitted , that it was still not known how much latent infection existed and where exactly it was . "We don 't know which sheep are incubating the disease ," he said . Facing the outbreak , scientists keep silent . They argue : Culling out is the only solution . But still guarantees of future immunity do not and cannot exist . The proud human kinds with all the achievements of genetic technology are now engaging in the war on the invisible frontiers .

Facing the crisis of the food -and -mouth is to face the limit of the scope of knowing by scientific observation . Healthy animals are culled out because there is no way to distinguish healthy animals from infected ones with mathematical precision . In the age of information , the information to protect health cattle is absent . A Scottish farmer has spoken of the " heart wrenching " prospect of having to cull his entire flock of sheep to combat foot - and - mouth . In this case , the seed of tragedy is the ignorance , the lack of knowledge to discern healthy from infected cattle . The myth of the omniscience of science has been shattered .

An Example of Ethnic Division

The Macedonian government says its latest offensive against ethnic-Albanian rebels in the north of the country is over, although "mopping up operations" are continuing. Since Macedonians voted for independence in 1991, their new state's external stability has been gradually strengthened as Skopje has overcome the hostility and suspicions of its neighbors. But internal security remains at times precarious in the face of what are often tense inter-ethnic relations between the Macedonian Slav majority and the ethnic Albanian minority. Macedonia is a country made of two peoples who are barely speaking to each other. While the Macedonians are Orthodox Slavs, kith and kin of the Serbs, the Albanians are mainly Muslim. (March 24, 2001)

Macedonia came through the Kosovo crisis better than expected, accommodating hundreds of thousands of ethnic Albanian refugees without upsetting the delicate ethnic balance in the country.
Macedonian Slavs say that Albanians are treated as equals, and they point to the fact that ethnic Albanian representatives have some of the top jobs in government. But radical ethnic Albanians claim that their community is continuing to suffer discrimination in a whole range of areas - from access to public service jobs to education in their own language (BBC 27 February, 2001). Thus, in Macedonia, it is the ethnic difference that is responsible to the divide of the nation.