Where Eastern European intellectuals sit today

The House of the Arts Encouragement Company in St Petersburg Photo: DmitriyGuryanov (CC) Commons.wikimedia.org

Even though he was consistent in his rebellion, the ten-year-old Cosimo never stopped studying and continued his lessons after more or less one month break. His teacher, despite having radical Jacobin views, was not the brightest star in the sky. Thus, it was self-education that awoke a hunger for knowledge in the rebel boy. Living in the tree also did not stop Cosimo from being with people. He would be with them from a different position, watching them through their windows, accompanying them in their meals, gatherings or religious ceremonies. And when they were outside, he chatted with them, exchanged objects, even commanded them in battles – all without leaving his treetop home.

Leader in crisis

Cosimo came from an impoverished aristocratic family, one that had no means of influence, money or authority that would allow its members to have a real impact on the course of events. Yet despite its fading position the family did not fully vanish. This was probably for two reasons. First, the old tradition was then reaching its end. Second, as the Cosimo family stayed out of the spotlight it was less noticed when other aristocratic families were being murdered by guillotines.

Nonetheless Cosimo kept a distance from his family, and thus stayed independent. He bought his own books; he was one with an open mind and could afford to live in a tree, in close proximity to a village beside the sea. Cosimo made his living by hunting, working on farms and advising peasants on modernisation. In crisis situations, he took command, using his authority to lead the community through difficulties like fires, the Napoleonic wars, confrontations with new political trends, or fights with smugglers and thieves. Yet once a crisis was over, he would resign his leadership. Cosimo’s noble family background certainly helped him get the right education and respect from others. However, the true prestige he gained over time came from his superb reasoning skills, his judgement, and his satisfaction with life as well as the never-ending expansion of knowledge. It was the wonderful, confident and innocent knowledge of the Enlightenment period – the epoch that believed in a better world.             

Cosimo’s example clearly shows that cultural, social and economic (base) capital, which enables our access to education, make a nice inheritance. The further development of these assets is yet the responsibility of the individual. In today’s changing economy where many of the old methods no longer apply, minimum support at the starting line still helps. Thus, I was quite amazed when someone said that without inheriting an apartment, it is nearly impossible to pursue an artistic profession, since all your energy goes towards paying off the mortgage. I heard these words in Eastern Europe, around the year 2000. They were uttered in a discussion with a group of well-educated artists.

Adherers to the French Revolution

Some 200 years earlier, in the 19th century, Eastern Europe’s intelligentsia emerged from a class of dramatically impoverished landowners (a few from the clergy as well).  Even though there were some exceptions already in the 19th century, the truth is that it was only after the Second World War when people with different class and cultural backgrounds could start holding public functions.

In the 19th century, as a result of civilisational changes which forced major reforms (e.g. the abolition of serfdom), landowners could no longer live off their land with unpaid and forced peasant labour. Thus, they entered the “free professions” and became civil servants, administrators, doctors, and lawyers. The Jews also joined these professions, but a bit later. Women were excluded from this process for a long time; however, in the 1840s George Sand’s writings sparked interest in women’s emancipation in the Russian Empire.

At that time the Eastern European intelligentsia was interested in the grand ideals of the Enlightenment: freedom, equality and brotherhood. Thereby its members were adherents to the French Revolution and sought change. In the Russian Empire these ideas turned into state modernisation policies which were implemented after Russia lost the Crimean war in 1856 and the rise to power of Tsar Alexander II. In the following years, the process of forming local communities and self-education movements by Russian intelligentsia happened at such a fast pace that it could not be stopped, neither by Alexander III’s restrictions nor Nicolas II’s flippancy.

The Russian intelligentsia, with great devotion, was then not only looking for new models of social life but also trying to destabilise the society which, it felt, could not fulfil their needs. It organised underground parties, networks and assassinations. It negotiated with neighbouring states and fought for a better future. It was also involved in extensive reading and writing activities. It is the legacy of its members that today determines our understanding of that epoch. As a matter of fact their plans to implement change were helped by subsequent wars: the Russo-Japanese war, the First World War, and finally the 1917 revolution where the Bolsheviks took power.

The latter, however, managed to destroy all centres of rebellion. This included the intelligentsia and old revolutionaries. As a result, the former landowners either emigrated or were murdered; at the very least they were degraded. Their social place was taken over by new groups which, after the Second World War, also included the “technical intelligentsia”. Characteristically, this latter group had to think critically when it was introducing new functional solutions. There is quite a difference, however, when you compare it with the Soviet humanists who could only reproduce Stalin’s social and political ideas.

Dreaming of blue jeans

Less than half a century later Soviet dissidents, protesting against human rights violations, were sent to the Gulag, locked up in psychiatric institutions, or exiled from the USSR. Their protests were better known in the West than in their own country. For sure, it was their works that shaped opinion about the Soviet Union around the world – even though they received very little support from their own state. At that time, the Soviet society was secretly dreaming of blue jeans and was less interested in the Gulag or Stalinist repressions.

As history has already shown, the Soviet Union, deeply stuck in its dogmas, did not adequately react to the changing reality. It collapsed. In the meantime, a group of intellectuals who were not dissidents started to emerge out of its ruins. After the demise of the Soviet Union, the dissidents faced a new situation. Their freedom of expression was no longer limited. For the first time, they had a chance to publically express their ideas and also could implement some of them and make wider social alliances.

Unfortunately, these new intellectuals failed at appealing to the wider public. As a group, they were a very diverse bunch, presenting a whole spectrum of political ideas. Among them were liberals, nationalists, democrats, imperialists and others. However between then and now, few Russian intellectuals have become involved in politics. The only names that spring to mind are Gleb Pavolvsky and Aleksandr Dugin, whose ideas are nonetheless far from being free of controversy. They are also in opposition to those intellectuals who defend values like democracy or human rights. Members of the latter group certainly have been developing their own original ideas, researching deep causes of interdependencies, subordination and violence, yet they still need time to emerge and, for the moment, are known in rather small circles. 

Public intellectuals vs experts

What is the role of public intellectuals in the post-Soviet states today? Are they reforming the institutions they have inherited from the Soviet Union? Let us take the example of Ukraine, where in November 2018 the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences celebrated 100 years of existence.  Illustratively, this institution is also directed by 100-year-old Borys Paton. However, it would not be fair to limit the picture of Ukrainian science to this obsolete organisation. There are other academic institutions in Ukraine that are more modern and have become a training ground for the country’s elite. Here the leading positions belong to the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy and the Catholic University in Lviv. The majority of the activists who occupied Ukraine’s ministry of culture and ministry of education during the 2013-2014 Revolution of Dignity were affiliated with these two academic institutions, convinced that 23 years after the collapse of the Soviet Union these ministries were doing more harm than good. The protesters argued that change is not a one-time event but a process which requires permanent engagement and monitoring.      

Today in Eastern Europe, the word “public intellectual” is commonly used. In Ukraine and in Russia it is often used in the titles of books, meetings and essays. An intellectual means more than a teacher or an academic. It is someone who leads change. Yet questions remain: are the opinions of intellectuals something more than thought-provoking conversations within a very small circle of discussants? What is the real power of public intellectuals in Eastern Europe today? These questions, of course, exclude the ideas of devil-like minds that act against the public’s interest.

Based on the post-war model, a public intellectual is someone who dictates trends. It is someone who speaks from a position of being well-informed, including areas that he or she is not an expert in. As a result, they talk more to the public than with the public. In so doing, public intellectuals inspire others to act. Today, in a world where it is much easier to access knowledge than at any time before, we can ask whether public intellectuals can even claim they know better than anyone else. Indicatively in media discourse the term “expert” is now used more often than “public intellectual”. Being an expert also suggests knowledge of a rather narrow field. However experts today acquire their positions and recognition thanks to the media. Recognition by other experts is no longer as important as it was. Times have changed and the hierarchies that had constructed academic circles and determined who is an intellectual have also been tarnished.

Room for public intellectuals

Do intellectuals have greater knowledge of the world affairs because they read more and have a deeper insight into the history of culture? This is one of the questions we need to ask in a reality that changes dynamically and has recently seen the simultaneous emancipation of so many different groups. Thanks to post-colonialism we have indeed increased our sensitivity to different ways of thinking. This makes the present a very different situation than the 19th century, when the Eastern European intelligentsia was postulating change mainly because it felt responsible for social justice it contributed to when it had benefited from the unpaid peasants work.

Today’s intelligentsia from this region co-creates networks of international institutions and has opened doors to new solutions. At the same time, the range of civic awareness is much wider, while the pubic readiness to delegate symbolic leadership, something that public intellectuals want to pursue, is much smaller. However this does not mean there is no more room for intellectuals with convincing ideas. One such thinker is, for example, Timothy Snyder. This historian of Eastern Europe, in the face of challenges resulting from Russia’s aggression and the unpredictable behaviour of the current US president, suggests simple steps of how to prevent a return of the non-democratic tendencies of the 1930s. This includes getting to know your neighbour, supporting grassroots activism, reacting to violence, verifying facts and information, expressing your own opinion, taking part in elections and local politics, and, of course, actively protesting when necessary. Indeed, this is a recipe for all of us, not only today’s public intellectuals. If public intellectuals can shape opinions more than anyone else, they need to have good arguments. Had Cosimo not climbed the tree, giving up a part of his social capital, he would not have become famous or would have lost his ability to confront his knowledge. But what is there today to climb up?

Translated by Iwona Reichardt

Zofia Bluszcz lives in Eastern Europe. She is published in numerous periodicals, including Czas Literatury, Czas Kultury, Kultura Enter and Nowa Europa Wschodnia.

Eastern Europe, Public intellectual