Universities Behind The Iron Curtain
By REGINALD PECK
THE ancient ideal of a university as a universitas litterarum has not always been perfectly realised in the western lands that gave it birth. But the concept was for cen- turies at least not abandoned, and shortcomings were for the most part eventually made good. Yet all of this has now changed in those European countries which, though still geographically western, belong in their intellectual and cultural life, as in their political and social structure, to what is now called the eastern bloc. In Europe east of the Elbe the process is now virtually complete of turning universities that for centuries nurtured the common civilisation of the west into something like factories for mass-producing the specialised State functionaries and technicians required by what are pleased to call themselves " peoples' democracies."
Most of the countries concerned are too far behind the Iron Curtain for the " new type " universities, as they are officially called, to be studied in detail by western observers. But through the unclosed window of Berlin it is still possible to see at relatively close range what is happening in eastern Germany. The changes that have been introduced into the universities of Leipzig, Dresden, Halle and the rest are based on Soviet ideology and practice and are everywhere evident— in the social class and character of the staff and students, in the studies authorised or imposed and in the methods of teaching.
The sons and daughters of the old titled or landed or property-owning classes have disappeared from the univer- sities, as their parents have done from the world outside. If any of them are left at all in eastern Germany they are work- ing as domestic servants or as minor employees in such few privately-owned business undertakings as remain. University- going in the German " Democratic Republic " is now intended to be the prerogative of the sons and daughters of peasants and miners and factory-workers—of the " progressive working- classes." But as currently applied to the universities, this phrase leaves room for the inclusion of others besides the agricultural and industrial proletariat to whom it was originally limited.
The fact is that the children of the peasants and industrial workers show no great desire to leave the callings of theif parents and obey the party summons to study their way into the ranks of the " working intelligentsia." To main- tain the target output of functionaries (they are budgeted for in the five year plan like pig-iron or potatoes) an ordinance was therefore issued last year permitting an extension of the " working-class " qualification to selected members of the bourgeois class. Those might be accepted who had worked for at least two years in mines or factories—who could be regarded without too much loss of pgrty face as "working-class " in practice if not by birth. Defined in this way, the " working- classes " make up some seventy per cent. of the student mem- bership of east German universities.
The modification by the State of its original standards brings a double advantage to the pseudo-worker-students. Besides permitting them to enter the university, it enables them to qualify for the " basic state scholarship " of 180 marks a month (say fifteen pounds) without which none of them could live. Even so they have to pass strict intelligence tests, and are therefore less privileged than the " workers by birth " for whom the only qualification is class-origin and political record. If the one is genuinely proletarian and the other " progressive " (meaning that the candidate is an active member of the blue- shirt youth movement), then academic qualifications are entirely disregarded. That the remaining thirty per cent. of the students are undisguised members of the middle classes is further evidence of the fact that eastern Germany is not yet in a position to push the " sovietisation " of its universities to the planned extreme. But middle-class origin disqualifies from receiving the " basic state scholarship," and leaves open only the possi- bility of earning one of the 130-mark scholarships awarded for outstanding academic -achievement.
A middle-class student who was one of my principal informants is able to cover his expenses only by working at night in a steel-rolling mill. Even so, he can rarely afford an adequate meal. The rent of his furnished (with bed, table and chair) room takes thirty marks a month, and a pound of unrationed butter would—if he bought it at fourteen marks— cost over ten per cent. of his monthly: scholarship. He des- cribed his daily routine. He spends between six and eight hours at compulsory lectures and seminars, eats a meal and does some private reading and then goes to his heavy labour- ing work in the steel-mill until four in the morning. From about five to nine he sleeps—" I had to learn to manage with very little sleep "—and then the day begins again.
This programme commenced last September, and he expects to have to keep it up without a break except for ordinary public holidays until June. This unbroken ten-month term is the newest Communist device for " bringing the norms of intellectual workers into line with those of industry." But the --'new system was planned by men with little knowledge of academic work and is unlikely to survive its introductory year. Obedient as they are to the orders of the party, the teaching staff of the university of Rostock have nevertheless addressed a letter to the authorities complaining that " since the intro- duction of the new system signs of fatigue and lassitude have multiplied and the number of students reporting sick is rising rapidly."
Sovietisation " of the work of the east German universities has meant in the first place the compulsory addition to the syllabus of every faculty of what the Communists call—with their genius for exploiting the natural tendency of their lan- guage to evolve • long words—gesellschaftswissenschaftliche studies. The massive adjective is poorly translated by the English " social-scientific,' but its meaning is made clear by explanatory notes in the university regulations. Gesellschafts- wissenschaftliche studies are described as " MarxiSt-Leninist dialectical materialism." This turns out to mean in practice, as east German students report, the study of the life of Stalin and the history of. the Bolshevik Party. Extracts from the works of Marx and Lenin are included, but' they are selected and edited in accordance with the needs and-purposes of the present regime. The pure doctrine of the fathers has ceased to be considered suitable for general consumption.
Dialectical materialism is usually regarded in the West as a subject of considerable compldxity, but east German students who have completed the gesellschaftswissenschaftliche pre- liminary to their other work say that it is reduced to such simple terms, and presented with such skill and cogency, as to be all but irresistible _in its appeal to minds that have never been allowed contact with the outside world. East German universities have been " cleansed " of idealist philosophy, and idealists from Plato to Kant have been condemned as decadent and bourgeois. And so it is in every faculty. If western thought cannot be dispensed with—as in the natural sciences— then it is attributed to Lomonossov or some other suitable Russian. An east German student of biology need never have heard of Lamarck by name, nor a- young physicist of Faraday, nor a budding doctor of Lister. To further this dependence on Soviet sources, the Russian language has been made compulsory in every faculty except theology—a subject in which the Russians are less interested in demonstrating their supremacy. To complete the process of " sovietisation" a dose of gesellschaftswissenschaftliche teaching is included in every lecture on every subject. The first ten minutes are always spent discussing and interpreting news of the day. This means in practice_ that the lecturer lays down the party line on any- thing from the latest Russian or Allied Note to " bacterio- logical warfare." And the lecture itself will also be given a twist. If the subject is the architecture of ancient Greece, a Marxist-Leninist analysis of the Greek social system will be included.
It is hard to say what proportion of those students who are western, or at least open-minded, when they enter the universities retain their outlook to the end of three or four years of this " processing." On being asked for an estimate, one student replied, " No one who was not a Communist would dare to say so outside the smallest circle of trusted friends, and most of the time we avoid the subject altogether." The students have good reason for their reticence. The West Berlin " Committee on East German Universities " has drawn up a list of 350 east German students and professors who have disappeared since the end of the war. An extract taken at random from the list reads as follows: t` Bail, Franz. Born 1926; Student of classical philology at the University of Rostock; arrested October 6, 1950; sentenced to 25 years. Member of Christian-Democratic Party."
Introductory notes explain that the subsequent fate of many of tk missing students (of both sexes) is uncertain, but that the majority are known to have been arrested by either the Russian or east German security police and sentenced to anything up to twenty-five years' imprisonment for " sabotage against democratic reconstruction." The elastic term " permit- ting action against anyone displeasing to the party " was used until 1950 without any kind of legal justification, but in that year it was incorporated into the notorious " law for the protection of peace." Under this statute any of the students who described to westerners the true state of affairs in their universities could be given long sentences, but a handful of them refuse to be intimidated. One of them said: " Active resistance is impossible at present, but by talking outside I manage to keep straight with my conscience."
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