CEU is Here to Stay

I remember so well how at the beginning of the 1990s, people that used to be kept in the darkness about social sciences and history, in an Eastern Europe where everything that has to do with humanities was corrupted by the propaganda dictatorships, were introduced to the generous concept of the open society through the academic initiatives generously supported by George Soros. 

Social sciences were following a deformed, primitive version of marxism that people that hardly were able to write or to read couldn't grasp anyway. Psychology was forbidden because it allowed to individuals to be aware of their particular character threats and think independently. Concepts as Feminism or History of Ideas were in principle subversive and practicing them or even owning a book on topics that threatened the uniformity imposed by the political regime was paid with years of prison.

In the first post-dictatorship years, the institutions created by George Soros in Eastern Europe, based mostly in Budapest, as Hungary was at the time considered a oasis of liberal thinking, produced the new elites of the new Europe. People from all over the corners of the former communist empire were meeting in Budapest to get acquainted with the ideas that were prevented from entering their home countries. From Georgia to Albania, Romania and Bulgaria or Moldova, the concepts of the Open Society were conquering the world of ideas. I've had the chance to count among my best intellectual friends people that got educated to CEU and that further were brave enough to return to their home countries to challenge the way of thinking in universities, creating NGOs and supporting the creating of democratic institutions. How successful those ideas were for the countries and how many of those enlightened people are still in their former positions is another story and topic for another post.

The old elites, feeling thretened, mostly perceived the fabrics of ideas created by George Soros as a 'toxic' and dangerous entreprise. People educated to CEU or to other Open Society Institutes were often labelled as 'traitors', 'Jews', 'individuals sold to the foreigners', 'Soros' puppets'. The anti-democratic media and mindsets were easily accusing those people who at least were able to articulate coherently concepts in more than one language, as elements that should not be trusted because they are not 'patriotic' and dedicated to the 'motherlands'.

Such opinions were often shared in Ukraine, Romania or Moldova, but countries with a promising democratic record, as Hungary, a country I've had the chance to know pretty well for personal and professional reasons, were following fold. And it was a sign of embracing backwardness...

Compared to many other communist countries, Hungary always kept an intellectual allure. Its communist elites were educated, with a deep ideological knowledge into materialism and Marxism in general and an intellectual opposition, both outside and in the country that after the tragic events of 1956 succeeded to gain the sympathy of the West. The aggressive voices of the traditionalist right were outperformed by the intellectual strength of their left or liberal politicians and elites.

Among those who benefited from the generosity of Soros Open Network, Orban Viktor and some of his close FiDeSz political circle were among the first. However, it was most convenient politically to play the retrograd game of anti-Soros, pro-rightist discourse and keep being in power. Orban Viktor's ugly metamorphosis didn't appear overnight and his rise to power was also encouraged by the lack of a corruption-free, pertinent leftist discourse. In a climate which turned more and more ostile towards free thinking, Jews (I've heard more than once stories about Jewish intellectuals harassed by members of the far right who were ringing the bells to their doors late in the middle of the night only because their 'non-Hungarian' names were spotted), liberals, journalists (other than those from the state-supported media), CEU was an easy target.

After years of struggle with the system, the university that creates elites for Central and Eastern Europe is moving to Vienna. In an Austria where a party with clear rightist sympathies is in power. 

Hungary has lost, Budapest elites have lost, Orban Viktor has lost, Central and Eastern Europe has lost. 

CEU was instrumental in the post-communist changes in this part of Europe and made history in the field of mentalities. For the long duration of history, Orban Viktor would probably will be an acolade of history, but Central European University will remain as a basic and fundamental source of change. After all, the fight was worth.

  

The Transformatory Power of Education: Educated, by Tara Westover

Education has the power to change and challenge human identity. Opens up the mind, put into questions family realities and truth, and invites you to think. Think freely.

Tara Westover entered a classroom for the first time in her life at 17 and since then she went to Harvard and got a PhD at Cambridge. She grew up in a complicated family, that refused to use the doctor's services and harbored a very extreme conspirationist view of the world. (However they used email). She did not have a birth certificate until 9 and had a very limited knowledge about the outside world. She taught herself algebra and successfully passed the exams necessary to enroll to college and despite the self-doubts and family pressure, she did not give up learning and getting herself an education.

'Everything I had worked for, all my years of study had been to purchase for myself this one privilege: to see and experience more truth that those given to me by my father, and to use those truths to construct my own mind'. And what a long way she went, as education means more than going through a comprehensive bibliography, but reclaiming her own story, her own identity and system of thoughts which meant also conquering her fears and coping with the extremely aggressive behavior of one of her brothers. The world of her family, which was an extreme interpretation of Mormonism, was dictated by the moods and erratic behavior of her father, and the individually strong yet prone to denial mother, a self-made herbalist and midwife with a booming business in their hometown Idaho. 

Building the reality she was deprived of, trying to cope with the permanent denial of the agressive behavior of her brother, 'Shawn' - a given name in the book -, the activation of family loyalties to reject the accusation of denial, the pressure Tara had to deal with were terrific and she almost collapsed under the psychological pressure. 'When life itself seems lunatic, who knows were madness lies?' An old world is broken into small little pieces and she shall start creating her new reality in order to cope with a world she doesn't know. This is the strength of education, to get you a freedom, but only after you were strong enough to break with the un-educated world. 

At the beginning, I've found the first part of the book, relating Tara's life and childhood a bit too descriptive and way to fluffy, but actually it made sense in correlation with the second part, but at the end of the story the details make sense as they clarify at a great extent the 'educated' story covering her struggle to create her own narrative. What for me it was fascinated, was how those people survived in their world always ready for the end of times, suffering of burns and serious car accidents and never going to the doctor for a proper treatment, yet being able to survive. 

Educated, by Tara Westover is a wise book about the devastating power of knowledge and its strength that it gives to courageous people. There is no other way back. 

Rating: 4 stars

Disclaimer: Book offered by the publisher in exchange for an honest review

Is Nationalism Still a Solution?

In the last decade, also due to the explosion of social media, the identity politics are more visible and vocal than ever. But was it any different or it is only the power of the media which outlines the rapid and sometimes aggressive changes focused on the national redesigned and reinterpreted values and the exclusion of the other? He hear and read not with pleasure about Orban Viktor and the German AfD, but at what extent it is possible to separate the new from the old nationalist elements from the public discourse?

I personally think that there are always some old layers of mentality concept which lay the basis for new interpretations and evaluations, which are circumstantial and possibly in a decade or two becoming the basis for a new conceptual shift. I avoid to hurry up and say if it is good or not to have such identity politics present into the public discourse, but there are obviously some clear limits about what the public discourse should reject as part of the identity politics. For instance, the insistence of AfD politicians in minimizing the Holocaust or the increasing presence of statues of the pro-Nazi Admiral Horthy during the repeated governments headed by Orban Viktor shall be definitely rejected.

John B. Judis is relatively rapidly overviewing the last century of nationalism and the relative failures of creating and enforcing of a European identity which goes beyond the economic and social advantages as well as the current populist outburst in the time of Trump's America. One of the conclusions is that the revival of nationalism is a move forward from the 'illusions and excesses of globalization'. In his opinion, the 'challenge that will determine the future over the reminder of this century' is a 'new international order' that 'acknowledges and doesn't sidestep or discount historic nationalist sentiments'. 

At a certain extent, it is an easy to reach conclusion because, obviously, nationalism is alive and kicking all over the world, but not necessarily as a reaction to globalization. The Russian nationalism always had a global approach, for instance, and elements of the Polish nationalist discourse reiterates elements which historically are at least 2 centuries old. The Austrian nationalism deserves a study in itself and was completely ignored by the author. The Scottish nationalism - also not mentioned - is going through a new stage, with a European - global - approach a couple of steps ahead of the isolationist Brexit mindset. 

The book uses a minimal theoretical apparatus and is jumping too fast to the conclusion, which is nevertheless vague and non-involving. 

I completely agree that there is necessary a most serious consideration of the nationalist/identity policies, including a revision of the theoretical approach, but it should be done with more consideration for details and elaborated explanations. Otherwise, I am completely interested to figure out more discussions and details both based on events and elaborated new and old theories.

Rating: 3 stars

Disclaimer: Book offered by the publisher in exchange for an honest review

Gender Gap in Academia

You don't need to browse too many studies and advanced researches to realize that from the very beginning, single mothers start they academic life with a significant disadvantage compared to their male counterparts. Regardless how generous their home country social system is, a single woman will always cope with disadvantages and discrimination, and keeping the pace with the other colleagues - male especially, is a ride which starts from a disadvantageous perspective from the very first start. When it comes to academia, the struggle is getting even more complicated, for reasons that I will further explain.

In order to keep yourself from drowning in the academic world, you need to become obsessed with published articles in academic publications, teach as many classes as possible and also add every year a couple of conferences to your portfolio. Reading the latest academic results in your domain of activity and also writing moderately - but firmly - fast your next book is also a priority. Nowadays also social media and shaping your voice as an academic influencer matters. As the official - state - funding of an university is always scarce, applying for grants and always being aware of various financial opportunities is important. Add to this also applying for different scholarships and residences which may diversify the contacts, knowledge and academic opportunities.

However, when you are a single mother, balancing those exhausting activities that keep you late at night and wake you early in the day, are competing with the priority of keeping your child feed, clean, ready for school, perfectly fit to become an independent adult, healthy, but also entertained. When kids are screaming happily in your house playing the Indians, how can you easily focus on your next teaching plan or edit your chapter? And besides your health, you need money and insurances paid in time and many other bills to be paid. Indeed, also people with high qualifications and education might do once in a while the mistake of dealing emotionally with jerks. 

What happens often in such stressful situations is that the academic single mother might decide to take a break from academia, do one or two or even three jobs more rewarding financially and not necessarily within your academic field - but someone who is overqualified academically can easily adapt to the competitive business domain as well. Time is passing, you write less and read the latest reports from your field even less. Not time for conferences or other academic gatherings, as you don't have time to go to library or afford to spend one night reading. 

In the next 2-3 years there is no new title and new activity added to your academic CV. Sooner, you see how former colleagues are getting tenures and publishing new books, and you are happy with your stable world, where bills are paid and your child is happy, but sadly, you feel like you wasted your talents and chances only because it might happen to be in the wrong relationship. 

Of course that there is not always happening so tragically and it could be that you are energetic and ambitious enough to keep yourself on the swimming line of academia, although juggling with other jobs - this writer here, is an example. But at the end of the day, you will feel at least 10 times more worn out than your relaxed colleague which is only unhappy that the editing of the last chapter didn't turn out as expected.

Things are made this way and the system is created in a way which does not offer too much generosity to the outbreakers and people which cope with some special - sometimes at the limit of survival - situations. At the end of the day, you simply might feel guilty that you made once that wrong choice and now you have to pay not only with your time, money and health, but also with your career. 

It is not easy and coaching and support for those women who are fighting hard not only to survive, but also to outperform, is not easy. But it is doable and it is worth every single effort. Also, to prove that at the end of the day a life dedicated to the world of mind can succeed over adversities, be it social or gender-based. 

Movie Review: Luther

Financially supported by the Lutheran foundation based in the USA Thrivent Financial for Lutherans, this movie is both an official view on Luther as well as creates and enforces a founding German national myth.

It is directed by the Canadian film director Eric Till, which one year before this movie directed a production about the German resistance hero Bonhoeffer and admirably played by a selected list of actors, among which the impersonation of Luther, Joseph Fiennes, stands out as excellent. The movie was produced in 2003, more than 10 years before the 500 years of Reformation celebrated in Germany the last year. 

As a historical and religious character, Luther is both fascinating and controversial. He dared to fight against the powerful and deeply corrupt at the time Catholic Church, as well as created a German language-centered tradition and encouraged the spread of books and writings through the printing press. But he was as well highly controversial due to his strong anti-Semitism which was rarely brought into discussion during the 500 Years Reformation and it lacks as a critical approach of his life and works at his museum in Lutherstadt Wittenberg that I visited a couple of years ago. The movie do not tackle upon this issue at all, but at a certain moment it shows a Luther devastated that his writings created civil unrest leading to at least 100,000 deaths. However, the anti-Semitic tone of his writings is genuine and not the result of academic/theological interpretations. 

The Luther from the movie is going through pschotic episodes, of long solitude fights against the temptations of Evil, followed by serene moments of clarity. He looks like the tormented Romantic soul which cannot stand the corrupt system of the Catholic church and suffers deaply for the corruption of faith. Without the benefit of the strong support of a world institution, he dares to go on and defies the big power although at least at the beginning he was fighting mostly alone, if not the solidarity of the academic fellows from the theological university in Wittenberg.

The widespread use of the printing press and his courageous decision to translate the 'New Testament' in German, increased his credentials among the German nobles who will end up supporting him against the intrusions of Rome - particularly in the Catholic strongholds of Augsburg or Worms. 

Luther the movie has many strong images and a relatively simple, dichotomic structure - He versus Them. It is rich in symbols and meanings though that make it relevant for the student of the history of mentalities and with an interest in critical analysis of national and religious myths. 

Academic Book Review: Marriage and Fatherhood in the Nazi SS, by Amy Carney

Based on unique documents from the archives of the SS, Amy Carney succeeded to create a comperehensive overview of the lineage families within the Nazi elites, mostly focused on controlled parenting and a complex genetical selection for professional assignments. After 1933, 'only a person who descended from a superior racial lineage would have the hereditary credentials to join the SS', part of the larger race-based policy developed at different levels of the German society.

It profiled not only the SS as a racial elite - with the genetic lineage the main element evaluating the worth of a person and his or her place within the hierarchy - but created the model for the entire German 'Volk' as well. 'Himmler tasked each SS man with the responsibility of fathering a racially healthy family; the duty was repeatedly emphasized in commands, rhetorics, and policy'. With a clear distinction of the roles within the family and the mission to provide to the society at least to two children per family, with the corresponding financial state-supported measures, those elites were already in place at the end of the war and the model survived at certain extent in the post-war Germany. 

Carney is mostly focused on the analytical overview of the policies during the Nazi times, with an explanatory approach which doesn't leave too much space for a critical and comparative approach on the sources. Given the novelty and extent of the information, which will extensively influence the content of similar approaches regarding the elites during that those times, the study is mostly self-contained and explores the material. There will be the duty of further academic studies to diversify the approach and create the theoretical models and support theories in this respect.

Rating: 4 stars

Disclaimer: Book offered by the publisher in exchange for an honest review   

The Secrets of Cold War: Our Germans. Project Paperclip and the National Security State

In the last years, while studying and being involved in various projects about the Cold War, I got familiar with the fact that scientists and intellectuals with a tainted far-right past were willingly integrated into the Western intelligence aparatus for the sake of countering the Soviets. It doesn't mean that the other part of the 'War' was not doing the same, while accusing the 'capitalist world' of using former Nazis and their local variants from Central and Eastern Europe for ideological purposes. 

A clear case in this respect was East Germany which made a big ideological line of accusing the West Germany for re-cycling various Nazis, based on documents generously offered by the Soviets and their affiliate spies. After the Cold War was over and Germany reunified, the wonder was that the 'Nazi-clean' East was in fact as infestated as the West. 

The recently open Spy Museum in Berlin is documenting extensively the intelligence continuity between the old and new Germany(s), with long interviews with experts in security studies about who and how the transfer was done, a what extent and how the public opinion was, at least for a while, kept in jeopardy about the process. The thing is - and the post-dictatorship transitions in countries like Iraq, for instance, is another proof in this respect - that it is almost impossible to create new, democratic institutions from scratch, without using the institutional knowledge of some of the elites previously involved in the previous political processes. The question is at what extent and how you can avoid the ideological continuity.

Our Germans. Project Paperclip and National Security State is extensively documenting aspects not very well known academically, about top Nazi scientists, some of them with a clear role into the extermination policies that were smoothly brought to the USA for being part of the military planning during the Cold War. One of the most famous names is aerospace engineer Wernher von Braun who used to play an important scientific role at the Peenemünde complex in Germany, where slave labour was used intensively, and willingly lent further his knowledge to the Americans for setting up the basis for the aeronautical industry and the space race. The research by Brian E. Crim is based on newly declasified documents from the Department of Defense, FBI and the State Department. 

'American military officers and employers were all too willing to excuse, minimize, and eventually fabricate the Paperclippers' backgrounds to expedite their travel and ensure long-term exploitation within the US'. If once in a while there were news in the last decade about former Nazi guardians and people involved in killing 6 million Jews, is because those people were let to enter the USA and eventually received the American citizenship, in a time when the Jews that just escaped Auschwitz and other concentration camps were kept at bay because of the infamous quotas. According to the book, around 15,000 scientists and technicians - plus their families - benefited from this project and its successor programs. 

At a great extent, those scientists contributed to the configuration of a certain anti-Soviet position, in line with the Nazi ideology and further shaped policies during the Cold War in this respect. Not few of them were offered their services to Moscow too, which used them for a while, but let them go after. The role of biographies is very important in this research and it should be an important element of tracing various policies and personalities from this period of time. When their missions were accomplished, some ex-Nazis - at least institutionally - were lent to other part of the world affected by the policies of the game of influences: in Argentina, by the Americans, or in Syria or other Arab countries, by the Soviets - if they were not already there from the end of the war. 

This book enables without offering an answer, to the relationship between science and politics, starting with the way in which willingly or for 'amoral opportunism' brilliant minds served policies of muss-murder. 'Nazi science enables the worst attrocities committed by the Third Reich. Scientists and engineers, even those with few party affiliations or minimal ideological commitment, willingly lent their talents to the regime in exchange for professional advancement and the opportunity to continue their research with limitless funding or institutional support'. 

The competition to acquire German scientiests was apparntly not only an American and Soviet priority, but French and British intelligence agents also kidnapped once in a while some of them, keen to cover the scientific gap and use their knowledge for the sake of the 'new world'.

Our Germans...is an outstanding research that hopefully will be followed by other similar academic inquiries. The Cold War is over and right now it doesn't matter that much who gonna win. Investigating, based on documents and testimonies, its policies and directions, from an academic perspective will create a new level of accountability but also can offer some lessons learned about how far you can/must get for ideological purposes. It is about time that more academics are getting involved in such serious recent history researches. 

Rating: 5 stars

Disclaimer: Book offered by the publisher in exchange for an honest review