Centers of Education in Russia:
The Case for CASEs

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Like any presentation during the Soviet era, Popova’s talk contained a detailed list of facts: 66 conferences convened since the Voronezh CASE had been established three years ago; 33 books had been published; 500 copies of each book had been printed and distributed. But unlike the Soviet era, there was an openness and enthusiasm about Popova’s presentation, which focused on a rethinking of the Russian identity.

“We analyze our modern culture at the same time that it is changing,” Popova explained to the group. “We see our CASE in terms of the metaphor of a bridge. We understand where we are now but we don’t know what lies on the other side of the divide. We hope the scholars and students in the colloquiums and in their research will create a bridge to that other side,” she added hopefully.

When she finished, she asked for questions, “In the American style,” as she put it, “so we can have a discussion.” This was not a phrase tossed out for the benefit of her foundation audience. Popova had told me at the restaurant that she has changed her teaching style and that she is urging others in the university to do the same.

She said, “In Russia, what we’ve always done is lecture our students. You stand up in front of them for hours and tell them what to think. When they take exams, our tradition has been to have the students give back to you exactly what you’ve told them. Now, instead, I ask my students to analyze and think. For many of them, that’s something new.”

This kind of interactive educational process, challenging students and demanding dissent and debate, is
part of the revolution in the humanities that the Corporation and others are hoping will help to transform Russia’s university system. “My sense,” Deana Arsenian said to me, “is that none of the scholars from these centers are invited to Western conferences on the basis of their scholarship. Can the CASEs change that?” she wondered aloud. “I’ve no doubt CASEs will improve the scholarship in the country and within the universities, but I don’t know whether that will push the institutions to elevate the social sciences to world level,” she concluded.

And how effective radically re-engineering the way teachers of history, social studies and philosophy—so long steeped in the ideology of the Soviet system—will be, may not be known for years. Many factors mitigate against success: in some universities, for example, the average age of a professor is in the mid-60s. Products of Soviet ideology and scholarship, it’s unlikely these individuals will change their thinking or their methods. The promise of new ideas and innovative thought and teaching won’t surface for at least a decade when the young scholars, professors and leaders begin to dominate the intellectual life of Russia.

But almost five years since the Corporation began to study what could be done in higher education in the former Soviet Union, and three years since the establishment of the first three CASEs, there are results. In this article, I will not attempt to evaluate the level of scholarship being generated—that’s not my expertise—but I can report that as I traveled from once CASE to another, I heard, in the conversations and perspectives of the young intellectuals who are part of the centers, a great hunger for change. And in many of the young researchers and professors, I saw the kinds of attitudes and ideas common among ambitious young American scholars who are seeking to stand out among their peers, who are passionate about their field of research and quick to criticize programs that don’t quite work as promised.

Conversations in Moscow
On a Sunday afternoon, as darkness crept up early on the capital city, five young Moscovites, chosen as part of the community of 300 CASE fellows, joined me for tea in the lobby of one of Moscow’s new plush hotels that serve the burgeoning business class. They were mostly in their 20s, focused, intellectually aggressive and demanding: they showed up with as many questions as insights into the program.

“The regional head of my program is very hierarchical and really not open to new discussions. He is set in his ways and seems to have attitudes about young researchers from the capital,” Tatiana Pisheva, a political psychology student at Moscow State University told me about her contact at Saratov State University, a regional CASE we would travel to the next day. She echoed an attitude one might expect from an American Ivy League Ph.D. speaking about a less-than-stellar Midwestern university in the U.S., and one shared by both the CASE fellows I met here and later, in St. Petersburg.

Despite Pisheva’s reservations, connecting scholars, particularly those in the provinces outside Moscow and St. Petersburg—which have traditionally been the centers of intellectual thought in Russia—has always been one of the critical concerns underpinning CASEs, as has academic mobility, which stalled after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Financial support for regional universities also dried up. At the moment when the ideological noose around the humanities and social sciences was unknotted, and innovation and intellectual debate were most needed, entrepreneurship had replaced higher education as Russia’s leading value. Chaos rather than continuity was the hallmark of the 1990s. The fear among all the partners in CASEs was that one of the greatest strengths of Russia—its intellectual life—would be lost.

The students who joined me and the Corporation team for tea were some of Russia’s intellectual elite who saw their competitively won CASE fellowships as both financial support and a resume builder. As a group, they shared ambition, intensity and few illusions about their country or their future.

“I’ve had good cooperation with my Saratov colleague,” said Alexander Techoudinov, a historian, and, at 42, the oldest of the group. His fellow historian at the Saratov CASE, he said, was also very Western-minded. “We wrote and edited some papers together,” he explained.

Such publications are a plus for a young professor who is building a name for himself and who wants to help rewrite Russia’s history books. “It’s my goal to break the old stereotypes of historical memory,” he said. “Today, the textbooks are written by old-fashioned people and people who were not specialists in their disciplines. They don’t know enough about the world.” Quiet, studious, and clearly dedicated, he went on to say, “Changing and guiding the minds of young people—that is enormously difficult. It’s hard enough to change one mind, but to do it on a mass scale…” his voice trailed off. He wasn’t promising to change the minds and memories of Russia’s young people in one generation—he was just willing to try.

The younger women who joined us at tea were more impetuous, more in a hurry, more anxious to be part of the political swirl of Moscow. “The fellowship is very important for my Ph.D. It’s prestigious and gives me financial and intellectual support,” said Natalia Shelekasova, a lively and ambitious 31-year-old who, in addition to her academic pursuits, was working for members of the Duma, Russia’s principal legislative body, who hire young researchers and consultants like Shelekasova to carry out public opinion analysis for their election campaigns.

Because of her responsibilities, Shelekasova had no time to travel to CASE conferences outside Moscow, but Pisheva, her research partner thought the regional experience important for their joint work. “You need to understand public opinion outside Moscow,” she said.

Throughout the afternoon, the scholars’ conversation wandered through the pros and cons of academic mobility and interaction; they voiced complaints about voucher payments, confusion about what their stipend covered, and had many other questions about how their fellowship support was playing out. But Andrei Kortunov, the director of the CASE program who listened for most of the two-hour discussion, was offering no compromises on the basic notion behind the CASE fellowships. “They are meant to benefit the young scholars, yes,” he said. “But first and foremost, we must use our Moscow-based researchers to enhance the CASEs in the provinces,” he told the group without equivocation. These scholars, privileged in their Moscow positions, were not getting coddled by Kortunov. He was letting them know that they had a social compact with the larger Russian academic community. They were part of the Carnegie Corporation program because of what they could share with regional scholars. Social compacts—the responsibility to share with society, not simply advance oneself—is a theme close to Kortunov’s heart.

I watched the interaction between Kortunov and these young scholars and except for the halting English and need for translation from time to time, the setting could have been Cambridge, or Princeton or New Haven. Smart, focused, determined, opinionated and exciting, these young scholars were part of an international community of students who are anxious to influence the wider world. They are not ideologues. They are not captives of their past. They are infused with the power of ideas.

As the teacups emptied, I couldn’t help but ask one more question of this energetic group. I asked each where they wanted to be and what they wanted to do in ten years, but long-term plans were not something these products of the years of upheaval in Russia were comfortable depending on. “We can’t look that far ahead,” said Natasha Anokhina, another political scientist at Moscow State University. All five scholars did indicate, however, that in the future, they wanted a public leadership role, financial security and no connection with the concept of being an “idealist.” Once a respected notion in intellectual circles, in Russia, it is now a word with a taint. “We’re all optimistic,” Shelekasova interjected. “We believe we have a good life in Russia and certainly, a better one than before. But an idealist today, in Russia, is a foolish person. We are realists.”

Remembering my first trip to the Soviet Union at the end of the 1970s and the propaganda machine that saturated public life and political dialogue then—and continued to do so until the Soviet Union’s recent collapse—I wondered aloud where these young scholars had found their belief in the freedom of ideas. “In books,” the historian Techoudinov told me. No one disagreed.

The Ministry of Education:
a Welcome Partner
As a reporter who had known Russia in the days when it was ruled by rigid Soviet ideology, I had originally thought it ironic that one of the Corporation’s main partners in the CASEs program was the Russian Ministry of Education, which in the past had promulgated only “official” information in state-authorized textbooks. But Deana Arsenian, who was educated in Moscow before her family emigrated to the United States, and who worked in Russia during the Soviet days and in the period of transition to democracy, believes that the success of CASEs depends on an effective working relationship with the Ministry—not simply because the government’s educational leadership can open doors and reinforce the scholarship strategies the Corporation is promoting, but because the Ministry and the country have every reason to want the goals articulated by the CASEs mandate to be achieved.“What the Ministry wants is the CASE-produced research to lead to a new, strengthened and Westernized curriculum,” Arsenian said. “The CASEs are a way to create reform.”

Russia’s educational system has always been rigorous and demanding. And while it had its shortcomings—the same educational opportunities were not available to every student and examinations often determined a young person’s ability to continue on for future study—education was highly valued in Soviet society and university study was a widely offered and fully-paid-for option. Since the transition to democracy, education has been overshadowed by other national concerns and Russia’s educational standing in the industrial world has slid downwards, a position that Russian leadership finds unacceptable. “Emerging as a global player is a top goal for the Ministry,” Arsenian explained to me with the certainty that the CASEs can play a key role in the emerging new Russian culture.

Next page: Connecting scholars—particularly those outside Moscow and St. Petersburg—has always been one of the critical concerns underpinning CASEs

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