Alex Kozulin. Psychology in Utopia: Toward a Social History of Soviet Psychology. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1984. x + 173 pp. $17.50 (cloth) (Reviewed by James V. Wertsch)
- Publisher
- John Wiley and Sons
- Year
- 1985
- Tongue
- English
- Weight
- 142 KB
- Volume
- 21
- Category
- Article
- ISSN
- 0022-5061
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
✦ Synopsis
Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1984. x + 173 pp. $17.50 (cloth) (Reviewed by James V. Wertsch) Every Western college student who has taken introductory psychology knows that Ivan Pavlov was one of the founders of this discipline. For some reason, however, these students, as well as most professional psychologists in the West, seldom go much beyond this in their knowledge of Russian or Soviet psychology. They seem to assume that the work of Pavlov and his followers comprises everything there is to know about psychology in the Soviet Union. This view has not been entirely inaccurate during certain periods of Soviet history (especially the late 1940s and early 1950s). However, a moment's reflection suggests that this must be an overly simplified image in the long run. The USSR, after all, is a very large and diverse society that has benefited from many cultural and intellectual traditions. The centralization that has characterized scientific disciplines in that country should not be assumed to guarantee that all Soviet psychologists subscribe to a single, "party-line" view. That they do not is immediately obvious to anyone who has witnessed the heated arguments among them. Nevertheless, the abiding American tradition of viewing all things Soviet as part of a static, monolithic society has had a powerful influence on our understanding of psychology in that country.
Alex Kozulin's book, Psychology in Utopia, is perhaps the best antidote we have to date against this simple-minded view. Kozulin has managed to point out the diversity in psychology in the USSR while presenting a coherent picture of its development. In so doing, he debunks, one by one, many of the beliefs Westerners hold about Soviet psychology.
As a Soviet tmigrt and a former insider, Kozulin has an advantage in making his case over both his Western colleagues and Soviet psychologists who have written about the history of their discipline,' for he has seen things not accessible to Western scholars, and his view is quite different from anything publicly stated in the USSR. Kozulin's perspective, together with his obvious strengths as a scholar, makes this volume unique.
The major accomplishment of this work is that it provides a clear picture of the complex people and schools that have contributed to the history of Soviet psychology. Because scholars from this discipline in the USSR are usually known to us only through their translated writings and our stereotypic preconceptions, they are all too often thought of as lifeless figures who mechanically hew to a single, party-line view. At several points in his analysis, Kozulin successfully brings these scholars to life. For example, his comparative account of Vladimir Bekhterev and Pavlov will be fascinating and very informative to Western readers. His comments about the role of Russian chauvinism in the canonization of Pavlov are particularly useful in this connection.
Kozulin manages to put a face on several other figures as well. In providing an account of the person and the ideas of lesser known figures such as Nikolai Bernstein and Pave1 Blonsky as well as major figures such as Lev Vygotsky and Aleksei Leont'ev, he has presented a picture of Soviet psychology that is different from any other available.
Kozulin has enhanced his biographical sketches by depicting major figures in their social and political milieus. His comments on utopia are particularly interesting in this regard. Although one gets the impression that Kozulin's use of this term is occasionally tongue-in-cheek, if not downright sarcastic, the utopian ideal is of great importance when 227