West European Intellectuals and Communism (1930-1956)

The West European Intellectuals of the Twentieth Century were considerably attracted by communism. The scientific discussion of the political engagement of communist minded intellectuals over a long period of time was dominated or strongly influenced by ethical issues. The historical "defeat" of communism opens up the possibility of regarding the engagement of the communist intellectuals from a more neutral, historical perspective. It becomes possible to investigate the sources and the forms of the communist engagement of West European intellectuals in its social, political, cultural, and, last but not least, national aspects in a way which is free of any political or ethical bias. The objective of the present project is to undertake such an investigation through a systematic comparison of those groups of intellectuals of France, Italy, Austria, Great Britain, and West Germany which joined the communist movement between 1930 and 1956. The comparative approach will make it possible to uncover in a systematic way the motives, objectives, and forms of the engagement of the communist intellectuals and thus to provide an answer to the following question: why did so many Western intellectuals come to identify themselves with communism to the point of joining the communist movement? The comparative research project will be pursued in close connection with Max Weber`s Weltbild-anaIysis: The above mentioned groups of communist intellectuals will be compared with regard to their political "images of the world", to the forms of their political engagement and to the corresponding fundamental generational experiences. From a methodological point of view, the project relies on a combination of several perspectives: the methods of the "Intellectual history," the concepts of the latest French socio-historical research of the intelligentsia, and the methods of collective biography. Under the framework of the Lise Meitner Postdoctoral Position it is planned to make an extensive analysis of the Austrian case, and based on that to integrate the Austrian case into the comparative framework of the project.