Comparisons of Russia with the “West” have been a staple of historians and of contemporary observers for a very long time, and no end is in sight. A recent appraisal of Soviet developments in the decade after the death of Stalin was devoted in part to a consideration of the prospects for “a gradual convergence of the social and/or political systems of the West and the Soviet Union.” The variety of the contributors’ responses—“ very likely,” “necessarily uncertain,” “unlikely any meaningful convergence,” “highly improbable,” “depends on what is meant by ‘gradual’ “—suggests an ample range of disagreement, both in expectations for the future and in the characterization of the contrasts underlying these expectations.

The old French adage comparaison n'est pas raison indicates that comparison (contrast, too, for that matter) is never made for its own sake but only to lead to some conclusion. That is why the habit of comparing, or contrasting, the history of one country with that of another (or several others) gives rise to such vexing problems and generates such intense passions—and in turn feeds on them. We are dealing here not only with a “scientific” problem, whose solution would be an acquired truth, but with the attitudes of the participants and spectators of historical events as well. Unlike the scholar who is supposed to search only for truth, social and political thinkers and litterateurs engage in comparative analysis and reasoning in order to indulge whatever lies closest to their hearts at a given moment. In his paper Mr. Roberts has concentrated on the problems facing the scholar-scientist. His scientific similes and epistemological caveats are therefore neither mere literary embellishments nor a challenge to C. P. Snow's dichotomized view of the contemporary intellectual but quite deliberate and telling evidence that his main preoccupation is to clarify the methodological issues involved. In this very essential and laudable enterprise he has cut away much of the underbrush that all too often obscures comparative analysis and politically (or culturally or religiously) motivated contrasts. But in so doing he has perhaps allowed himself to lose sight of the reasons that made the question of Russia's relationship to the West an issue of such momentous concern for generations of Russians as well as Europeans—and now for Americans too. By taking up the discussion from the questions of method which Mr. Roberts has elucidated so well, we may be able to come to grips with the problem of attitudes and clarify a bit more the nature of the specific comparative issue with which we are concerned.

Professor Roberts’ study is an impressive methodological achievement. The more one meditates on it, the less one finds to disagree with. The task of this writer is rather a frustrating one, for how can one bring new points of view to supplement such a thorough treatment?

Professor Roberts pointed out that the future of the dilemma under study will hardly be dominated by the issue “Russia versus the West,“ for it will be overshadowed by more powerful factors which have dominated the life of both the West and Russia since the beginning of our century (Russia up to 1917!). I would be tempted as a historian to go one step further, and question our ability to see, or consciously to shape, the future. First of all, many new factors may appear. Second, we do not know the relationship and proportional weight of factors that will continue from the present into the future. So I would eschew the consideration of the future altogether.

I suspect that my commentators were overly indulgent with my methodological preoccupations—all egg crate and no eggs—but I am pleased that my piece should have elicited their own interesting observations on the theme. Taking advantage of their forbearance I shall limit my comments to just a few reflections on the points they have raised.

The question “Did Peter the Great exert a beneficial or a harmful influence upon the development of Russian history and culture?” is one that has provoked debate ever since that monarch ruled Russia in the first quarter of the eighteenth century. The varied answers to that question set up the general battle lines between Westernizers and Slavophiles during the first half of the nineteenth century. One of Russia's most critical intellectuals in that period, Peter Iakovlevich Chaadaev, answered the question in several ways. His answers provide a key to a peculiar kind of ideological westernization in Russian intellectual history. The discovery of hitherto unpublished source materials that fill an important gap in the documentation of Chaadaev's views on Peter the Great led to the writing of this article.

From even before the time of Peter the Great, and down to the present day, Russia has had a tradition of active state participation in manufacturing and extractive industry. However, both the nature and extent of governmental activity has varied greatly in different periods. The purpose of this essay is to determine what place government policy during the twenty-one-year term of Count Egor Kankrin as minister of finance (1823-44) has in this long-standing “mercantilist” tradition. Both Kankrin and Nicholas I, who usually followed Kankrin's advice on economic policy, were unquestionably conservative in matters of political and social policy, but there is no necessary connection between the political views of Russian rulers and their attitude toward industrial development. Men as different in political outlook as Peter the Great, Witte, and Stalin all favored vigorous state action of one sort or another to promote industrial development, but none of them were political liberals.

Historians have differed in their evaluation of the nationality problem in the Habsburg Empire, but they have generally agreed that the Military Border maintained along the southern boundaries of Hungary and Croatia constituted a traditional element of dynastic strength. “There arose,” Oscar Jászi wrote, “a proverbial Habsburg patriotism, perhaps the only real one which the Habsburgs were capable of fomenting in their realm.“ The dissolution of the Military Border in Croatia-Slavonia, which took place soon after the celebrated Ausgleich of 1867, has been considered a serious blow to the military posture and the stability of the monarchy. Yet such appraisals need a critical reassessment. After the middle of the nineteenth century, South Slav national tendencies profoundly altered; and the Border became a blunted and much less “reliable” instrument of imperial policy.

Practically every single work of the young Dostoevsky may be interpreted as what Jules Janin called a parodie sérieuse. What the young Dostoevsky seems to be doing is essentially the following: He presents a romantic or sentimental theme, but with the characters and setting of the natural'naia shkola, and seeks to find a form that would fit such a synthesis. As a result, his heroes are “miscast,” that is, they have to play roles for which they are not fit. The timid, middle-aged, baldish Devushkin in Poor Folk is cast in the role of a sentimental lover; the thoroughly prosaic, “ordinary,” trivial Goliadkin in The Double develops a Doppelgänger complex; the semiliterate, brutish miser Prokharchin in the story “Mr. Prokharchin” comes to stand for the idea of supreme individualism—and so on.

Prior to World War II, Hungary had no written constitution. The Arany Bulla (Golden Bull) in 1222, the Pragmatica Sanctio in 1723, and the Compromise of 1867 were considered basic laws, because they regulated the relations between the king and the “nation” (i.e., the nobility) and contained certain safeguards against tyrannical (arbitrary) government. Before the Compromise, justice was administered by the local (county) government for all inhabitants without state-wide supervision, except for the serfs who were subject to their landlords. The Compromise of 1867, which created a constitutional dual monarchy for Austria and Hungary, was the outgrowth of the revolution of 1848. The immediate results of this revolution were the emancipation of the serfs and the establishment of the Ministry of Justice. Law No. IV of 1869 unified the judicial system nationally by removing judicial power from the jurisdiction of the counties.

Institutions can frequently play crucial roles in the political process. Rarely has this been more true than in Poland immediately after World War I, and rarely has a great political party made a more substantial mistake than did the Polish National Democrats and their allies in backing the establishment of proportional representation. It was largely because of this ill-fated electoral device that the Nationalist Right failed to win control of the first and second parliaments in renascent Poland. Coincidentally, no government based on the support of one reasonably homogeneous group could be formed until 1930, and then the conduct of the 1930 election rendered the results highly suspect.

Proportional representation was first employed in Poland in the elections to the Constituent Sejm of 1919. The electoral law was promulgated in November, 1918, by Premier Jędrzej Moraczewski, whose action then could only be described as reflecting full national consensus.

The status of sociology and philosophy in the Soviet Union is radically different from that of the physical and mathematical sciences. The sociologists and philosophers are still regarded by the government as ideologists, whereas the mathematicians and physicists are considered scientists; and the ideologist is in low repute in the Soviet intellectual community. Thirty years ago, Nikolai Bukharin observed in a remarkable essay that the cultural style of the current Soviet period would be technicism, and that the humanities and historical sciences would be relegated to the background. He believed that this “one-sidedness“ was founded on the economic requirements of the time. Probably, however, the hollowness in the life of the Soviet ideologist is equally responsible for his low estate. The sociologists and philosophers are not regarded as independent thinkers; their job as ideological workers is to provide a documentation and footnoted commentary on the decisions of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Young men of ability consequently tend to avoid choosing a life work in the social sciences and philosophy. Why, they say, should they sacrifice their intellectual independence at the outset of their lives?

When my co-editor, Boris Filippov, and I were preparing our threevolume edition of Boris Pasternak’s Collected Works (published in 1961 by the University of Michigan Press) we were aware that some texts scattered in not easily obtainable publications were bound to elude us. Since then we have been able to lay our hands on some of them. Among them was an interesting short article, a copy of which was recently received by me from Moscow. I had known of its existence but could not find it anywhere in the West. It was published in the Soviet magazine Chitatel’ i pisatel’ (The Reader and the Writer), in No. 4/5, dated February 11, 1928, apparently without a title (at least the copy received by me bore no title), and therefore probably as an answer to a questionnaire addressed to writers about their current work and their relations with their public.