<論説>冷戦初期のアメリカ合衆国の大学におけるソ連研究の諸相 : ハーヴァード大学難民聞き取り計画と学知の「停滞」

Abstract

本稿は、ハーヴァード大学ロシア研究センターが空軍の人材開発研究所との契約研究に基づいて実施したソ連研究である難民聞き取り計画(RIP、一九五〇年～五四年) の歴史的経緯を大学と軍部との人的ネットワークに注目しつつ解明しようとするものである。一九五〇年、人材開発研究所とロシア研究センターは、ソ連空爆にあたっての都市選定を目的とした研究契約を締結し、ドイツとオーストリア等に居住していたソ連人難民への聞き取り調査を開始した。しかし研究者達が人々の行動に関する行動科学研究への強い関心を抱いていたことから、RIPは「ソ連の社会制度の研究」へと変貌した。これに対し連邦議会をはじめとする反共主義者が激しい攻撃を浴びせた結果、RIPは中止に追い込まれた。RIPの研究成果はその後に刊行されたものの、それらは軍部との人的ネットワークの緊密さゆえに、ソ連人難民に関する貴重な資料を用いながらもソ連の制度や社会に対する画期的な視座や知見を提示することができないという意味で、学術的な「停滞」に陥ったことを示すものとなった。ただし、こうした「停滞」状況は軍部とのネットワークが消滅することで大きく変わることになる。

This article elucidates the historical processes behind the Refugee Interview Project (RIP) conducted by those involved in Soviet Studies at Harvard University while focusing on the human relationships between those at Harvard University and U.S. Military, especially U.S. Air Force. The aim of this study is to clarify the fact that this close network certainly helped to start the RIP, but that this relationship also led to intellectual stagnation and finally worked to bring the RIP to a close. Harvard University's Russian Research Center (HURRC) conducted the RIP in collaboration with the U.S. Air Force affiliated Human Resources Research Institute (HRRI) during the period from 1950 through 1954. The ultimate aim of the RIP was to acquire information on the Soviet Union in order to determine which Soviet cities were to be bombed in case war broke out. The human networks between Harvard scholars and U.S. military personnel had already been constructed in late 1940s: before the RIP was begun. Clyde Kluckhohn, a professor in anthropology and the director of the HURRC, had worked for the Defense Department as a consultant. And Air Force Colonel Raymond Sleeper had entered Harvard University and studied Anthropology, Psychology, and Sociology under Kluchholn, psychology professor Gordon Allport, and sociology professor Talcott Parsons in the 1940s. After obtaining a master's degree and returning to the Air Force, Col. Sleeper began to consider adapting his academic knowledge to the operation of air power. He then made a decision to request that the HURRC collect information on the Soviet Union by interviewing Soviet "refugees" living in the U. S. military occupied zones in Germany, Austria and selecting about 30 cities of the Soviet Union for bombing, Col. Sleeper also asked his colleges Raymond V. Bowers, a Ph.D. sociologist and the director of the HRRI, to provide financial support for Harvard's RIP. Accepting Sleeper's request, Bowers decided to make a contract with the HURRC to interview Soviet refugees and expend about one million dollars for Harvard. Owing to this funding, researchers from the HURRC were able to depart for Germany and Austria in September of 1950. They conducted interviews with approximately 14, 000 Soviet refugees and collected information on the Soviet Union until February 1951. After returning home, the HURRC researchers started to arrange the collected data and analyze them. However, the RIP did not proceed along the lines set out by the Air Force. In other words, the HURRC began research to elucidate the "social system" of the Soviet Union rather than with the aim of picking Soviet cities for bombing. The cause of this research "shift" was closely related with the HURRC's academic interests; The HURRC was founded for the pursue of developing the methods of the Behavioral Sciences pioneered by Parsons and Kluckhohn. The HURRC's director Kluckhohn in particular hoped that the Behavioral Sciences could be developed by collecting and analyzing the data on the Soviet refugees' political and social "behavior" through the RIP. In addition, sociologists Alex Inkeles and Raymond A. Bauer, influential leaders of the RIP, also shared nearly identical views as Kluckhohn. Ultimately, they virtually ignored the assignment imposed by the Air Force and the HRRI to determine which Soviet cities to bomb. Instead, HURRC researchers concentrated on revealing the structure of the Soviet social system. The aforementioned RIP "shift" resulted in criticism from the FBI, Republicans in the U. S. Congress, and Boston citizens. These critics suspected researchers of having relationships with the American Communist Party, while they also criticized the Air Force for allowing and supporting the studies not of targeting the Soviet cities but of "the Soviet Social System." The Air Force, under the severe attack from the Federal Government, U. S. Congress, and the anticommunist movement in Boston, made the decision to shut the HRRI down, fire its director, Raymond Bowers, and put an end to the RIP. Thereafter, the HURRC began to prepare a final report for the Air Force (making of the report was required by terms of the contract between the Air Force and the HURRC). Although the final report was completed in 1954 and the book titled How the Soviet System Works? was published three years later, intellectual immobility was the result. The main reason for this intellectual "stagnation" was that HURRC researchers could not offer new insights into the Soviet system and its people due to the close relationship that had been built up with the Air Force during the RIP; HURRC researchers were forced to consider the Air Force's rather than researchers' intellectual interests. This "stagnation" of Soviet Studies at Harvard was, however, cancelled out by the diminishing level of the human networks with the Air Force in late 1950s.