An Alternative on the Ideological Front: Petrograd University and Power in the Context of the Civil War

Abstract

The article deals with the situation in Petrograd University (St. Petersburg State University) which developed during the Russian Civil War. The University was one of the biggest centers of science and education at the beginning of the First World War. The Bolsheviks’ coming to power was not accepted by professors and students, and during 1917–1919 they awaited the fall of the Bolsheviks in Petrograd. Thus, the University corporation was an ideological enemy of the Bolsheviks. This antagonism further intensified during the realization of high school reform by Narkompros. The University did not want to lose its autonomy; however, the Bolsheviks perceived it as a source of counterrevolutionary activity. This led to repression of University professors in 1919 during the offensives of General Yudenich against Petrograd. Further, attention is paid to how the University community perceived the Civil War. The infamous “philosophical steamboat” was the last act of state terror against the Petrograd University during the Civil War. The University became a symbol of an alternative to the reform of higher education, based on autonomy and opposed to the position of the Bolshevik authorities, that remained unrealized.