| Anatoli MIKHAILOV, President of E.H.U. International
Introductory remarks at the Inauguration Ceremony of E.H.U. International
Vilnius, Lithuania, Thursday, June 9, 2005 Your Excellency, Mr. President! It is hard to believe that in the 21 century in the heart of Europe we would be confronted with the prospect of establishing of a university in exile. So far there have been two well known similar cases, both of them taking place in the context of the totalitarian suppression of human freedom in Germany. Facing the threat of persecution during the Nazi regime, the liberal minded academic community established in New York, the New School of Social Research. After the Second World War in divided Berlin the Free University of Berlin became another symbol of recognized resistance against domination of totalitarianism. We were wrong to assume that both these cases belonged to the past history. In 2004 the authorities of Belarus took steps which added them to the list of countries with the shady reputation of closing universities. In 1992 when the European Humanities University was established, those few intellectuals who were inspired by the challenging idea of overcoming of the totalitarian heritage and creating a favorable intellectual framework for the democratization of the country were well aware of the difficulty of this task. At that time, slowly growing intellectual community in the former Soviet Union, which consisted mainly of dissident oriented individuals, was practically non-existent in Belarus. But it was also the time of rosy illusions and euphoric expectations, when hundreds of thousand of people enthusiastically demonstrated on the streets of Minsk their willingness to transform their life. It was the time when finally in the first free presidential elections they voted against the nomenclature… Let us acknowledge that we were not able to predict such developments which are taking place in Belarus. Now, more then ever before, it becomes evident how strategically important educational initiatives are for promoting and even enabling of social democratic transformation. We also realize how grave the consequences of pure quality education can be. The 12 years of our existence have always been very difficult. From the very beginning our project was adventurous in nature. We started our project with no property, being permanently homeless and without adequate financial resources. There were various stages when we approached the dangerous edge of ceasing to exist. Threats, humiliation, antagonistic attitudes some of colleagues who had in the Soviet time actively participated in promoting of disciplines of the communist ideology created constant obstacles. The idea of the private university itself in the space of for many decades dominated tradition of state controlled education was something so unusual that we were forced to constantly justify ourselves. But what made us unique in the intellectual and educational landscape of Belarus was our persistence in the promotion of principles of free thinking and our readiness to create educational programs in the field of the social sciences and humanities based on the values of European civilization. We were identified soon in this capacity by our Western partners. In 1993 a unique program was created at the initiative of the Embassy of France in Belarus and with generous support of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs – Department of Political Sciences and Administration (later renamed in Department of Political Sciences and European Integration). In 1994, at that time Charge d’Affairs of the US Embassy and present Ambassador in Belarus George Krol wrote in his letter to the President of his alma mater Harvard University: “ Here in Minsk, I have encountered a promising, entirely locally-inspired initiative –the European Humanities University which was established two years ago by a number of liberal-minded philosopher professors, desirous of providing a private, liberal arts, non-state-directed higher education for a new generation of Belarusians. Since its incorporation, the university has grown to encompass several faculties unknown in Belarus in Soviet times … and now comprises a student body of several hundred souls who, despite severe economic hardship and the complete lack of state financial support, manage to pay for their education… I should note that EHU has been under great pressure from reactionary forces in the Belarusian Government and society to cease its operations. As is understandable, there are many in this society who cannot simply accept the concept of a private, liberal arts education which they view as a direct threat to Soviet values”. In spite of these difficulties, already present at the very beginning of its existence, EHU was able to become in a very short time the most internationally recognized university in Belarus. Various new, previously not known in our country, projects and programs were developed: Institute of German Studies, Center of American Studies, Center of Scandinavian Studies, Center of European and Transatlantic Studies… I will not take your time, ladies and gentlemen, describing the whole spectrum of activities of our university and simply would like to refer you to our new brochure where you will find an impressive enumeration of our partners in various countries of the world. In addition, particularly, in recent years, we have managed to establish fruitful cooperation with local universities in Belarus, Ministry of education, Commission for Culture and Education of the Parliament and became the institution of higher learning leading the application of the Bologna educational model to the local circumstances of Belarus. Although we were always subject of the scrutinized attention and strict control the new policy toward the university was apparently formulated sometime in summer of 2003. There were not only traditional inspections of various state control organs. In December, speaking before rectors of universities of Belarus the new minister of education A.Rad’kov while acknowledging the high quality of teaching at EHU, publicly expressed his doubts with regard to necessity of inviting so many foreign faculty. “We should not allow to convert them the university into a passage yard. Don’t we have our own specialists?” concluded the minister. It was not simply unique case when the minister of education questioned international cooperation in research and education, but an indication of the strengthening of the isolationist policy of the country on the international scene. In January 2004 during my meeting with the minister of education I was asked without any explanation to submit my letter of resignation. At the same time, while speaking with the group of Ambassadors from the European Union and US, who protested against the pressure, exercised on the university, he told that it was my initiative to make the decision to resign. Starting from this moment students and faculty of EHU have been subjected to unprecedented threats and harassment. I am proud to tell the distinguished audience today that our university’s corporation has succeeded in overcoming this pressure with honor. Many of them are with us today, ladies and gentlemen, and I would like to express my deepest gratitude and high admiration for their courage in this dramatic time. What happened then is pretty well known: protests addressed to various authorities of Belarus, the letter signed on behalf of 25 ministers of Foreign Affairs of the European Union, resolutions of The Commission on Human Rights of the United Nations, of the European Parliament, support of famous European intellectuals, various publications in the press in various countries. All these initiatives have never received any official response from those to whom they were addressed. As a result, up to 200 hundred students are spread all over the world. Germany, France, Russia, Poland, US, Bulgaria, Ireland. Poland…. Some other students are forced to continue their education in various state universities of Belarus far from being satisfied with the quality of teaching there. But we did not cease to exist. We are continuing our activities in different form, under difficult circumstances, developing distance learning programs and having face-to-face contacts with our students. We have learned proper lessons from this dramatic experience. One of them is related to our own understanding of the nature of the social sciences and humanities. It is not simply pure reflection upon the essence of social reality. It has its very important constituting element – our own practical behavior. In the end it is the challenge to our own way of life in this world. Dear Ladies and Gentlemen, when we created EHU we were wrong in our attempt of proper translation of the name of this university. We called ourselves European Humanitarian University taking into account that in Belarusian and Russian language the term for Humanities has two meanings: on the one hand, it indicates the specific knowledge addressed to human and social reality, on the other hand, however, it could mean assistance to those who are in need. Particularly this second meaning is what is required now and this conference could be regarded as such action of humanitarian assistance to European Humanities University. The purpose of this conference today is to convey to you, distinguished ladies and gentlemen, our message of urgent need to be supported in this endeavor. Here, in this room I see many familiar faces. You came from different countries of the world to demonstrate your solidarity with our project. Many were not able to attend this meeting but they indicated their support sending their greetings letters and finding ways in assisting the university in this dramatic period of its existence. Years will pass, and everything will fall into place, and all things will be called by their proper names. It is my firm belief that the idea of the European Humanities University, which was proclaimed a little more than 12 years ago by a small group of committed academics, will once again come to be in great demand in its own country. We express our sincere gratitude to the academic community of our neighboring country Lithuania, to the authorities of Lithuania for their generous support and hospitality in this difficult time. Our words of thanks belong to all who came today and those who are with us being supportive from the distance. Living in this globalizing world and being confronted with its challenges we should be able to find the way of proper responses in each particular case of violation of human rights. Your Excellencies! We made our choice which is vitally important for the creation of favorable conditions for integration of Belarus in the community of civilized world and we would appreciate your solidarity and assistance in our continuation of this important endeavor. Thank you very much for your kind attention.
|