The Thinking Reed

At this point, however, we must define somewhat more precisely the actual concept of the intelligentsia. Today the Russian word intelligent, which was made current by P. Boborykin, is often employed as a synonym for the Western word ‘intellectual’. There are, as we shall see later, some grounds for this, but originally the concept intelligentsia was almost the direct opposite of the concept ‘intellectuals’. It is much easier to clarify the term ‘intellectual’. This means (in common usage) a person engaged in mental work, an expert. There is no moral or ideological content in the concept. Intelligent is a different matter. Berdyaev quite rightly protested against treatment of the two concepts as identical: ‘Our intelligentsia were a group formed out of various social classes and held together by ideas, not by sharing a common profession or economic status,’ he declared.17 What was the important distinctive mark of the intelligentsia? Not only formal occupation with mental work, but also exceptional concern with European culture. But even this definition may prove inexact. Originally the word intelligent was clearly marked with moral evaluation. Polonsky wrote in the 1920s that from Boborykin’s time what was meant by the intelligentsia was ‘a historical group of people who promoted the self-awareness of Russian society.’18 He considered that as a Marxist he was obliged to treat such a definition ironically, but he recognized that in nineteenth-century Russia, the intelligent ‘was a spiritual leader, a worker on behalf of social ideals.’19

It is obvious that a ‘purely functional’ definition of the intelligent is quite inadequate, unless it is supplemented with a ‘cultural’ definition.20 On the other hand, the contradiction between these two definitions can be seen as a contradiction between phenomenon and essence. Apparently, the Russian intellectuals of the nineteenth century discovered and developed within themselves some important characteristics of which their Western colleagues had, up to that time, no suspicion. This was due, however, not to ‘the mysteriousness of the Russian soul’ or to ‘divine grace’ but to the specific sociohistorical and historico-cultural peculiarities of the Russian intelligentsia’s being. Plekhanov’s biographer, Samuel Baron, observed that it was quite natural for the intelligentsia to produce revolutionaries: ‘This social group had no exact parallel in Western society; yet, paradoxically enough, it was itself a consequence of the Western impact upon Russia. The intelligentsia was the product of cultural contact between two unlike civilizations…’21 It found itself on the frontier between two worlds and its thinking could not but be critical.

From the very beginning of the nineteenth century the Russian intelligentsia was to a certain extent outside the system. Already quite numerous it found, in the words of Brym, that it ‘had no functional role to play in Russian society: intelligently originated as, and remained, “superfluous men”.’22 This indefiniteness in their social role made them ‘marginals’, compelled to look upon the given society ‘from without’.23 They became radicals and ‘ideologues’ in the sense that their behaviour was determined more by ideas than by social interests. Such ‘ideologism’ is, of course, typical of all intellectuals, but in Russia the objective conditions caused it to develop with exceptional vigour. Members of the Russian intelligentsia were given no specific function in the framework of their country’s social organization and their spiritual rights were trampled on by the autocratic government. At the same time, a typical feature of Russia — with its academic institutions which grew proportionately to the state’s ambitions but disproportionately to the real requirements of a backward country — was a great overproduction of intelligenty. In a country where there were not enough schools, there was no shortage of universities. What could the new-baked intelligenty do? Entry into the bureaucracy meant then, as now, either breaking or at least weakening the ties with one’s intellectual milieu: going into the quite different world of the state apparatus. The state could find no other employment for the educated youth, and private enterprise never really developed (except in the short period 1909 to 1913). The new Russian bourgeoisie had as yet no need of intelligenty.