How they argued with Anton Makarenko during his lifetime and after his death

Elena Ilaltdinova, Doctor of Pedagogy, Head of the Laboratory of the Russian Academy of Education, tells about the most important elements of Anton Makarenko’s pedagogy and the ongoing discussions around it.

– What was the essence of Makarenko’s pedagogical system?

— We, representatives of the scientific school of Anatoly Arkadyevich Frolov, are talking not just about the system, but about the pedagogy of Makarenko. I propose to consider as the essence of his pedagogy – dialectic, the combination of contradictions. His pedagogy is the golden mean in the balance of individual and social, personal and collective, spiritual and material, traditions and management of the future, leadership and submission, demand and respect, responsibility and trust, freedom and discipline, educator and pupil, fundamental knowledge and connection with life. And he realizes this balance not in words, but in concrete pedagogical methods and technologies. For example, the law of parallel action (education in a team) allowed Makarenko to get away from the edifying position of the teacher and verbal methods of influence, to work through the asset, the general meeting, public opinion; with a deep knowledge of each pupil, he implemented the principle of relying on the positive in a person and did not remember the negative baggage of his past; he combined the right of everyone to become a member of the collective with the right of the collective to be protected from the individual; despite the negative attitude of the official pedagogy of that time, his pupils had pocket money, they participated in solving production, economic issues and carried out the usual Komsomol work; he relied not on the discipline of inhibition and prohibitions, but on the discipline of “moving forward”; everyone knows Makarenko’s principle “the greater the respect for a person, the greater the demand for him”; he skillfully organized the life of pupils on the basis of rituals (form, the reception of new pupils with the burning of old clothes), traditions (harvest festival, summer hike) and at the same time used education, including legal and ethical; with the widespread use of labor in education, he substantiated the thesis of its pedagogical neutrality.

Who shared his views, and who criticized him for what?

– This is probably the most important question for understanding the pedagogy of Anton Makarenko and his fate. The life of Makarenko and the life of his ideas is a fierce struggle! No pedagogical heritage in the world has such a huge potential for discussion, no heritage has so many opponents and followers. At different stages of development, when conditions changed, his followers suddenly turned into ardent persecutors. The line of struggle often passed between practitioners and theorists, when the latter, for example, in the post-war period, ignored his legacy in their writings, when preparing textbooks on pedagogy for universities. Disputes are still ongoing between researchers of Makarenko’s legacy, for example, about the Orthodox origins of his ideas, the possibility of applying his pedagogy in practice today, and the interpretation of certain provisions. The most severe critics of Makarenko’s experience were those of his contemporaries, who were hampered by his practical successes against the background of the general inefficient functioning of the system, since in practice he proved the inconsistency of their conclusions and actions.

– How popular was Anton Makarenko during his lifetime as a teacher, or was he better known as the author of the Pedagogical Poem?

– In 1928, at the height of his professional success, Makarenko’s methods of work were declared “non-Soviet” by official pedagogy, and he had to leave the colony, earlier Nadezhda Krupskaya had criticized him. Perhaps this can be seen as his fame as a teacher at the highest level. But when he was dying of a heart attack in 1939 on a suburban train near Moscow, he said: “I am the writer Makarenko.” In my opinion, his sense of self as a writer at the end of his life is very important, while we know about his desire from his youth to write.

Paradoxically, after the death of Makarenko, as a teacher, he became extremely popular precisely because of his literary activity, thanks to the Pedagogical Poem.

Now, few people know who Makarenko is, few have read the Pedagogical Poem, but when they hear the phrase: “Well, you’re right Makarenko!” – everyone understands, this is an ironic commentary on their pedagogical activities, treatment of children. In the same context, folklore keeps only the name of Alexander Pushkin.

– Why was the “Pedagogical Poem” published with cuts, when did it begin to be censored and what fragments were cut out?

– There are many different opinions here, including the politicization of the issue, which became especially acute during the Cold War and in the 1990s. Like any other work of art, the “Poem” went through editorial revision. This is a normal process when the editor makes certain changes to the author’s text. The main thing is that the last version is signed by the author, who agreed with these edits. Of undoubted scientific value is the tremendous work that was carried out by the researcher Svetlana Nevskaya to restore the text of the “Poem” to cuts. There are facts of editing Makarenko’s texts after his death in the preparation of collected works. For example, the German researcher Goetz Hillig was sharply negative about non-author’s editing of texts. But we cannot but admit that, without editing, much of the heritage would not have seen its reader and researcher until the 1990s, or never at all. Makarenko’s pedagogical and literary talent was not distorted. Greater damage to the legacy of Makarenko was caused by the so-called quotation, when phrases were taken out of context and freely interpreted, often changing the meaning to the opposite or emasculating the meanings. In the process of mastering the heritage in practice, its ideas were simplified, stereotyped, mythologized.

– How has the attitude towards Anton Makarenko changed after his death?

— The comprehension of his ideas began immediately after his death, already in the first publications, including the publications of his pupils. Almost immediately after the creation of the Academy of Pedagogical Sciences, the successor of which is the Russian Academy of Education, which celebrates its 80th anniversary in 2023, a laboratory was opened to study the heritage of A. S. Makarenko. This was the start of a large research work that changed forms, value orientations, accents, and eventually came to a modern understanding of Makarenko’s pedagogy.

In the 1940s-1960s, specialists appreciated the organizational and methodological component of his pedagogical activity: the organization of labor and the team.

After the war, the practice of educational work at school developed largely under the influence of Makarenko’s ideas in the context of the activities of many scientists and practitioners. All the brightest, most creative, productive work of teachers in our country was associated with the name of Makarenko. It was during this period, under the influence of the pedagogical community, that Makarenko’s ideas entered the content of pedagogical education, in textbooks of pedagogy. In the 1970s–1980s, interest in the theoretical and methodological foundations of his pedagogy increased, new author’s materials were included in the scientific circulation, including those with the participation of the Marburg laboratory “Makarenko-abstract”. Since the 1990s, researchers have been striving for a holistic characterization of his pedagogy against the backdrop of increasing negative social stereotypes in relation to Makarenko.

– When did foreign teachers become interested in the author of the “Pedagogical Poem”?

— Even during the lifetime of the author, The Pedagogical Poem began to be translated and now exists in more than 50 languages. This is the main source of information about the ideas and experience of Makarenko in the world. Makarenko was well known and studied on all continents. The interest of German and British researchers in the legacy of Makarenko was formed and developed under the influence of the goals and means of the Cold War of the West in a general logic that culminated in the 1990s with a complete devaluation in the public consciousness of both education and Makarenko’s legacy. On the basis of a combination of political and scientific interest, the work of the Marburg laboratory “Makarenko-Referat” was carried out. In general, the activity of this laboratory has become an activator of research activity, scientific discussion, and has consolidated the community of researchers of Makarenko’s heritage. The great contribution of foreign scientists is that they debunked some of the dogmas and myths that have developed in the official Soviet pedagogy about Makarenko, gave a new impetus to discussions around his legacy. Firstly, they showed that Makarenko is not just an outstanding Soviet teacher, he is a classic of world pedagogy. Secondly, when official Soviet pedagogy proclaimed that Makarenko’s legacy had been fully studied and research had been stopped, German colleagues introduced previously unknown archival materials into scientific circulation, thereby stimulating a new stage of research in our country.

Prepared by Maria Bashmakova