Documents on the reorganization of the Communist University of the Working People of the East. 1936-1938

Document publication

doi 10.28995/2073-0101-2025-3-798-817

For citation

Dolgova, Evgeniya A. (2025). Documents on the reorganization of the Communist University of the Working People of the East. 1936-1938, Herald of an Archivist, no. 3, pp. 798-817, doi 10.28995/2073-0101-2025-3-798-817

Dolgova, Evgeniya A., Russian State University for the Humanities, Moscow, Russia

Documents on the reorganization of the Communist University of the Working People of the East. 1936-1938

Abstract

The documents on the reorganization of the Communist University of the Working People of the East (KUTV) in 1936-1938, identified in the Russian State Archive of Socio-Political History and the Russian State Archive of Modern History, are published. The Communist University of the Working People of the East was established on the basis of the Oriental courses at the People's Commissariat for Nationalities in Moscow to train political workers of the republics and autonomies of the Soviet East in 1921. Until 1923, KUTV was subordinate to the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs, then it passed under the jurisdiction of the Central Executive Committee of the RSFSR (since 1924 - the Central Executive Committee of the USSR). Throughout the 1920s, KUTV set two tasks – training personnel for national republics and foreign personnel for revolutionary movements in the colonial and dependent countries of the East for the Comintern. Since 1936, only the Soviet sector remained in the institution, and the sections for the training of foreign personnel were separated into an independent school under the jurisdiction of the Executive Committee of the Comintern, which operated under the conspiratorial name "Scientific Research Institute for the Study of National and Colonial Problems." The transfer of half of the student body dealt a blow to KUTV. Even more sensitive was the transfer to a new institution of the material and technical base of the Comintern. The published documents reveal the dramatic events of this reorganization, which turned into an open conflict between the Comintern, which was responsible for the training of personnel in the NIINKP, and the Department of Party Propaganda and Agitation of the Central Committee of the CPSU(b), which sought to preserve the KUTV. Taking into account the reduction in the number of students due to the transfer of foreign sections to another institution, the question was raised about the effectiveness and legality of maintaining the "Soviet" sector. In 1938 It was decided to liquidate the KUTV, which became one of the events during the reorganization of other institutions for the accelerated training of Marxists – the institutes of the Red Professorship, the All-Union Communist Agricultural University named after Ya. M. Sverdlov, the International Lenin School operating under the Comintern, etc. Given the complex structure and importance of the KUTV, during the liquidation of the institution, proposals were made to preserve it in one form or another – an independent institution for training personnel in Tuva, Buryat Mongolia and Yakutia, to include it in the N. N. Narimanov Institute of Oriental Studies, and in courses for training editors and translators of Marxism-Leninism. Documents are published according to modern rules of spelling and punctuation, while preserving the stylistic features of the source.

Keywords

Oriental courses at the People's Commissariat of the RSFSR in Moscow, Communist University of the Working People of the East (KUTV), Scientific Research Institute for the Study of National and Colonial Problems (NIINKP), Comintern, Comintern School, I. V. Stalin and the National Question, training of national personnel, Higher School for the Training of Personnel of the Foreign East of the Executive Committee of the Comintern (Scientific Research Institute for the Study of National and Colonial Problems), the Scientific Research Association for the Study of National and Colonial Problems (NIA NCP), infrastructure, financing.

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About authors

Dolgova Evgeniya A., Doctor of Historical Sciences, Russian State University for the Humanities, Scientific and Educational Center, Senior Researcher, Moscow, Russia, +7-905-695-56-08, This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Grant information

The publication was prepared with the support of the State Assignment on the topic "Historical dynamics of traditional cultures in transitional epochs: ethnosemiotic features of transition and mechanisms of knowledge transfer", FSZG-2023-0010

The article was received in the editorial office on 21.02.2025, recommended for publication on 20.06.2025.