Martin Luther King and the Nations of the Communist Bloc
On January 18 Dr. Baktybek Abdrisaev moderated a panel of students in a discussion of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and possible connections or influence on the dissident movements in the nations of the communist bloc, focusing mainly on the former Soviet Union. There has been more than seven years cooperation between Utah Valley University (UVU) and the Andrei Sakharov foundation (ASF) from Russia. The Chairperson of ASF, Elena Bonner, before passing last June acted as the Honorary Chair of two International Women of the Mountain Conferences at UVU. Alexey Semyonov, President of ASF, visited UVU, lectured a number of times and provided several grants to UVU faculty and students on projects promoting democracy and sustainable mountain development. The moderator praised all three students for their willingness to become deeply involved in their fields of study, deep enough to actually travel to the Soviet Union, interact with people key to their research, and strive for firsthand accounts of the struggles for liberty in the former Soviet Union. Each of the students presented on their experience and perspective.
Matthew Joseph, first UVU student-intern at ASF in Moscow during presentation
Matthew Joseph first presented on his internship at the Andrei Sakharov Foundation in 2010, and what he learned there about this famous Soviet dissident. “Sakharov,” Joseph said, “was a physicist valuable to the Soviet Union, the father of the thermo-nuclear bomb. But he was also a dissident, perhaps beginning, Joseph said, with a speech he gave wherein he encouraged the peaceful use of the technologies for which he was largely responsible, and after which a Soviet official rose to say that his work was for the state, and the state alone would determine its use. Perhaps from this point onward, Sakharov, who was a prominent figure in the Soviet elite at the time, began speaking increasingly for human rights, famously quoted as saying “Где наша совесть?”, meaning where is our conscience? Later, his motto was to become Peace, Progress, Human Rights which was also the title of his Nobel lecture. Though Joseph could find no direct link to the influence of Martin Luther King, Jr., he expressed a belief in the possibility that the Civil Rights movement in the U.S. may have had some influence on the Helsinki Accords.
Shane Davis, Peace and Justice Student at UVU shares thoughts about coming trip to Moscow
Shane Davis spoke of his upcoming trip to Russia in June. He will there attempt to catalog any connections he can find to former Soviet dissident movements and the U.S. Civil Rights movement and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in particular. He noted that the Sakharov Museum in Moscow has become a place to gather for Russians involved in the recent opposition movements. He will there actively pursue interviews with opposition leaders to see if Dr. King has had any influence.
Richard Portwood speaks about Andrei Sinyavsky, the Russian writer and dissident
Richard Portwood, Executive Director of Center for American/Russian Engagement and Emerging Leadership (CAREEL), spoke of Andrei Sinyavsky, the Russian writer and dissident. Portwood told of how Sinyavsky was not a well-known writer until his trial and sentence in public courts for dissident writing. He said that the modern dissident movements had their start with the trial of Sinyavsky. “Writers had a unique ability,” Joseph said, “to mobilize public opinion in the Soviet Union.” Inspired by Russian poet and novelist Boris Pasternak, Sinyavsky was followed by the KGB and arrested in September of 1965, the same month U.S. President Lyndon Johnson issued EO 11246, requiring Equal Employment Opportunity. While, like his colleagues, Portwood could not point to any definitive connection between the work of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Soviet dissidence, he noted the time parallels between what was happening in the Soviet Union and the U.S. Civil Rights movement. After the death of Stalin, under the leadership of Nikita Khrushchev, the period of 1954 to 1964 has been referred to as the “thaw” period, during which there was a little more openness of the Soviet Union toward the rest of the world. In July of 1964 in the U.S., Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act and in August 1965, the Voting Rights Act. It was during these same years that Sinyavsky wrote, was arrested along with his friend and fellow writer Yuli Daniel, was charged under Article 70 of the Soviet Criminal Code (prohibiting propagandizing with the purpose of subverting of the Soviet regime), and was sentenced to seven years for anti-Soviet activity.
While none in the panel could point to any definitive evidence of connection to or influence of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. on Soviet dissidents, it was interesting to note the parallels in both the timing of events and spirit of the movements they inspired.
Barry McLerran, student UVU, Comparative Politics class
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Agenda of the 18th Annual Utah Valley University Martin Luther King Jr. Commemoration
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PRESENTERS SHORT BIOS
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Matthew Joseph Richard Portwood Shane Davis
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POWER POINTS OF PRESENTERS
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Matthew Joseph-Martin Luther King Jr. and Andrei Sakharov
Richard Portwood-Andrei Sinyavsky and the Human Rights Movement in the Soviet Union
Shane Davis-MLK and Andrei Sakharov
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STUDENT REFLECTIVE ESSAYS
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12-01-24-Tatiana-Montfleuri-Civil Rights Leader Julian Bond-UVU’s MLK Commemoration
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