Boris Rabbot Papers, 1930-2012

Collection context

Creator:
Rabbot, B. S. (Boris Semenovich), 1930-2011
Abstract:
The Boris Rabbot Papers consist of the writings, lectures, notes, correspondence, personal documents, post-doctoral dissertation, photographs, research and reference materials related to the professional activities of Boris Rabbot—one of the first Soviet sociologists employed at the pioneering Institute for Concrete Social Studies of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR (IKSI) and an influential intellectual who tried to introduce a policy of liberalization within the Soviet system in the mid-1960s - early 1970s. The collection reflects Rabbot's professional life both in the USSR and USA. The collection gives an unprecedented insider's view into the workings of the Politburo and also traces the early development of a previously banned social science discipline, sociology, in the Soviet Union.
Extent:
5.42 linear feet (13 document boxes, 1 oversize folder)
Language:
Russian , English .
Scope and content:

The bulk of the collection comprises Boris Rabbot's professional writings, documents and publications related to his academic work both in the Soviet Union and in the United States. There are also some personal documents, biographical materials, photographs, lectures and interviews.

Boris Rabbot served as a ghostwriter to Rumiantsev, authoring opinions on Soviet economic and political liberalization anonymously or in his supervisor's name; he also occasionally wrote speeches for Brezhnev. The collection contains several of these ghostwritten pieces.

Rabbot's writings in the United States include a number of texts about the Soviet Academy of Sciences and the Politburo. Some of these were published as newspaper articles—most notably, "A Letter to Brezhnev," The New York Times Magazine, Nov. 6, 1977, which challenged the hardline course that Soviet leadership had taken—while others remain in the collection as unpublished manuscripts.

Biographical / historical:

Boris Semenovich Rabbot was born on September 18, 1930 in the city of Kostroma, Russia, USSR and moved to Moscow at an early age. In 1948, Rabbot was admitted to Moscow State University's Department of Philosophy, where he studied until 1953. From 1954 to 1956 he was a graduate student at Moscow State University's Department of History of Western European Philosophy and Sociology. From 1958 to 1959 he worked as the managing editor of the journal V pomoshch' lektoru of the Vsesoiuznoe obshchestvo Znanie (All-Union Knowledge Society) and, from 1959 to 1965, department head and traveling correspondent for the magazine Nauka i religiia (Science and Religion). From 1965 (official appointment 1967), he held the position of Executive Secretary and Chief Researcher of the Sector for Social Sciences of the Presidium of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, led by Academician Aleksei Rumiantsev. In the years 1969-1972, he served as Head of the Sector for Experimental Research of the recently founded Institute for Concrete Social Studies of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR (IKSI), led by Rumiantsev.

Following the anti-Soviet protests in Prague of 1968 and demonstrations of support for them—some from IKSI researchers, as documented in the archive—the Brezhnev regime cracked down on détente and IKSI was disbanded. Rabbot, whose 1970 post-doctoral dissertation raised controversy by dealing with the Soviet experiment from a sociological standpoint and was banned from defense, had to curtail his intellectual work and hence worked as senior scientific researcher at the N. I. Vavilov Institute of the History of Natural Science and Technology.

In 1976, Rabbot gained legal entry to the United States as a Jewish refugee, having applied for his exit visa two years previously. Joined by his wife, he settled in New York City and, after a separation, got married for a second time, to Lynn Visson. Visson's father, a Russian émigré to France and then the United States, had been the director of exhibitions at the Wildenstein Galleries in New York (see Vladimir Visson Papers at the Bakhmeteff Archive of Russian & East European Culture at Columbia University).

Upon immigrating to the United States (1976) Rabbot's activities changed to those of a freelance consultant, independent scholar and lecturer of Russian. He also worked on several unpublished manuscripts that straddled academics and politics, including a translation of his dissertation on the "Problems of the Experiment in Social Research" and popular analyses of Brezhnev-era Soviet politics and society. The most important of these were an unpublished manuscript on the private lives of the Politburo members and a series of lectures on the consequences of the American approach to détente. Rabbot's controversial position was that the Carter Administration's tactics of forcing the human rights issue by passing the Jackson-Vanick Amendment backfired by bringing hard-liners to the fore in the Politburo. Boris Rabbot died on February 3, 2011.

Access and use

Restrictions:

This collection has no access restrictions.

Terms of access:

Reproductions may be made for research purposes. The RBML maintains ownership of the physical material only. Copyright remains with the creator and his/her heirs. The responsibility to secure copyright permission rests with the patron.

Preferred citation:

Identification of specific item; Date (if known); Boris Rabbot Papers; Box and Folder; Bakhmeteff Archive, Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Columbia University Library.

Location of this collection:
6th Floor East Butler Library
535 West 114th Street
New York, NY 10027, USA
Before you visit:
Researchers interested in viewing materials in the RBML reading room must must book an appointment at least 7 days in advance. To make the most of your visit, be sure to request your desired materials before booking your appointment, as researchers are limited to 5 items per day.
Contact:
rbml@library.columbia.edu