The Voice of Discontent

Another prominent Soviet intellectual last week joined the growing debate on East-West detente. In a 7,000-word article circulated in Moscow and published in West Germany's weekly Die Zeit, Historian Roy Medvedev, 48, best known for his exhaustive expose of the Stalinist purges (Let History Judge), took issue with several fellow dissidents who believe that Western pressures can lead to internal reforms. Arguing that change in the Soviet system can come only from above, Medvedev expressed fears that demands from the West are more likely to "make more difficult the process of democratization."

Medvedev's argument is directly opposed to that of Physicist Andrei Sakharov (TIME, Sept. 24), who has called for congressional passage of Senator Henry M. Jackson's amendment making most-favored-nation status in Soviet trade contingent upon free emigration. Medvedev praised Sakharov's "unquestionable courage" and denounced the "gross and unjust" harassment that the scientist has suffered from Soviet authorities. But Medvedev also suggested that Sakharov and Novelist Alexander Solzhenitsyn may unwittingly be aiding reactionaries within the Soviet leadership, who can seize on their declarations "to split and demoralize dissidents."

Lagging Behind. The crux of Medvedev's argument is that in the long run "the basic impulses for democratization of the U.S.S.R. must emerge from Soviet society itself." The right kind of Russian leader, he implies, could marshal enormous support "from below" because of widespread discontent over "the slow pace of economic, social and cultural progress, the bureaucratic system, mismanagement, lack of information and the lagging behind Western countries in many respects." Medvedev fears that pressures from the West could backfire and strengthen the hand of regressive elements. Indeed, he observes that there has already been an alarming "shift to the right in our political and social life." Still, he is ultimately optimistic, concluding that "the more distant prospect is that detente will undoubtedly promote broadening of democratic rights and freedoms."

Medvedev's pragmatic view does not come as all that much of a surprise. While Sakharov apparently no longer even considers himself a socialist, Medvedev remains a committed Marxist-Leninist. Even though he was expelled from the Party in 1969 for his writings about Stalin, he is respected both by dissidents and many orthodox Communists. Shortly after Medvedev's expulsion, Soviet authorities tried to have his twin brother, Zhores, a brilliant biologist, declared insane for writing a critical book about Stalin's crackpot geneticist, T.D. Lysenko.

Last August the Soviet embassy in London lifted Zhores' passport while he was doing research in Britain. That action may well have influenced Roy Medvedev's poignant comment on freedom of emigration, which he calls "an important civil liberty. But it is more important for conditions to be created here under which the Soviet people would not want to leave their country."

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