Fighting for Survivor: Ideological and Ethical Conflicts of A.S. Makarenko with Dzerzhinsky Commune

Abstract

In the paper the Authors tried to analyze how A.S. Makarenko’s educational system might grow while in the early 1930s the control over social and political life in Soviet Union was strengthened. Using unpublished and previously classified materials, the Authors events which took place in the Children Labor Dzerzhinsky Commune, established in Ukrainian capital Kharkov, whose activity represented the highest point in development of A.S. Makarenko’s pedagogical theory and practice. Facts that led to establishment of the Commune, age and social status of pupils, employment policy, difficult relationships between Makarenko and NKVD leaders, many “not pedagogical” – criminal and amoral factors, conflicting with Anton Semenovich’s works have been carefully analyzed. Authors outlined conflict between the educator and Commune administration based upon different approaches to social and moral education of youth. Makarenko’s perspective was more humane and less ideological than the one of his opponents.