Exploring Socialist Solidarity in Higher Education: East German Advisors in the People’s Republic of Mozambique

(Mirror.)

Socialist solidarity did not mean keeping other states perpetually dependent on a stronger one, as the case is in colonialism, but rather helping new republics learn the skills that they needed to remain independent, a difference embodied in the saying ‘give someone a fish and you feed her for a day; teach someone to fish and you feed her for a lifetime.’ This chapter by Alexandra Piepiorka is a good example of that: this is a very mature and mostly pleasant reading for anybody interested in how the people’s republics interacted. Example:

Besides their inefficient ideological endeavors at the UEM, the GDR staff were largely respected for their professional knowledge in other fields, and their cooperative behavior in most aspects of collaboration was perceived well by their Mozambican partners.^97^

GDR cooperators usually looked to Frelimo’s educational guidelines for pedagogical orientation, and a corresponding mode of conduct was officially promoted by the GDR ministries of education (MHF and MfV) when sending staff to the UEM. GDR advisors working at the Faculty of Education, for instance, were instructed “not to copy GDR‐plans” and to rather do the “necessary and right” according to Mozambican conditions.^98^

Bearing this in mind, GDR cooperators at the UEM proved quite open to acquiring new teaching skills proposed by their Mozambican counterparts or—in some cases—by their international colleagues.^99^ Beyond this, more pragmatic factors may also have played a part in the cooperative behavior of GDR staff. Documents indicate that GDR teaching staff were not always sufficiently prepared to meet the Mozambican realities on the ground, consequently, newly arrived GDR cooperators may have been more amenable to follow Frelimo guidelines.^100^

In addition, experienced GDR staff members were reportedly keen to maintain a high level of recognition both at the UEM^101^ and in relation to the Frelimo Party. Therefore, experienced staff members made some effort to effectively integrate new GDR cadres, in order to prevent losses in working standards.^102^

[…]

The history of the Faculty for Former Combatants, for instance, showed that educational ideas “borrowed”^109^ from socialist partners were useful for the consolidation of the new education system (SNE) and, thereby, were conducive to the decolonization process of the newly independent country in a broader sense.

This faculty not only successfully promoted the education of former independence fighters within the UEM, but also qualified a certain number of Mozambican cadres to contribute to post‐colonial state building, as envisioned by the (then Socialist) Frelimo government.

(Emphasis added.)