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5. Social Descent and Professional Integration In the three countries under analysis (Serbia, Bulgaria, Greece), in the nineteenth century, the Serbian Radicals and the Bulgarian Socialists appear to display a more egalitarian social structure. The Radical intellectuals in Serbia, with negligible exceptions like Pera Todorović and Svetomir Nikolajević, were predominantly of modest social origins, not far removed from the social groups (peasants, artisans) that they claimed to represent. The founding father of Serbian radicalism, S. Marković, wrote in relation to this: Fifty years ago in Serbia there were hardly any other classes but peasantry . We are all sons or grandsons of peasants. The educated people (and I am thinking of the truly educated, not the bookish intellectuals) that have come from that background are the educated democracy in the true sense of the word. Most of them grew up on proja [cornbread] and skrob [starch], and obtained their higher education thanks to the very people who remained on the proja and skrob, amongst whom there were many of their closest relatives. (While some of the intellectuals who made this same “career” seek to forget this, we are not willing to do so.)56 Both S. Marković and N. Pašić, for example, were able to conduct their studies abroad by means of state-sponsored scholarships. The former’s critique of official Serbian politics cost him his scholarship. Notwithstanding the fact that the radical intellectuals could be officially classified as of “urban” descent, this categorization is misleading. Connections to the state class or the leading political elite, either by means of family affiliation or lineage, were negligible if not practically nonexistent . The Radicals reversed this configuration upon their ascent to power in the 1890s, and transformed themselves successfully into the bearers of the state class. Generally speaking, the picture in the Bulgarian setting appears to be similar. The case of Krŭstiu Rakovski, who was descended from a wealthy landowning family from the Dobrudja, appears rather singular. On the whole, the Bulgarian Socialists’ backgrounds varied from the 52 II. Intellectuals small merchant milieu to more modest classes. Intellectuals like Blagoev or Bozveliev came from very modest backgrounds and may properly be classified as self-made men. The first went through a small “odyssey” of extreme poverty in order to self-finance his studies in Russia; the second received training as an apprentice and had no formal academic education whatsoever. Even an intellectual like Nikola Gabrovski, who hailed from the small merchant milieu, found himself in extreme financial difficulties upon the death of his father, a circumstance that seriously endangered his studies in Switzerland. Apparently, none of the Bulgarian intellectuals who turned to socialism belonged to the statesponsored intelligentsia (recipients of state stipends). On the contrary, according to the testimony of S. Nokov, Bulgarian state-sponsored students in Geneva acquiesced in official politics—in this case, the Stambolov regime.57 Finally, it is worth emphasizing that socialist intellectuals in Bulgaria were integrated professionally almost exclusively in the teaching profession. Gulapchev, Blagoev, Gabrovski, Sakŭzov, Bakalov, Dabev, Nokov, etc., were all high-school teachers, before some of them rose to the rank of “professional” socialists. Bulgarian socialist intellectuals therefore found professional integration at the lowest level of the state mechanism, in the educational sector, a circumstance that also provided them with a certain room for maneuver. Apparently, while the civil-service sector was saturated by the 1900s, a shortage of teaching stuff meant that school instruction was still an open vocation for nonconformist university graduates.58 The teaching profession had been a traditional locus of integration for radically oriented intellectuals since the liberation period (1870s). The circumstances by which the Bulgarian socialists won control of this essential vein in the reproduction of the state system gave rise to two significant consequences: in the first place, the continuity in the recruitment of socialist cadres, a chain clearly linking teachers and pupils;59 and in the second, the diffusion mechanisms of socialism via the educational system. In fact, the educational sector would remain a stronghold of radical thought in Bulgaria, not only at the secondary but also at university level. The teaching profession was one of the strongholds of radicalism in Serbia as well. There, the “second -rank officers” of the Radical Party were largely high-school teachers , particularly those of “local production.”60 A somewhat different picture emerges in the case of Greece. Intellectuals with socialist inclinations appear to have originated largely from [18.119.107.161] Project MUSE (2024-04-25 11:44...

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