Rockefeller Archive Center

Rockefeller Archive Center Research Reports are created by recipients of research travel stipends and by many others who have conducted research at the RAC. The reports demonstrate the breadth of the RAC's archival holdings, particularly in the study of philanthropy and its effects. Read more about the history of philanthropy at resource.rockarch.org. Also, see the RAC Bibliography of Scholarship, a comprehensive online database of publications citing RAC archival collections.

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The Ford Foundation and the Reinforcement of Democracy in Cold War Europe, 1950-69

January 1, 2013

My study of the Ford Foundation's efforts toward establishing peaceful relations between East and West and toward the strengthening of democracy in Europe is part of an extended research project titled "Cultural Diplomacy and the Reinforcement of Democracy in Cold War Europe, 1945-1969." It attempts to investigate American cultural and educational policy in Europe during the Cold War and the broad impact that foreign exchange programs have had on the process of furthering the values of democracy and civil society in select Western and Eastern European countries. I intend to evaluate the degree of cohesion between US foreign policy and the international activity of private foundations, identifying any possible connections between them in the enhancement of democracy in Europe. It is of highest significance to determine whether these efforts were parallel and complementary, separate and independent, or even in conflict or competition.

American Private Foundations and Reinforcement of Democracy in the Cold War Europe, 1945-1968: Rockefeller Foundation as the Case Study

January 1, 2012

My study examines the role of the Rockefeller Foundation (RF) in the processes of delivering democratic values, enhancing democratic behavior, reeducating societies in democratic processes and conduct, and promoting free exchanges of ideas and scholarly pursuits in Europe during the initial period of the Cold War. At the same time, I wanted to find out if there were any existing relations between the RF and the U.S. government in the broadly defined goal of promoting democratic actions in the countries of Western and Eastern Europe. My intention was also to assess the function that select American universities performed in establishing networks of scientific cooperation with institutions and research centers in Western and Eastern Europe that received RF funding. The democratic values were to be reinforced within the nations that suffered from totalitarian regimes, that needed reeducation and reestablishment of civic behavior, freedom of intellectual exchanges, and a willingness for peaceful cooperation.

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