Navigating global socialism: Tanzanian students in and beyond East Germany

Eric Burton

doi:10.1080/14682745.2018.1485146

Navigating global socialism: Tanzanian students in and beyond East Germany

Cold War Hist. 2018 Jun 25;19(1):63-83. doi: 10.1080/14682745.2018.1485146. eCollection 2019.

Author

Eric Burton^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ Research Project 'Socialism Goes Global', Department of History, University of Exeter, UK.
² Department of African Studies, University of Vienna, Vienna, Exeter.

Abstract

This article investigates tensions and dynamics in global socialism through a focus on Tanzanian students in East Germany between the late 1950s and 1990. Disciplinary techniques partially known from Tanzania and everyday strategies of survival explain why most students complied with official requirements, but did not necessarily agree with East German ideological tenets. Additionally, throughout the decades, mobility across the Iron Curtain remained an important strategy to further own interests. The article concludes that an analytical framework spanning several decades and paying attention to dynamics in the country of origin sheds new light on agency and mobility among 'East', 'West', and 'South' during the Cold War.

Keywords: East Germany; Tanzania; mobility; socialism; students.

Grants and funding

Research has been funded by the Austrian Science Fund (FWF) within the framework of the research project ‘Personal Cooperation in “Development Aid” and “Socialist Aid” in the Context of System Competition’ (P-25949-G16). This work was further supported by a scholarship (Abschlussstipendium) from the University of Vienna.