University of Virginia Health System

U.VA. Center Presents Results of Five-Year Project to Reduce Ethnic Tension in Estonia

For the past five years, faculty from the University of Virginia Center for the Study of Mind and Human Interaction (CSMHI) have been working to reduce ethnic tension in the Baltic Republic of Estonia. On April 30 and May 1, they will present the methods and results of their Estonia project at a two-day conference at U.Va.'s Miller Center of Public Affairs in Charlottesville. The conference will culminate in the U.S. premiere of The Dragon's Egg, a documentary on the Estonia project by noted Canadian filmmaker Allan King.

CSMHI, the only center of its kind affiliated with an academic medical center, was founded in 1988 to study large-group issues such as ethnic tension, racism, national identity and societal trauma. Its faculty includes psychoanalysts, psychiatrists, former diplomats, historians and political scientists, whose combined perspectives enable in-depth analysis of the political, historical and social issues as well as the psychological processes that drive large-group dynamics.

The Estonia project evolved from CSMHI's collaboration with Soviet psychologists in 1990 to examine U.S.-Soviet relations. After the Soviet Union collapsed, CSMHI turned its attention to the Baltic state of Estonia, where the newly re-independent country struggled with both external and internal difficulties in the sudden shift from Soviet communist domination to democracy.

Tensions were high, said Dr. Vamik Volkan, CSMHI founder and director. Native Estonians blamed the Russians for the chaos, and the Russians, humiliated over the loss of their empire, were frustrated with the Estonians. Of the 1.5 million people in Estonia, one-third of them were Russian speakers. Our goal was to break down the psychological resistances to peaceful collaboration and coexistence.

In collaboration with The Carter Center, a humanitarian organization founded by former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, Volkan's group held a series of psychopolitical meetings in Estonia every few months. These meetings brought together influential leaders from Estonia and Russia as well as Russian speakers in Estonia and were designed to facilitate and encourage discussion of key issues.

Two years into the dialogue meetings, the Pew Charitable Trusts awarded CSMHI $650,000 to foster ethnic reconciliation in Estonian communities. After visiting towns throughout the country, the group chose the towns of Klooga, Mustvee and Mustamae, a suburb of the capital Tallinn, to participate in the community-building projects. Each town was given funds for its project.

The village of Klooga was an abandoned Soviet military base. It was a garbage dump, Volkan said. Soviet soldiers had left behind their wives and children, and the Estonians had moved in on the free housing suddenly available. The Estonians and Russians living there, therefore, did not even know each other and yet they faced a myriad of environmental and other health hazards. For example, they were freezing in the winter as the heating plant was inoperable and sewer lines were also broken.

Adding to these problems, Volkan said, the Estonian military began to use the fields surrounding Klooga for target practice, because they couldn't shake the image of it as a Russian military base, even after Estonians themselves moved there for free housing. CSMHI's community-building project in Klooga is the subject of the film The Dragon's Egg that will premiere on Saturday evening of the two-day conference.

In Mustamae, CSMHI facilitated meetings between Russian and Estonian teachers and parents, who developed the idea of a collaboration between Russian and Estonian kindergartens. The goal was to have the Russian children learn the Estonian language and history so they could become more a part of where they live, Volkan said. From the collaboration, new textbooks were produced for teachers on how to teach the Estonian language.

In Mustvee, a rural community, collaborative efforts between Russians and Estonians was more difficult to inspire. Russians — old believers — had emigrated to this location 400 years ago, Volkan said. When the Soviet Union collapsed, they lost their market and had no way to make a living, which led to tensions in the community. Ethnic issues suddenly rose to the surface. When the group brought together 10 Russians and 10 Estonians, they wouldn't listen to each other, so CSMHI invited former Charlottesville Mayor Bitsy Waters to consult. After visiting the community, she suggested they give up the idea of a big project and work on smaller projects instead. One project involved the preservation and display of ancient books as a tourist attraction.

Volkan said the key to the success of the Estonia project was the CSMHI faculty's willingness to immerse themselves completely in the Estonian culture to understand the country's problems. We didn't come in as experts telling them what to do. We used our unique psychology-based perspective to help them develop their own solutions to improve their communities. We hope this project will serve as a psychological model for group mediation in other countries.

For more information on the conference or the Estonia project, call the Center for the Study of Mind and Human Interaction at (804) 982-1045.

April 16, 1999