2021 年 31 巻 1 号 p. 47-71
This paper focuses on the communication between Japanese Mendelian geneticists and Soviet Michurinists, including Ivan Glushchenko, at the International Genetics Symposia in Tokyo and Kyoto, September 1956. The Symposia attracted attention because a Soviet delegation had not attended an international genetics meeting in Western Bloc countries since 1932. More importantly, the Symposia were held five months after T. D. Lysenko's resignation from the presidency of the Lenin All-Union Academy of Agricultural Sciences. The Soviet delegates, particularly Glushchenko, aimed to rescue the international reputation of the Michurinist school through "diplomacy" in Japan. After his return to the USSR, Glushchenko utilized the favorable response the Soviet delegation received in Japan to enhance the standing of the Soviet Michurinists in the USSR Academy of Sciences. At a personal level, some members of the Organizing Committee in Japan, including Hitoshi Kihara and Yoshito Shinoto, were motivated to communicate directly with the Soviet Michurinists in connection with their own research interests. Glushchenko, Kihara, and Shinoto benefited from their individual exchanges at the Symposia and from their continued collaborations and correspondence afterwards. I present the 1956 Symposia as a unique case where geneticists belonging to opposing scientific camps sought collaboration with each other, seeing beyond their disagreements.
