Although not well known in the West, most scholars who have studied his works consider Bogdanov among the most creative and profound European thinkers of his age. Among his many other pursuits, Bogdanov was a practicing medical doctor throughout his career and helped to organize the Soviet Union's pioneering Institute for Blood Transfusion - which still exists today. He believed blood exchange not only would be good for our health, but would promote comradeship as well, referring to such a procedure as "physiological collectivism," explains Douglas W. Huestis, MD, who translated and edited Bogdanov's The Struggle for Viability: Collectivism Through Blood Exchange. To test his theories, Bogdanov persuaded Joseph Stalin, who gained control of Russia following Lenin's death, to finance the world's first institute devoted entirely to blood transfusion in Moscow in 1926.
The new volume includes both Bogdanov's book and his report of the establishment of his institute and the initial work there. These are supplemented by a critical account of his life and work, which largely have been unknown to the Western medical world. (Bogdanov's relative obscurity may be explained in part as a result of his bitter break with V.I. Lenin, founder of the Russian Communist Party. Lenin proceeded to attack Bogdanov's ideas, branding them as false and anti-Marxist, according to biographical material.) An epilogue tells the story of Bognanov's institute to the present day. "His ideas regarding blood transfusion seem like an off-the-wall concept to us today," Dr. Huestis says. "Bogdanov, himself, was a participant in 12 of these experiments. It is ironic that he died as a result of the last of these transfusions...I don't think he was a great medical scientist by any means - he is much better known among systems scientists -- but my Russian colleagues worship his memory.
His great work on organizational science foreshadowed present developments in the field of cybernetics."
A clinical pathologist, specializing in blood transfusion and transplantation, Dr. Huestis is emeritus professor at the UA College of Medicine. In addition to numerous scientific articles, he wrote a textbook of blood transfusion with two colleagues. He also has written several pieces of fiction and of medical history. Dr Huestis also spent time at the Institute for Blood Transfusion in 1976, where he developed a keen interest in Bogdanov and his book on blood transfusion.
EDITORS PLEASE NOTE: Review copies of this book are available upon request.
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