A Life Spent in Political Geography Radovan Pavić (Delnice, 30 June 1933 – Zagreb, 4 May 2020) In memoriam

In early May, Radovan Pavić, a full professor at the University of Zagreb, died at the age of 87. The news of his death was mentioned in several electronic publications, and suitable tributes were published on the web pages of the institutions in which the professor was active. In the journal Politički misao, published by the Faculty of Political Sciences, an obituary appeared by Marta Zorko, and Ivan Zupanc paid his respects on the Geography Department pages of the Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics website. Neither of these obituaries was typical – instead of listing the usual factual information and highlighting standard career achievements, Pavić’s junior colleagues wrote warm, personal accounts of the professor they had met when his professional career was already on the wane. Although they knew him for only a relatively short period, what they wrote showed that he was truly an exceptional person. Since I got to know him much earlier, at what was probably the height of his professional career and full strength, when the political map of the world was very different from the present one, I am deeply honoured to respond to the invitation by the editor of Vijenac to record some of my own personal memories.

Pavić was my professor when I studied Geography. His primary institution was the Faculty of Political Sciences, but he also lectured to geography students at the Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics. Although he was unquestionably firmly attached to the faculty where he was employed, I have reason to believe that he considered himself primarily to be a geographer. In fact, he took his first degree in Geography (1957), his second in Economics (1965), and defended his dissertation in Geography (1978). The course he taught (according to my old student record book) was officially called ‘Geographic Aspects of the Political Structure of the World’, but we used to call it colloquially ‘Political Geography’, and that is in fact what it was. Among all the other kinds of geography (urban, transport, tourist, etc.), political geography is for me the ‘queen’ among disciplines, and I was fortunate to be introduced to it by Radovan Pavić. The course was taught for two semesters in the fourth and final year of our studies. In my case, this was the academic year 1979/1980. If I remember well, Pavić’s lectures were held in the afternoons or early evenings, which were not the most popular times, but we attended regularly and listened with interest. Students can easily tell when a lecturer is well prepared and focused on his material, and they appreciate an open, frank, and well-meaning approach, which Pavić certainly had. He would bring huge hand-made posters to the lectures, showing individual topics presented in map form. He would place them on the board before he started, then concentrate on his topic and deliver his lecture enthusiastically. Students were allowed to interrupt him with questions and he was always ready to answer. None of our other professors ever prepared for lectures in the same way. There were others who were good, responsible lecturers, but none were like Pavić. The topics he chose were of great interest to me, and in fact the material he dealt with was closest to what I had imagined I would be studying when I applied to the faculty four years earlier. He taught us about the world in which we lived, divided sharply at the time into political blocs and fraught with occasional local conflicts. His lectures were right up to date, and he was not afraid to discuss current affairs, as some people were. Thanks to him, during that study year I discovered in detail the causes of and background to the Iraq-Iran war which had recently broken out. In his lectures interpreting political processes and phenomena in their spatial dimension, Pavić linked various elements in a wide range, from relief to ideology. He gave the impression of having the whole world at his fingertips, he knew the best mountain passes and sea passages, the ethnic make-up of the population in little- known African countries, distant islands and remote regions, the local names for certain geographical objects, and so on. He would draw the locations of oil-fields and other strategic mineral deposits on his posters, show where the great powers had maritime bases and services, and mark with arrows the direction taken from the Heartland to the Rimland and the coastal warm waters. He would link all these things to events in the past and note regularities. He knew who conquered which cities or territories and when, and when boundaries were formed or changed. Finally, I had the opportunity to hear why and about what exhausting wars in the Near East were being fought, why Israel was in conflict with its neighbours, and who was merciless battering Lebanon with civil war. I learned about some of these and similar topics on other courses, too, but nobody could interpret them as convincingly as Pavić.

After graduating, I met Professor Pavić again quite soon, in the mid-1980s. I was employed at the Lexicographical Institute, and the first project I worked on was the Atlas of the World. When Pavić heard about the project, he offered his cooperation to the editor-in-chief, who accepted it. Pavić was attracted to the project because it allowed him to place a large number of his own texts and accompanying maps in a single publication, and to have them professionally produced in colour. As ever, he was motivated by the desire to affirm political geography. However, it should be mentioned that Pavić had a particular approach to dealing with topics, and the contributions he produced were not always exactly in the form and format required by a publication which had its own internal ‘discipline’ and house style. My role was to be a sort of liaison officer between Pavic and the cartographers who transformed his sketches into atlas contributions. During the next two or three years, which is how long it took to prepare the edition, Pavić produced about 80 contributions on individual states, parts of continents, and entire continents. In his own way, and with the emphasis on cartographic depiction, he covered all parts of the world and in fact produced the first real geopolitical atlas in the Atlas. Each of his contributions consisted of a cartographic sketch, which the institute’s cartographers would transform into a full-colour thematic map, and an accompanying description, which I had to summarise as briefly as possible for the map legend. I had various other tasks within the same project, and gained a great deal of work experience at the institute, but my collaboration with Professor Pavić was by far the most interesting and intellectually motivating. We discussed each of his contributions in detail before I took it over, so that the time we spent together turned into a sort of political geography tutorial for me, in which I was privileged to be the only student. After explaining each contribution to me orally, he and I would develop the use of colours and symbols on the maps and agree on the terminology to be used. Then I would take the results of our discussion to the cartographers and supervise their work. Although there was a wide age difference between us, and of course our statuses of professor and former student lay in the background, he accepted me as an equal co-worker, which was his usual style.

Thanks to our cooperation at work, I began to receive invitations to Pavić’s occasional public appearances. He used to give occasional public lectures at the Academy, in the University Teachers’ Club, and at forums held by geographical or other professional societies. He was particularly fond of such occasions, to which he would invite people he considered part of his private or professional inner circles, so he began to invite me, and I was delighted to attend. He would turn up clad in a suit, which was not his usual dress code. He was always thoroughly prepared, with some new posters and illustrations of which he was rightly proud. From that time (the mid-1980s), I remember a lecture he gave on Europe as a common home with no borders or divisions. Today, the topic may seem passé, but then, it was prophetic. It led me to start following events with much greater understanding and enthusiasm – events which several years later led to the fall of the Berlin Wall.

Having become part of Pavić’s moderately-sized, completely informal circle, I came to know something about his private life too. He used to invite me sometimes for work purposes to his elderly parents’ flat in Boškovićeva St. I also went to his flat in Knežija, which he had turned into a personal library. His library, which was divided between the two flats, was impressive. He started his collection at a time when it was not at all easy to find foreign books or journals. It contained not only classic textbooks on political geography, but large numbers of other titles on wider geographic or political topics. A special space was reserved for atlases, particularly thematic atlases, of which he was very fond. They were his inspiration and the basis on which he developed and honed his own cartographic concept, which was his professorial forté and trademark. Apart from professional literature, there were works of fiction in his library, too. My wife and I recall that Professor Pavić lent us Bulgakov’s The Master and Margarita. It contained not only Bulgakov’s novel, but entertaining marginal notes by Professor Pavić.

My cooperation with Professor Pavić continued after the Atlas was published, particularly after the Lexicographical Institute employed another of his former students, Duško Topalović. He worked with us on the Atlas of Europe published in 1997, in which we tried to use what Pavić had taught us to depict a new geopolitical picture of the European continent. Pavić always followed what we were doing with great attention and selflessly praised us for the atlas. He continued to invite us to his public lectures and brought us his new work, which he published himself, less and less in professional journals, and more and more in newspapers. He certainly published a great deal. As students, we were familiar with his study notes, which were published in several volumes for those taking his courses. They included contributions by other authors, chosen by him, of course, but mostly he had written them himself. I still look at them sometimes. It is absolutely correct to say that he was founder of political geography in Croatia. When we speak about its beginnings, Filip Lukas and the versatile Ivo Pilar must also be mentioned. In their works, which were published before Pavić was born, there is indeed a political-geographical element, but they were pioneering works, the first flashes and hints of a discipline which as yet had no system. It was not until Pavić appeared on the scene that political geography in Croatia became a fully valid university discipline. It was elevated to the status of a university course in the early 1960s thanks to Radovan Pavić, first as a political, then as a geographical course, and then for the next four decades, to the end of the century, he developed it independently and systematically, educating generations of students and writing only about topics that were generally relevant to the field. Painfully aware that he was operating alone, he issued insistent warnings about the problems of having a ‘field of expertise with no experts’, and about the need to pay more social attention to political geography.

In the 1990s, he began to show signs of tiring. He stopped being a regular lecturer in the Geography Department, published less and less in professional journals, and did not keep up as much with developments in the field throughout the world. He was greatly occupied with what was happening on our own doorstep. The collapse of Yugoslavia and the invasion of Croatia affected him emotionally, but not in a backward-looking sense. He had no illusions about the enemy’s goals, and as soon as mass meetings started and the first barricades went up, it was clear to him that the problems would not just go away. He had no faith at all in the UN peace mission and cautioned from the beginning against repeating the Cyprus model, which would have divided Croatia permanently. He expressed his opposition in the only way he knew – by writing. He wrote in newspapers, needing quick access to the public. He appeared occasionally on television programmes which were often devoted to war topics in the early 1990s. Among other things, he was an occasional guest on Slikom na sliku, one of the most respected television talk shows of the time with the highest ratings. Dubravko Merlić, the host of the programme, included an interview with Pavić in a book with selected interviews between 1992 and 1994. Pavić also cooperated with Matrix Croatica, as he was very aware of the social importance of that institution. When the Department of Geography and Demography was formed at the Matrix in 1991, he was in the first row. Later, he wrote for Vijenac, and gave occasional public lectures at the Matrix.

There is much more to say about the opus which Radovan Pavić has left behind. Today, there are fewer and fewer professors who are devoted to their subject without reserve and without considering personal advantages. Professor Radovan Pavić was and is a synonym for political geography in Croatia. We will miss his lectures and articles, but above all, we will miss his original cartographic depictions.

Published in Croatian in Vijenac No. 686, 18 June 2020

Početkom svibnja u dobi od 87 godina preminuo je Radovan Pavić, redoviti profesor Sveučilišta u Zagrebu. Vijest o smrti profesora Pavića prenijelo je nekoliko elektroničkih glasila, a prigodne tekstove objavile su na svojim stranicama i ustanove u okviru kojih je profesor djelovao. Na stranicama časopisa Politička misao, koji izlazi u nakladi Fakulteta političkih znanosti, tekst je objavila Marta Zorko, a na stranicama Geografskog odsjeka Prirodoslovno-matematičkog fakulteta od profesora se oprostio Ivan Zupanc. U oba slučaja riječ je o netipičnim nekrolozima – umjesto nizanja uobičajenih faktografskih podataka uz isticanje standardnih karijernih postignuća, Pavićevi mlađi kolege ispisali su topliji, osobni doživljaj profesora kojeg su upoznali kada je njegova profesionalna karijera već bila na zalazu. Bez obzira na činjenicu da su ga poznavali razmjerno kratko, mislim da je iz oba teksta svakome vidljivo kako je bila riječ o iznimnoj osobi. Budući da sam profesora Pavića upoznao mnogo ranije, moglo bi se reći na vrhuncu njegove profesorske karijere i u naponu snage, u vrijeme kada je politička karta svijeta izgledala mnogo drugačije nego na početku 21. stoljeća, s dubokim sam se poštovanjem odazvao pozivu urednika Vijenca da pribilježim i osobne uspomene.

Bio mi je profesor na studiju geografije. Njegova matična ustanova bio je Fakultet političkih znanosti, no predavao je i studentima geografije na Prirodoslovno-matematičkom fakultetu. Ne sporeći nimalo profesorovu privrženost fakultetu na kojem je bio zaposlen, imam razloga reći da je Pavić sam sebe ipak smatrao ponajprije geografom. Na koncu konca, geografiju je i diplomirao (1957), uz nju još i ekonomiju (1965), a i disertaciju je obranio na geografiji (1978). Njegov kolegij, provjerio sam u indeksu, službeno se nazivao „Geografski aspekt političke strukture svijeta“, no mi smo ga kolokvijalno nazivali političkom geografijom, što je zapravo bilo i točno. Od svih inih geografija (urbana, prometna, turistička) politička je geografija po meni geografska "kraljevska" disciplina, a imao sam sreću da me je u nju uveo Radovan Pavić. Kolegij se predavao dvosemestralno na četvrtoj, završnoj godini studija. Kalendarski, riječ je bila o školskoj godini 1979/80. Ako se dobro sjećam, Pavićeva su predavanja bila u poslijepodnevnom ili čak večernjem terminu, inače ne baš najpopularnijem, no dolazili smo redovito i slušali sa zanimanjem. Studenti znaju prepoznati dobro pripremljenog i sadržaju posvećenog predavača koji k tome još prema njima nastupa otvoreno, prostodušno i dobrohotno, a Pavić je bio takav. Na predavanja je donosio velike, vlastoručno izrađene plakate na kojima su pojedine teme bile kartografski predočene. Plakate koje je izrađivao vlastoručno, polijepio bi po ploči prije predavanja, a zatim bi se posvetio temi i predavao s punim žarom. Studenti su ga smjeli prekidati i postavljati mu pitanja na koja je spremno odgovarao. Nitko drugi od naših profesora nije se za predavanja pripremao na sličan način. Bilo je i drugih dobrih i odgovornih predavača, ali nijedan nije bio poput Pavića. Teme o kojima je predavao meni su bile silno zanimljive, štoviše, baš to o čemu je Pavić govorio smatrao sam da je najbliže onome kako sam zamišljao taj studij četiri godine ranije kada sam se odlučio za njega. A predavao nam je o svijetu u kojem smo živjeli, tada još blokovski oštro podijeljenom i opterećenom povremenim lokalnim sukobima. Predavanja su bila aktualna, Pavić za razliku od drugih nikad nije izbjegavao govoriti o trenutačnim temama. Zahvaljujući tome moja studijska godina detaljno se upoznala sa uzrocima i pozadinom iračko-iranskoga rata koji je baš tada izbio. U svojim predavanjima, tumačeći političke procese i pojave u njihovoj prostornoj dimenziji, Pavić je povezivao raznorodne pojave u širokom rasponu od reljefa do ideologije. Stjecao se dojam da ima cijeli svijet u malome prstu, znao je koji su najpovoljniji gorski prijevoji i morski prolazi, kakav je etnički sastav stanovništva malo poznatih afričkih zemalja, dalekih otoka i zabačenih regija, poznavao je lokalne nazive pojedinih zemljopisnih objekata, na plakate ucrtavao naftna polja i druga strateška mineralna ležišta kao i gdje koja velesila ima morske baze i služnosti, strjelicama je označavao smjer kojim sile iz Heartlanda traže put kroz Rimland do obala toplih mora. Sve te sadržaje znao je povezati sa zbivanjima u prošlosti, uočiti pravilnosti, znao je kada je tko osvojio neki grad ili komad teritorija te otkad datira i kako se mijenjala neka granica. Konačno sam imao prilike čuti zbog čega i oko čega se vode iscrpljujući ratovi na Bliskome istoku, zbog čega je Izrael u sukobu sa svim susjedima i tko se to nemilice mlati u građanskom ratu u Libanonu. Doznali smo ponešto o tim i sličnim temama i u drugim kolegijima, ali nitko to nije znao uvjerljivo rastumačiti kao Pavić.

Nakon studija s profesorom Pavićem ponovno sam se susreo razmjerno brzo, već sredinom 1980-ih godina. Zaposlio sam se u Leksikografskom zavodu i prvi projekt na kojem sam radio bio je Atlas svijeta. Kako je i Pavić dočuo za taj projekt, ponudio je svoju suradnju glavnom uredniku, a ovaj je to prihvatio. Profesora Pavića privukla je mogućnost da u jednome izdanju plasira velik broj svojih priloga te da prateće karte budu profesionalno izrađene i tiskane u boji. Kao i uvijek, vodila ga je želja za afirmacijom političke geografije. Treba znati, međutim, da je Pavić imao specifičan pristup obradi tema pa se prilozi kakve je on u uredništvo donosio po formi i formatu nisu baš savršeno uklapali u klišeje izdanja koje je imalo svoju unutarnju „disciplinu“ iznošenja građe. Moja uloga bila je da budem neka vrsta oficira za vezu između Pavića i kartografa koji su njegove skice pretvarali u atlasne priloge. U sljedeće dvije, tri godine koliko je trajala priprema izdanja, Pavić je priredio osamdesetak priloga koji su se odnosili na pojedine države, dijelove kontinenta ili cijele kontinente. Na svoj način, s naglaskom na kartografski prikaz, obradio je sve dijelove svijeta i zapravo izradio pravi geopolitički atlas u atlasu. Svaki njegov prilog sastojao se od kartografske skice, na temelju koje su zavodski kartografi izradili višebojnu tematsku kartu, i pratećega teksta, koji sam ja sažimao u što je moguće raći tumač karte. U okviru istoga projekta radio sam još kojekakve poslove i stjecao iskustvo rada u Zavodu, no upravo suradnja s profesorom Pavićem bila je daleko najzanimljiviji i intelektualno najpoticajniji posao. Svaki smo njegov prilog detaljno prokomentirali prije nego sam ga preuzeo pa se naša suradnja za mene pretvorila u svojevrsni političkogeografski seminar u kojem sam imao povlašteni status jedinog seminarista. Nakon što bi mi Pavić prepričao cijeli prilog, zajednički smo razrađivali korištenje boja i simbola na kartama te dogovarali terminologiju koja će se koristiti. Dogovoreno sam potom prenosio kartografima te nadgledao izradu. Iako je među nama razlika u godinama bila znatna, o razlici u statusu profesor-student da i ne govorimo, prihvatio me je kao ravnopravnog sugovornika kao što je i inače znao ljude prihvaćati.

Zahvaljujući suradnji na poslu, počeo sam dobivati i pozive za Pavićeve povremene javne nastupe. Naime, profesor je imao običaj povremeno držati javna predavanja u Akademiji, u Klubu sveučilišnih nastavnika, na tribini geografskog ili nekog drugog strukovnog društva. Na takva predavanja, do kojih je osobito držao, običavao je pozvati ljude koje je smatrao dijelom svog privatnog ili stručnog užeg kruga pa sam i ja počeo dobivati pozive na koje sam se rado odazivao. Na predavanja profesor bi dolazio u odijelu, što inače nije bio njegov običaj. Za predavanje se uvijek posebno dobro pripremio, što je uključivalo i izradu novih postera i plakata na koje je bio osobito ponosan. Iz tog vremena, a riječ je o sredini 1980-ih, ostalo mi je u sjećanju njegovo predavanje posvećeno Europi kao zajedničkom domu bez granica i podjela. Danas se to može činiti banalnom temom, no tada, duboko još u 1980-im godinama, bilo je to proročansko predavanje poslije kojega sam i ja s puno više razumijevanja i entuzijazma počeo pratiti događaje koji su nekoliko godina kasnije doveli do pada Berlinskoga zida.

Postavši na taj način dijelom Pavićeva nevelikog i posve neformalnog kružoka, upoznao sam se donekle i s privatnom stranom njegova života. Ponekad me je radi posla znao pozvati u stan njegovih starih roditelja u Boškovićevoj ulici, a bio sam i u njegovu stanu na Knežiji kojeg je potpuno pretvorio u osobnu knjižnicu. Pavićeva knjižnica, smještena dijelom u Boškovićevoj, a dijelom na Knežiji, bila je impresivna. Nastala u vrijeme kada nije uvijek bilo jednostavno doći do inozemnih knjiga i časopisa, sadržavala je ne samo klasične političkogeografske udžbenike i priručnike, nego i golem broj drugih naslova šire geografske i politološke tematike. Posebno mjesto zauzimali su atlasi, osobito oni tematski, kojima je Pavić bio osobito sklon. Bili su mu inspiracija na temelju koje je razvijao i usavršavao vlastitu kartografsku predodžbu koja je bila njegov profesorski forte i zaštitni znak. Osim stručne literature, našlo se u njegovoj knjižnici i beletristike. Suprugi i meni ostalo je u sjećanju da nam je upravo profesor Pavić posudio Bulgakovljeva Majstora i Margaritu. Knjigu smo, između ostaloga, zapamtili i po tome što smo osim Bulgakovljeva teksta imali priliku čitati i zabavne Pavićeve marginalije.

Suradnja s profesorom Pavićem nastavila se i nakon izlaska spomenutog Atlasa svijeta, a osobito nakon što se u Leksikografskom zavodu zaposlio i drugi njegov bivši student, kolega Duško Topalović. Surađivao je s nama na projektu Atlasa Europe objavljenom 1997, u kojem smo nas dvojica, koristeći se uvelike onome što nas je Pavić naučio, nastojali prikazati novu geopolitičku sliku europskoga kontinenta. Pavić je uvijek s najvećom pozornošću pratio sve što smo nas dvojica radili pa nas je i za taj atlas nesebično pohvalio. I dalje nas je pozivao na svoja javna predavanja te nam je donosio nove radove koje je sam objavljivao, sve manje u strukovnim glasilima, a sve više u novinama. A profesor Pavić je objavljivao mnogo. Već kao studenti upoznali smo se sa skriptama koje je njegov fakultet u više svezaka objavio za slušače Pavićevih kolegija. U tim skriptama, za kojima i danas nerijetko posegnem, bilo je i tekstova drugih autora, naravno u Pavićevu izboru, no glavninu su činili njegovi autorski tekstovi. S punim se pravom ističe da je bio utemeljitelj političke geografije u Hrvatskoj. Kada se govori o počecima discipline u nas, valja spomenuti geografa Filipa Lukasa i svestranoga Ivu Pilara. U njihovim radovima, objavljenima prije nego se Pavić rodio, ima političkogeografskih elemenata, no to su bili pionirski radovi, tek prvi strukovni bljeskovi i epizode u kojima nije bilo sustava. Sve do Pavića politička geografija u nas nije bila punopravna disciplina sveučilišnog kurikula. U sveučilišni kolegij promaknuo ju je početkom 1960-ih godina upravo Radovan Pavić, isprva na politološkom, a potom i na geografskom studiju, a potom ju je puna četiri desetljeća, sve do kraja stoljeća, samostalno ali i sustavno promicao i razvijao, odgajajući generacije studenata i pišući jedini o većini za tu struku relevantnih tema. I sam itekako svjestan svoje usamljenosti, sustavno je upozoravao na probleme "struke bez stručnjaka" i na potrebu pridavanja veće društvene pozornosti političkoj geografiji.

U 1990-im godinama počeo je ipak pokazivati znakove zamora. Prestao je redovito predavati na geografskom studiju, sve manje je objavljivao u strukovnim glasilima i sve manje pratio razvitak struke u svijetu. Bio je zaokupljen onime što se događalo u našem dvorištu. Raspad Jugoslavije i agresiju na Hrvatsku doživio je emotivno, ne i nostalgično. Nije imao iluzija o ciljevima agresora, čim su krenuli masovni mitinzi i bile postavljene prve barikade bilo mu je jasno da to neće proći tek tako. U mirovnu misiju Ujedinjenih naroda nije imao povjerenja i otpočetka je upozoravao na opasnost od ponavljanja ciparskog modela trajne podjele u Hrvatskoj. Svemu tome suprotstavljao se jedinim sredstvom koje je imao i poznavao – svojim radovima. Pisao je mnogo u novinama, tražeći prostor za brži pristup do javnosti. Nastupao je povremeno i u televizijskim emisijama koje su početkom 1990-ih često bile posvećene ratnim temama. Između ostaloga, bio je povremeni gost i u tada najcjenjenijoj pa i najgledanijoj emisiji Slikom na sliku. Dubravko Merlić, voditelj emisije, uvrstio je razgovor s Pavićem u ukoričeno izdanje s odabranim razgovorima koje je s različitim gostima emisije vodio u razdoblju 1992-94. Surađivao je Pavić i s Maticom hrvatskom, svjestan važnosti ustanove u društvu. Kada se 1991. osnivao Matičin Odjel za geografiju i demografiju, sjedio je u prvome redu. Kasnije je pisao i za Vijenac, a održao je u MH i pokoje javno predavanje. Mnogo toga trebalo bi se još kazati o djelu kojeg je Radovan Pavić ostavio za sobom. Sve su rjeđi danas takvi profesori, posvećeni svojemu predmetu bez ostatka i bez primisli o osobnom probitku. Profesor Radovan Pavić bio je i ostao sinonim za političku geografiju u Hrvata. Nedostajat će nam njegova predavanja, njegovi članci i napose originalni kartografski prikazi.

Objavljeno u Vijencu br. 686 od 18. lipnja 2020.