Malia Says Many Soviet Youths Cynical Towards Official Policy

Many university students in the Soviet Union are cynical toward Communist indoctrination and rigid discipline, Martin E. Malia, associate professor of History, and Richard N. Frye, associate professor of Middle Eastern Studies, asserted last night.

The students, however, retain faith in socialism as the economic "form of the future," and in the might of the Soviet Union, Malia stated. Malia and Frye gave "Impressions of Russian Travelers" in a discussion moderated by Merle Fainsod, professor of Government, in the Adams House dining room.

Malia recently returned from a fivemonths' tour to locate books and materials for the Library of Congress and several American universities. Frye, who has lived for four years in Afghanistan and Iran, spent a month visiting Soviet Central Asia.

The speeches and the question-and-answer period centered on attitudes which the people of the Soviet Union, and especially college students, feel toward the government and party-line doctrine.

The skeptical student is not actively opposed to the state, Malia said, but is often bored with the Communist way of life and resentiful of the discipline and barriers to obtaining knowledge about the West. Possession of banned literature is a common practice among students, Malia reported.

Frye indicated, however, that the peoples in Soviet Central Asia were less inclined to question Communist doctrine and policy.