User:Shadowowl/Ger Harmsen

This article is a translation of nl:Ger Harmsen, and is likely, in my opinion, suitable for the encyclopedia. However, there are currently numerous grammatical issues stemming, I think, from the translation process. Nearly every sentence includes examples of poor word choices, tense usage, and other clumsiness. Also, please add the full citation of Fortuyn 1988 and Schaminée 2000. I find that enough work is needed that it is best to decline at this time and encourage further development.

Gerrit Jan (Ger) Harmsen (Amsterdam, 15 mei 1922 – De Knipe, 3 April 2005) was a Dutch philosopher and historian. He was a connoisseur of Marxism and the history of Labor movement. Harmsen saw himself as a child of the unemployment years, the Second World War and especially the Cold War. Ger Harmsen was intensively engaged in nature studies in different periods of his life, especially with Phytosociology and bryology, studying moss.

Biography

Youth

Ger Harmsen was born as the eldest son of a carpenter, Jan Harmsen (1899 - 1971) and Emma Clasina Blase (1902-1969). They were married in 1921. Three of his four grandparents were illiterate; two of them have learned to read and write later in life. "Interest in nature was not given out of home, because other things asked for more attention: there was the need to get food on the table. Books were not present at home. ".

Ger was born when his parents lived in the Indian Neighborhood with his grandparents. It would take several years before they had their own home. Although they were Reformed, the parents of Ger Harmsen were atheist after their marriage.

In the time Harmsen had to go to elementary school, his parents moved to Tuindorp Oostzaan. His father worked at Werkspoor. But when he was fired, they returned to the Indian neighborhood in Amsterdam. Jan Harmsen then started his own business and built a company in shop machines. Ger worked from an early age to join this company. His brother Jo would take over the business later.

Ger was a child with poor health. He struggled with chronic bronchitis. After he spent several months in a cottage settlement in Egmond aan Zee in 1933, he was cured. His health was one of the reasons that he was an "outcast" was without friends in elementary school. Another reason was the fact that he visited at least six different primary schools.

After primary school

After primary school, from 1933 to 1937, Ger visited the Amstelschool for lower trade education at the former Stadstimmer garden (in 1941 there would be the Jewish Lyceum). He met his first friend, Henk Brouwer. Under his influence, Harmsen discovered nature in 1935. He raised a great love for plants and became a fanatic botanist. From then on, flowers went to him more than "study, a job, progress or girls". Nevertheless, he managed to finish the trade school with good results, to accept his first job in January 1938 with a tobacco trader. Work at the tobacco trade was unsuccessful and in May 1938 Ger Harmsen was working at the Dutch Cocaine Factory NV, a chemical company where opiates such as heroin, morphine, and codeine were partly manufactured from opium and partly synthetically. He graduated as a chemical analyst and continued to work with the company until 1941.

The NJN

Now that he earned his own money, he could become a member of the Dutch Youth League for Nature Studies (NJN), which for a number of years - until the World War II (World War II) - would be the focal point of his world. In the NJN Harmsen made more friends, for example, Chris Homburg, who worked like a chemical plant. Together they floated in their scanty free time through the Netherlands along youth hostels. Every weekend, Harmsen went on an excursion. He learned within the NJN to know a group of young plant sociologists, including Victor Westhoff, Jacques Meltzer, Wim Margadant, Huib de Miranda and Han Alta. He also became active in the "shock group" ("shock" was in the NJN the word for plant sociology) and also began to be interested in mosses. Harmsen became administrator of the shock group and in 1942 editor of the magazine Kruipnieuws . In the NJN-era, between 1938 and 1942, his first publications in the section leaflet, the Amsterdam leaflet, The Ink Mushroom and in Kruipnieuws were published: a total of twelve articles on botanical subjects.

The few NJNs who worked at an office or factory found each other at Kolland, an estate between Amerongen and Leersum between the Lower Rhine and the Utrechtse Heuvelrug . The feelings of Harms by the NJN were double. The NJN consisted mainly of high school students and students. For Ger, the NJN was, therefore, an elite club: "A worker's boy would rather not have been in the board", because they lacked culture. Nevertheless, the NJN meant a lot for Harmsen, although he could not attend many of the camps because he only left one week a year. The meeting with students and students also left the need to go to high school.

WO II

Very slowly he also started to develop a political interest in him; discussions in the NJN contributed to this to a large extent. He regarded himself as a humanist, rejected National Socialism, but there was no practical form of resistance.

He met Annie van der Lugt, who lived with her mother in Apeldoorn. He responded to the offer to come home with them and follow the fifth grade of the national HBS. Very slowly a love relationship developed with Annie. Harmsen became chairman of the NJN's Apeldoorn department. On 1 June 1943, together with Annie, he obtained the diploma HBS-B.

Immediately after the final exam, Ger was employed in Germany. The intention of the massive ([Allies of World War II Alliance] bombardments escaped him. Did they amplify his anti-American? feelings. The work fell heavy on him. Harmsen suffered from pneumonia and pleuritis on both sides and ended up in a hospital. He also got the measles. Through a contact with the German plant sociologist and botanist Reinhold Tüxen, he succeeded in being employed at his research institute in[Stolzenau|Stolzenau am Weser]]. The necessary papers were signed by Speer and Göring personally. In the eight to nine months that he stayed in Stolzenau, Ger became fully acquainted with plant sociology. After the British armies had occupied Stolzenau in April 1945, Harmsen returned to the Netherlands. Afterward, he regretted:"I had a job in Stolzenau, and I could probably have kept it".

On 19 September 1945 Ger Harmsen and Annie van der Lugt married in Amsterdam. They went to live in the Indian neighborhood. The day after his marriage, Ger's father came by to tell him that he was divorcing from his wife.

It would take until 1957 before Harmsen started to develop field biology activities again.

The first CPN-period

In 1946, Harmsen had registered as a member of the Communist Party of the Netherlands (CPN) - that was the expression of his 'desire to belong to a left mass movement'. The first post-war years were a period in which the "revolutionary expectations" were high. In the first post-war elections the CPN won almost eleven percent of the votes for the House of Representatives. In the period of the Cold War that followed, this revolutionary élan would largely evaporate. Harmsen was quickly introduced to the principles of marxism-leninism and was introduced to texts of the "classics": Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin. In 1947 Harmsen became the CPN's national training leader. He was to remain so until 1952. In this time he published educational texts as well as a large number of articles in Politics & Culture, The Truth and other party bodies. Through his work, Harmsen came to all corners of the country to give courses and he got to know the party well. He was also given the leadership of the party school in Laren, in the Louis de Visser House, named after the pre-war chairman of the party, Louis de Visser, who had died in the war. The party school was disbanded in 1949. He became involved in "Pegasus", the communist publishing house. As part of his work, Harmsen also had contact with Paul de Groot, the party's political leader.

In the period when Harmsen was training leader in the CPN, he was generally loyal to the party line: his contributions are characterized by dogmatic Marxism and his political views are undisguised stalinist. Harmsen himself considered the most important problem of this period of his life to be that he did not learn in the CPN to respect people, even if they had a great record of service. "The CPN did not teach me to hold my own, to recognize the human side of politics and to get an eye for relationships."

At the end of 1951, Harmsen was told that he had been removed from his position as national training leader. He was also banned from publishing. On December 7, 1951, a statement about his resignation was published in De Waarheid (The Truth). The training he gave was too theoretical and too intellectual, to which must be added some organizational mistakes. At a members' meeting (of the Indian Neighborhood Department) Harmsen exercised self-criticism. Harmsen was still active in the party department, he was even used as an instructor here at a certain point.

Doctoraalexamen

Shortly after he had been dismissed by the CPN, Harmsen decided to study philosophy. He studied with, among others, Jacques Presser and H.J. Pos on December 9, 1955, Harmsen took a Ph.D. in Philosophy, History, and Russian.

Active again and again out of the party, and now for good

The political climate change in the Soviet Union after Stalin's death in 1953 also led to a change of course in the CPN. As a result, Harmsen was able to return to work in the party immediately after his doctoral examination. Harry Verheij invited him, on behalf of the party board, to work for the publishing house Pegasus. He went back to writing for "Politics & Culture" and prepared the publication of books. He also published a brochure entitled 'The current class struggle in our country' (1956). In April 1956, the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union took place in which Nikita Khrushchev gave his speech on the errors and crimes of Stalin. Harmsen went through a "deep crisis of conscience. Could one still call oneself 'Communist' with good decency, after it had become clear that 'the dream of a human world' was in fact 'a terrorist regime that had claimed millions of victims'? The [[De-Stalinization|destalization] of the CPN did not continue, and another global phenomenon then crossed the slow-moving liberalization. Harmsen was one of those who defended the besieged communist stronghold against popular anger. Nevertheless, there were soon controversies between him and the party leadership. In that conflict, he received support from the leaders of the Trade Union Confederation Unit (EVC), the communist trade union. Harmsen resigned as a party official in the spring of 1957. His health left him in the lurch and his marriage also fell into crisis. His wife Geert and he "handed in their party books".

1957 - 1971: Teacher, doctoral candidate and scientific assistant

From 1957 to 1961 Harmsen was a history teacher in Zierikzee at the Professor of Sea Manlyceum. At that time he broke with his wife Geert. In 1961 he married Albertine Françoise (Tienka) Wiersma. In his Zierikzeese years, Harmsen hardly developed any political activities, although he did feel related to the Bridge group. He took up work on his dissertation again. On 4 July 1961] he was promoted cum laude on Blue and red youth: a contribution to the history of the Dutch youth movement between 1853 and 1940 with [[Jacques Presser|prof.]. J. Presser. The youth movement would also remain interested in the future. In 1962 he published a booklet on the Young People's Total Owners' Union (JGOB) and in 1969 on the Dutch Association of Abstinent Students (NBAS). In 1961 Harmsen was appointed as a teacher at the P.C. Hooft-lyceum in Amsterdam. He moved to Buitenveldert.

In the early sixties, Harmsen began to play an increasingly important role in the debate on the [[Marxism|Marxism], which also developed in the Netherlands at that time of destalinization. He met, among others, Bernard Delfgaauw. In 1964 Harmsen edited the collection 'The topicality of Marx', in which he depicted the introductions of and discussions between and with seven speakers; in 1968 he published a collection of poems entitled 'Marx contra de Marxist ideologues: historical-physiological reflections'.

In 1964 Ger Harmsen became a member of the [[Pacifist Socialist Party|Pacifistic Socialist Party] (PSP)], although in a statement in Liberation' - the party magazine - of 24 October 1964 he stated that he was not a pacifist.

In September 1965 Harmsen became an employee of the Documentation Centre for the Newest History (DNG) at the Politiek-Social Faculty of the University of Amsterdam, where Frits de Jong Edz ruled. For the theoretical introduction to a course for future MAVO history teachers, he made a text, which would later become Harmsen's best-known and best-selling work as the "Introduction to History", with a circulation of more than 40,000 copies.

Harmsen collaborated on various periodicals, such as the anarchist magazine 'Buiten de perken' (Outside the Limits). This was abolished in 1966. In 1967 he ended up in the editorial staff of The New Voice, which was the successor of the humanist body The Voice of Dirk Coster. This became part of the Interlinks in 1968. In addition to Harmsen, the editors included Marius Broekmeyer, [[Wouter Gortzak] and Frits de Jong. Harmsen withdrew from the editorial staff after only one song. By the way, the magazine was abolished in 1971. Later Harmsen joined in on Te Elfder Ure.

In 1966, Tienka and Ger Harmsen had their first child, but it only lived for a few days. On October 14, 1968, Tienka gave birth to a son, Roelant Jan, and on January 7, 1970, his daughter Jantien was born.

In the first years on the DNG Harmsen published a lot about the history of the labor movement, especially that of the CPN and the Komintern. He studied the lives of communists such as Alex de Leeuw, Daan Goulooze and [[Gerben Wagenaar]. After Goulooze died in 1965, Harmsen wrote it for the first time in 1967: 'Daan Goulooze: from the life of a communist'. On the occasion of the book, Harmsen was interviewed by Martin de Ruyter for De Volkskrant]: his first interview and photo in a newspaper. Harmsen also got overstrained for the first time. In 1967 Ger Harmsen bought a small farm in [[De Knipe] in [[Friesland], which he calls 'De Weegbree'.

In the first years on the DNG Harmsen published a lot about the history of the labor movement, especially that of the CPN and the Komintern. He studied the lives of communists such as Alex de Leeuw, Daan Goulooze and Gerben Wagenaar. After Goulooze died in 1965, Harmsen wrote it for the first time in 1967: 'Daan Goulooze: from the life of a communist'. On the occasion of the book, Harmsen was interviewed by Martin de Ruyter for De Volkskrant: his first interview and photo in a newspaper. Harmsen also got overstrained for the first time. In 1967 Ger Harmsen bought a small farm in De Knipe in Friesland, which he calls 'De Weegbree'.

Youth- and Student movement

Harmsen had close contacts with the emerging youth movement, which manifested itself from 1959 onwards. He held lectures at meetings, wrote articles and participated in public discussions. He experienced the Democratisation movement among students at the universities at first hand. He sometimes held some 'old-fashioned' points of view, for example with regard to the control over the quality and content of the study and the testing of study results. Around 1969, the student movement began to focus increasingly explicitly on the worker movement. In a project group of mainly [[Political science|politicology] students, Harmsen contributed to a comparative study of the history of the student and labor movement. The results of this work were incorporated into the book by Frits de Jong - 'Power and participation, the struggle for democratization at the University of Amsterdam' (1981). -

In 1969 Harmsen became a member of the board of the Federation of Scientific Researchers (VWO). From 1971 to 1973 he was chairman.

In 1970 Harmsen came into contact with Hugues Boekraad and Sjef van de Wiel of the Socialistische Uitgeverij Nijmegen (SUN). The SUN was a publishing house and also a printing house run by a student collective. In 1971 Harmsen's first publication on the history of socialism and the labor movement (initially intended for internal use) appeared as a working publication for the SUN, the first edition still anonymous. A year later followed a bibliography of the history of the labor movement. Articles by Harmsen were also published in 'Te Elfder Ure' (TEU), a magazine that came into being in 1954 and was taken over by the SUN. In particular, the 'Against Labour Tourism and Sociologism', published in TEU in 1971, was widely read and discussed by the student movement. The SUN gradually developed into a professional publisher. For a number of years, Harmsen had a lot of involvement in SUN publications in the field of the history of the Dutch labor movement

In June 1971 Harmsen completed his education at DNG after he had been appointed as a scientific assistant for philosophy at the Rijksuniversiteit Groningen

Subsequent career

In 1973 werd Harmsen hoogleraar dialectische filosofie en historische sociologie aan de Rijksuniversiteit Groningen (RUG). Harmsen werd lid van de PvdA.

Harmsen died at the age of 83 in his home town of [[De Knipe] (municipality of Heerenveen).

Bibliography

The complete overview of Ger Harmsen's publications between 1938 and 1987 is 56 pages long. A small selection of these publications:

• 1947: De weg naar een nieuwe wereld. Beknopt overzicht van de doelstellingen van het communisme; met Evert Jan Harmsen ("geen familie")
• 1956: De huidige klassenstrijd in ons land. (anoniem). Amsterdam : CPN
• 1961: Blauwe en rode jeugd : een bijdrage tot de geschiedenis van de Nederlandse jeugdbeweging tussen 1853 en 1940; proefschrift (reprint 1973 bij uitg. SUN, Nijmegen)
• 1962: J.G.O.B. De geschiedenis van de Jongelieden Geheelonthoudersbond van oprichting tot opheffing (1912 – 1950). Z.p., z.j.
• 1964: De actualiteit van Marx : een symposium (red.). Den Haag : uitg. Kruseman.
• 1967: Daan Goulooze : uit het leven van een communist (een tweede herziene druk uit 1980 draagt de titel Rondom Daan Goulooze : uit het leven van kommunisten)
• 1967: De Russische Revolutie : terugblik vijftig jaar later. Amsterdam : uitg. Bevrijding. 61 pp. Bewerking van 7 artikelen in Radikaal.
• 1968: Inleiding tot de geschiedenis. Bilthoven : uitg. AMBO.
• 1968: Marx contra de marxistische ideologen : historisch-wijsgerige beschouwingen (reprint 1974 bij uitg. SUN, Nijmegen. ISBN 90-6168-509-5)
• 1969: Wij zijn jong, de aard' ligt open : NBAS tussen twee wereldoorlogen. Amsterdam : uitg. Contact.
• 1970: Lenin, filosoof van de revolutie. Baarn: Wereldvenster.
• 1971: 'Tegen arbeiderisme en sociologisme'. In: Te Elfder Ure, 18e jaargang, dubbelnummer 9/10 - thema: studenten- en arbeidersbeweging; p. 429 – 474
• 1972: Historisch overzicht van socialisme en arbeidersbeweging in Nederland (werkuitgave). Nijmegen : Uitg. SUN. ISBN 90 6168 752 7
• 1972: 'Ekonomie, politiek en geschiedenis'. In: Te Elfder Ure, 19e jaargang nr. 9 - thema: studenten- en arbeidersbeweging III; p. 522 - 543
• 1972: Idee en beweging. Nijmegen : uitg. SUN; SUN-schrift 57. ISBN 90 6168 057 3 - "bibliografiese aanwijzingen bij de studie en het onderzoek van de geschiedenis van socialisme en arbeidersbeweging in Nederland"
• 1974: Natuur, geschiedenis, filosofie (Rede uitgesproken bij de aanvaarding van het ambt van gewoon hoogleraar in de dialektische wijsbegeerte aan de R.U. Groningen op 26 November 1974). Nijmegen : uitg. SUN. ISBN 90 6168 089 1
• 1975: Voor de bevrijding van de arbeid : beknopte geschiedenis van de Nederlandse vakbeweging (met Bob Reinalda)
• 1977: Leven en werk van Alex de Leeuw : het Nederlandse kommunisme tussen de wereldoorlogen
• 1979: Hamer of aambeeld? Een en ander uit de geschiedenis van de amsterdamse arbeidersbeweging ter gelegenheid van het negentigjarig bestaan van de Industriebond NVV afdeling Amsterdam. Amsterdam : Uitgave Industriebond NVV. 112 p.
• 1986: Biografisch Woordenboek van het Socialisme en de Arbeidersbeweging in Nederland (mederedacteur) (9 delen, 1986–2003)
• 1992: Natuurbeleving en arbeidersbeweging : de Nederlandse socialistische arbeidersbeweging in haar relatie tot natuur en milieu. Amsterdam : uitg. Nivon. ISBN 90 70601 31 1
• 1993: Herfsttijloos (Colchicum autumnale) : een levensverhaal (autobiografie). Nijmegen : uitg. SUN. ISBN 90 6168 397 1
• 1998: Nieuwe inleiding tot de geschiedenis. Nijmegen : uitg. SUN. ISBN 90 6168 638 5
• 1998: Passie voor Mossen. Een historische schets van de Nederlandse bryologie en lichenologie ter gelegenheid van het 50-jarig bestaan van de Bryologische en Lichenologische Werkgroep van de KNNV. Utrecht.

References

[[:Category:University of Groningen faculty]] [[:Category:Marxists]] [[:Category:Dutch philosophers]] [[:Category:Dutch historians]]