Piaget as scientific diplomat: Exchanges between the Geneva School and Soviet psychologists during the 1950s–60s

It is known that Jean Piaget visited the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and other socialist countries during the second half of the 20th century. However, these trips are usually mentioned in historical works as one more episode referring to Piaget's international circulations or as a marginal information in the general plan of discussing divergences, complementarities, or incompatibilities between Lev Vygotsky's psychology and Piagetian genetic psychology. In this article we intend to provide some arguments and archival evidence to open new avenues of reflection on the links between the Geneva School and Soviet psychology, based on the exchanges that Piaget and his Geneva research team had with several Soviet colleagues between 1954 and 1966. For this purpose, we have analysed some unpublished material from the documentary collection of the Centre Jean Piaget at the University of Geneva. In particular, the personal and institutional correspondence between the Swiss and Russian teams, promoted around Piaget's visits to Moscow and Leningrad in 1955 and 1966. These documents show Piaget's efforts to engage in scientific diplomacy in order to articulate his research programme, with his institutional positions and the international exchanges, while navigating the political tensions of the Cold War.