Tributes

Raoul Kneucker

Austria, Europe

In the 1960s, Lawrence Wien and his wife visited Vienna; President Abram Sachar joined them. President Sachar wished to see me as he was exploring the possibility of establishing joint-degree programs with European universities. We all met in the Hotel Sacher for lunch -- where else? I had the pleasure of taking these special visitors on a tour of Vienna University. In the main courtyard, they saw statues, busts and plaques of those scholars whom the University is “officially” proud (10 years after the death of a scholar, the Senate votes to put up a bust or plaque). All were impressed. Then President Sachar, smiling at the Wiens, remarked to me, “Well, we would put up the busts of our sponsors, wouldn’t we? Maybe, we should do both.” Definitely, Lawrence Wien would be a candidate because of the impact he had on my life and the lives of everyone in the first group of Wien Scholars in 1958.

Reflecting on my Brandeis experience, an incredible span of 50 years ago, it contributed to shaping me in many principal aspects. First, the new ways of learning at an American University were so different from our Austrian universities. The give-and-take in the classroom was something I have always taken with me -- and introduced in my own classes. Second, I was able and lucky to stay in touch with some of the professors and some friends, who shared with me the education of viewing our own identities from the angle of a foreign country and culture. Third, seven years after I returned home, Linda Brailove ’59 and I were married. I rediscovered Judaism. Also, including comparative studies in my academic work in law and political science was clearly an outcome of my studies at Brandeis. I have always been grateful that the Music School accepted me; Robert Koff had a profound influence on my violin playing and I was able to participate in chamber music events and the Brandeis Orchestra.

After leaving Brandeis, I returned to the University of Graz. I finished my law studies in 1961, and began work as a law clerk at the courts and the district administration of Graz. I joined the Vienna University Law School in 1964 as a teaching and research assistant in the Department of Constitutional and Administrative Law, and began specializing in public administration and human rights. I became engaged in the reform of the Austrian universities from 1965 to 1969, and was invited to create and head a new office of the universities’ rectors shaping higher education policies in Austria in 1970. Expert work with UNESCO, the Council of Europe and Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development followed.

In 1966 Linda and I married. We have three children – Fanny (born in 1969), Hannah (1971) and Alexander (1977).

In 1977, I became the administrative director of the Austrian research funding organization, which is similar to the U.S. National Science Foundation. I accepted an offer to join the Federal Ministry of Science as the director general for research and international affairs in 1989 (similar to the position of an undersecretary of state in a U.S. federal department). My main task and challenge at the Ministry was preparing the
Austrian research and industrial communities to participate in the new European programs for student movement and research and technology, and creating new infrastructures and introducing new administrative processes to make the science system fit for Austria’s accession to the European Union in 1994.

At the obligatory age of 65, I retired from the federal government. Fortunately, I was able to teach again: European politics and law at the University of Innsbruck and religion and law at the University of Vienna. I served as an evaluator of science systems in the Netherlands, Poland and Czechoslovakia, and I continue to serve as an expert on the European Commission in Brussels.

My wife was active in establishing a progressive Jewish community here in Vienna, and I was able and delighted to assist her in this. And I am now active in the Protestant church, serving as legal advisor in the Oberkirchenrat (Consistory). Thus, we have been able to work together in a variety of ways -- and the influence of my year in the United States has been a fascinating and lasting one, for which I will always be grateful.