Kalman Hirsch Silvert 10 March 1921 – 15 June 1976

Extract

When Kalman Silvert died of a heart attack, Latin Americanist scholarship lost its greatest protagonist; American scholars lost one of the most active opponents of intellectual technocracy, and, thereby, the American public lost an important proponent of democracy; the Ford Foundation lost a guiding figure in international social science planning; his family and friends lost an individual of inestimable and irreplaceable personal worth; and Kal, himself, lost the opportunity to pursue his own course toward the development of a humanistic politics for the Western world. In the fall of 1976, Kal and Frieda Silvert were to have taken up residence in Mexico, to continue to work for the Ford Foundation, but in a new direction and with much more time for him to dedicate to the problems that interested him the most. Leaving some part of his task undone was inevitable; it is difficult to imagine anyone being able to achieve the goals that Kal set for himself.