The director of Harvard's Russian Research Center said yesterday that the document issued Wednesday at the end of a two-day conference of European Communist leaders in East Berlin did not necessarily indicate any change in Communism.

The document, the result of two years of negotiations, asserts the independence of the various national Communist parties.

Adam B. Ulam, who is also professor of Government, said that although the Yugoslav government of Marshall Tito has been one of the most independent among Communist countries its foreign policy is "very close to the Soviet line."

Ulam characterized Italian Communist chief Enrico Berlinguer's criticism of the 1968 Soviet invasion of Czecholovakia, made during the conference, as "a slap on the wrist." He expressed uncertainty as to whether a similar Soviet action was now less likely as a result of the conference and document.

He emphasized the difficulty in predicting the impact of what, he said, is at most a psychological development. "We'll have to wait and see," he added.

In Public

Edward L. Keenan Jr. '57, professor of History and associate director of the Russian Research Center, said that "the most interesting thing for those who study Soviet affairs is the degree to which the Soviets had to compromise in public."

Economic problems within the Soviet Bloc were a key factor in the Russians' willingness to compromise, Keenan said.

Keenan added that "one should be very cautious about the interpretation of such a carefully hedged document hammered out by compromise."