Yoram Gorlizki and Oleg Khlevniuk— Over the last few weeks Russia has been rocked by demonstrations in a number of regions. One of the key points of contention has been the dismissal and arrest on July 9, 2020, of the popular governor in Khabarovsk, Sergei Furgal. Local protesters have rallied
Alexandra Popoff— Vasily Grossman began Life and Fate, a powerful anti-totalitarian novel, when Stalin was still alive. Back then he had no prospect of publication. But after the dictator’s death, when the regime admitted half truths about Stalin’s crimes, there was a glimmer of hope. Despite knowing that the repressive
Molly Pucci— News of the trial of the former Hungarian Politburo member László Rajk, staged as a show trial in Budapest between 16 and 24 September 1949, traveled quickly across the Eastern Bloc. Over the course of these fateful, widely propagated eight days, Rajk came to represent many things to
Evgeny Dobrenko— In Russia everything changes over ten years and nothing changes over two hundred years. These words, attributed to Petr Stolypin, were borne out, it seems, by all of the country’s subsequent history. In the first decade of the twentieth century, when the words were spoken, Russia had experienced
Oleg V. Khlevniuk; Translated by Nora Seligman Favorov— Over his seventy-four-year life, the Soviet dictator fought through a stormy historical landscape to become an important factor in events not only in Russia, but also the world. Among scholars, there is more agreement than controversy on the historical and ideational antecedents
The following two poems are written by Arsenii Formakov, a Latvian Russian poet, novelist, and journalist, during two terms in Soviet labor camps, 1940 to 1947 in Kraslag and 1949 to 1955 in Kamyshlag and Ozerlag. This correspondence, which Formakov mailed home to his family in Riga, provides readers with
Ellen Rutten— Concerns about sincere expression matter hard today. Social media and e-services are transforming the meaning of trust – in both bad ways (online frauds, hacker interventions) and good (when that cut-rate Airbnb apartment turns out to be as homely and lovely as you expected). Spin doctors and fake news makers
James Heinzen— I first became fascinated with the social and cultural dimensions of everyday bribery in the Soviet Union when I was robbed in Moscow in 1992, just after the collapse of the USSR. My wallet was swiped by a group of kids while I was walking in central Moscow. When
Janice Ross— “Ballerinas dance anti-Putin Swan Lake in Odessa.” The headline sounds like a set-up for a sketch comedy routine but it was deadly earnest. This past May, four Ukranian ballerinas donned tutus and pointe shoes and interlaced arms to dance the four little swans quartet from Swan Lake as
December 25 is an important date for millions of Christians around the world who mark Christmas Day and the birth of Jesus Christ, but the early morning hours of December 25, 1991 also marked Mikhail Gorbachev’s resignation as president of the Soviet Union (which would be officially dissolved the next