The annexation of Crimea is not an ordinary event in contemporary international relations. Since WWII, there has been no precedent in Europe when one state under dubious premises has forcefully annexed a part of another state. This article scrutinizes the Crimean case in the context of the ongoing Ukrainian crisis and uncovers the rationale behind…[Read more]

The article aims to uncover the nature and distinctive features of the contemporary messianic narrations in the Russian public discourse, as well as estimate their impact on the actual policy-making. For this reason, the article scrutinizes the political philosophy of Aleksandr Dugin, Nataliia Narochnitskaia, Egor Kholmogorov, and Vadim…[Read more]

This article traces the attempts by the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact countries to devolve economic powers to the regions and the ultimate failure of this project, which was a contributing factor to the fall of the Berlin Wall.

Examines the role of the yeti in shaping Cold War popular science networks and relations between official and popular scientific practices in the Soviet Union.

Outlines the restoration of the Russian film classic “Man with a Movie Camera” (USSR, 1929) by Dziga Vertov which was carried out by the EYE Filmmuseum in Amsterdam between 2008 and 2010. The restoration allows contemporary audiences the possibility to once again experience Vertov’s film as the filmmaker originally intended – or at least in a v…[Read more]

In the context of the war between Ukraine and Russia in the Donbass and the earlier crisis over Crimea, this paper examines four speeches by Vladimir Putin to identify and map populist elements in his discursive and formal strategies of justifying and creating a specific form of conflict. The analysis shows how this populism goes beyond the…[Read more]

А.Г. Шляпникова арестовали ночью 1-2 января 1935 года и обвиняли в том что он «являлся одним из руководителей контрреволюционной организации рабочей оппозиции.» Он не признавал себя виновным и не обвинял других.

The remote location of Beshankovichy’s mass grave for Jewish victims of the Nazi genocide reflects the exclusion of local Jews during the German occupation of Soviet territories and limits their memory to a few knowledgeable survivors and witnesses. In contrast, local commemorative practices focus on memorials for Soviet soldiers, partisans, and…[Read more]

How did Soviet Jews respond to the Holocaust and the devastating transformations that accompanied persecution? How was the Holocaust experienced, survived, and remembered by Jewish youth living in Soviet territory? Anika Walke, Assistant Professor of History at Washington University in St. Louis, examines these important questions in Pioneers and…[Read more]

The article shows the form taken by certain discourses about the after-war reconstruction of the Polish city of Poznan . It is perceptible a nationalist aim, which tried to overcome the marks of the German past in the now exclusively Polish town. The post-war imperatives and the practical necessities constituted no serious impediment to the…[Read more]

Through an analysis of the ideas about change and continuity in Russian history and its dif- ference or similarity with the Western European experience, the article explains that the historical transformation begun with the Russian Revolution of February 1917 and continued by the Bolshe-vik rise and subsequent civil war, can be considered within…[Read more]