Deviations of the Politics of Memory in Eastern Europe and in the Post-Soviet Space

Abstract

The narratives of the Second World War, which may undoubtedly be referred to as “complex issues of history”, have not been entirely reflected upon yet and therefore are full of phobias and myths. While analysing the set of tools of the politics of memory, the author of this article points outs the following: the politicization of history (following political conjuncture), the manipulation of facts, the glorification of history and its actors, demonisation, i. e., the construction of the image of an internal and external enemy, the ideological censoring of controversial assessments, and the actualisation of sociopolitical nostalgia. The use of this arsenal of ideological influence on mass consciousness can be seen in high-profile sociopolitical incidents of recent times. The difference in historical assessments is a reality that is pointless to obscure. Overcoming historical traumas, i. e., the “combination of history and memory”, is an indispensable condition for normalising and objectifying reflection on the past. The subject of the author’s attention is foreign policy invectives that have become hotbeds of diplomatic tension (more particularly, the Declaration of the European Parliament on the Outbreak of World War II adopted in 2019), the activities of governmental organisations “responsible” for the politics of memory (the Ukrainian Institute of National Memory), expositions of museums in Eastern Europe (the Museum of the Second World War in Gdansk, the Museum of the Occupation in Riga), school history textbooks, the fate of the monuments dedicated to the Second World War (in particular, the Bronze Soldier in Tallinn), public historical and political actions that “overturn” historical reality (for example, Legionnaire Day marches in Riga), and the censorship of publications with an alternative view of the traumatic events of the war.