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Papers by Roman Khandozhko

Research paper thumbnail of How Should History of Technology Be Written? Some Lessons from an Ongoing Research Project on the Global History of Nuclear Energy

Research paper thumbnail of Quantum Tunneling through the Iron Curtain: The Soviet nuclear city of Dubna as a Cold War crossing point, in: Cahiers du Monde russe 2–3/60 (2019), 369–396

Cahiers du Monde Russe 60 (2-3) : 369-396, 2019

In this article, the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR) in Dubna, USSR, is considered as... more In this article, the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR) in Dubna, USSR, is considered as one of the institutional hubs in the complex mosaic of the “Global Cold War”. The paper discusses how the bureaucratic machinery of Soviet science and the authoritarian Soviet state in general, with its omnipresent state security apparatus and party control, responded to the challenges of scientific globalization in the field of high energy physics by creating an “international oasis” on its own territory. The author argues that establishing the research centre in Dubna helped the Soviet Union implement the policy of “nuclear imperialism” in the Eastern Bloc and facilitate access to the latest achievements of Western science and technology. At the same time, from the 1950s to the 1980s the Dubna institute functioned as an interaction zone in which stable informal relations between scientists from both sides of the Iron Curtain led to cultural and ideological interpenetration.

Research paper thumbnail of Kasatkina Alexandra, Vasilyeva Zinaida, Khandozhko Roman. Thrown into Collaboration: an Ethnography of Transcript Authorization, in: Adolfo Estalella/Tomás Sánchez Criado (Ed.): Experimental collaborations: Ethnography through fieldwork devices, New York; Oxford 2018, pp. 132–153.

This chapter is an account of the three authors’ fieldwork experiences of authorization in the pr... more This chapter is an account of the three authors’ fieldwork experiences of authorization in the process of preparing interviews for a digital archive: once audio records were transcribed, researchers were to come back to their interlocutors to authorize the transcripts for online publication. Describing three field cases, the authors reflect on the dynamics of the relationships with their research partners, and how they were shaped and transformed through those negotiations. Functioning as an experimental device for collaboration, authorization created a new and uncertain communicative space, in which all the participants constantly needed to improvise and compromise.

Research paper thumbnail of Dissidence behind the Nuclear Shield. The Obninsk Atomic Research Centre and the Infrastructure of Dissent in the Late Soviet Union, in: Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas 66/1 (2018), pp. 65–92 (Abstract)

Protagonists of the atomic project often figure prominently in narratives about nonconformist mov... more Protagonists of the atomic project often figure prominently in narratives about nonconformist movements in Soviet history. This article provides an in-depth analysis of the dynamic entanglement of nuclear history and the history of dissident networks in a place where they became particularly visible. Via the example of the atomic city of Obninsk, it shows how the independent social activism of the shestidesiatniki originated in the institutional and social infrastructure of Cold War nuclear science, and how their activity became an important sub-strate for political dissidence during and after the conservative turn of the late 1960s. In the early 1970s, dissident scientists such as Valentin Turchin and Zhores Medvedev could still rely on their local and international scientific networks to provide a certain level of protection against state persecution when disseminating their critical views. Despite their defeat at the hands of Party authorities in the 1960–70s, representatives of the local dissentient milieus again became an active group within the democratic movement during Perestroika. Drawing on a broad range of original sources, including biographical interviews, private archives and records stored in some of the most important archives of the Soviet dissident movement, this study provides a differentiated view on Obninsk's " atomic intelligentsia ". Con-ceptualised as a social micro-analysis of networks established in a formerly closed nuclear city, it discusses the scientists' activities in a world between technocratic pragmatism, faith in socialism and participation in the troublesome development of nonconformist circles.

Research paper thumbnail of Территория политической аномалии: партийная жизнь в советском атомном городе 1950–1960-х годов

Реализация советской ядерной программы предполагала концентрацию большого количества научно-техни... more Реализация советской ядерной программы предполагала концентрацию большого количества научно-технических специалистов в атомных городах, которые были территориально удалены и политически изолированы от «гражданских» административных центров. Управление ими осуществлялось в системе Первого главного Управления, а затем Министерства среднего машиностроения, которые руководили атомными разработками в чрезвычайном режиме, опираясь на почти неограниченные ресурсы. Этот особый режим власти ослаблял позиции партийных инстанций в атомных центрах и затруднял осуществление идеологического контроля над научно-технической интеллигенцией. Предметом статьи стал город Обнинск Калужской области,
возникший вокруг секретной Лаборатории «В». Автор рассматривает историю формирования местной организации КПСС , изолированной от областного руководства, в условиях атомной секретности. Эта замкнутость не была полностью преодолена и после «открытия» города в 1956 г., что проявлялось, в частности, в кадровом составе городского комитета КПСС . Наличие среди партийных начальников либерально настроенных выходцев из научной среды позволило активистам разных институтов создать в 1960-е годы единое городское публичное пространство, нацеленное на свободу самовыражения и дискуссии, используя, в том числе, партийные сети и ресурсы. Эта модель городского развития была разрушена в 1968 г. в результате изменения центрального курса и последовавшего переформатирования локального политического поля.

Research paper thumbnail of Lastouski A., Khandozhko R., Sklokina I. Rethinking the Soviet Memory of the "Great Patriotic War" from the Local Perspective: Stalinism and the Thaw, 1943-1965. - Kharkiv: Kharkivske istoryko-filologichne tovarystvo, 2013. - 65 p.

Books by Roman Khandozhko

Research paper thumbnail of Antarctic minerals for the Soviet Bloc? Imagining the South Pole frontier of extractive socialism

Colonialism and Antarctica: Attitudes, logics and practices, 2024

This chapter discusses the USSR’s activities in Antarctica as a continuation of the traditions of... more This chapter discusses the USSR’s activities in Antarctica as a continuation of the traditions of Russian/Soviet continental colonialism, particularly of the practices of exploring the far north. It shows how transfer of people, institutions, technologies and discourses from the Arctic to the Antarctic created an interpolar space of Soviet colonialism. On the other hand, the author examines the representations of the Soviet Antarctic programme within the context of the anti-colonial discourse of the Cold War period. Attention is drawn to the USSR’s particular focus on the mineral resources of the icy continent as a manifestation of its colonialist intentions. The chapter examines both the reflection of Antarctica in the resource imagination of the Soviet era and the history of specific research programmes for geological exploration of the continent and its shelf in the second half of the twentieth century. It employs the concept of extractive socialism to highlight the specificity of the Soviet response to resource challenges of the 1970s.

Research paper thumbnail of How Should History of Technology Be Written? Some Lessons from an Ongoing Research Project on the Global History of Nuclear Energy

Research paper thumbnail of Quantum Tunneling through the Iron Curtain: The Soviet nuclear city of Dubna as a Cold War crossing point, in: Cahiers du Monde russe 2–3/60 (2019), 369–396

Cahiers du Monde Russe 60 (2-3) : 369-396, 2019

In this article, the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR) in Dubna, USSR, is considered as... more In this article, the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR) in Dubna, USSR, is considered as one of the institutional hubs in the complex mosaic of the “Global Cold War”. The paper discusses how the bureaucratic machinery of Soviet science and the authoritarian Soviet state in general, with its omnipresent state security apparatus and party control, responded to the challenges of scientific globalization in the field of high energy physics by creating an “international oasis” on its own territory. The author argues that establishing the research centre in Dubna helped the Soviet Union implement the policy of “nuclear imperialism” in the Eastern Bloc and facilitate access to the latest achievements of Western science and technology. At the same time, from the 1950s to the 1980s the Dubna institute functioned as an interaction zone in which stable informal relations between scientists from both sides of the Iron Curtain led to cultural and ideological interpenetration.

Research paper thumbnail of Kasatkina Alexandra, Vasilyeva Zinaida, Khandozhko Roman. Thrown into Collaboration: an Ethnography of Transcript Authorization, in: Adolfo Estalella/Tomás Sánchez Criado (Ed.): Experimental collaborations: Ethnography through fieldwork devices, New York; Oxford 2018, pp. 132–153.

This chapter is an account of the three authors’ fieldwork experiences of authorization in the pr... more This chapter is an account of the three authors’ fieldwork experiences of authorization in the process of preparing interviews for a digital archive: once audio records were transcribed, researchers were to come back to their interlocutors to authorize the transcripts for online publication. Describing three field cases, the authors reflect on the dynamics of the relationships with their research partners, and how they were shaped and transformed through those negotiations. Functioning as an experimental device for collaboration, authorization created a new and uncertain communicative space, in which all the participants constantly needed to improvise and compromise.

Research paper thumbnail of Dissidence behind the Nuclear Shield. The Obninsk Atomic Research Centre and the Infrastructure of Dissent in the Late Soviet Union, in: Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas 66/1 (2018), pp. 65–92 (Abstract)

Protagonists of the atomic project often figure prominently in narratives about nonconformist mov... more Protagonists of the atomic project often figure prominently in narratives about nonconformist movements in Soviet history. This article provides an in-depth analysis of the dynamic entanglement of nuclear history and the history of dissident networks in a place where they became particularly visible. Via the example of the atomic city of Obninsk, it shows how the independent social activism of the shestidesiatniki originated in the institutional and social infrastructure of Cold War nuclear science, and how their activity became an important sub-strate for political dissidence during and after the conservative turn of the late 1960s. In the early 1970s, dissident scientists such as Valentin Turchin and Zhores Medvedev could still rely on their local and international scientific networks to provide a certain level of protection against state persecution when disseminating their critical views. Despite their defeat at the hands of Party authorities in the 1960–70s, representatives of the local dissentient milieus again became an active group within the democratic movement during Perestroika. Drawing on a broad range of original sources, including biographical interviews, private archives and records stored in some of the most important archives of the Soviet dissident movement, this study provides a differentiated view on Obninsk's " atomic intelligentsia ". Con-ceptualised as a social micro-analysis of networks established in a formerly closed nuclear city, it discusses the scientists' activities in a world between technocratic pragmatism, faith in socialism and participation in the troublesome development of nonconformist circles.

Research paper thumbnail of Территория политической аномалии: партийная жизнь в советском атомном городе 1950–1960-х годов

Реализация советской ядерной программы предполагала концентрацию большого количества научно-техни... more Реализация советской ядерной программы предполагала концентрацию большого количества научно-технических специалистов в атомных городах, которые были территориально удалены и политически изолированы от «гражданских» административных центров. Управление ими осуществлялось в системе Первого главного Управления, а затем Министерства среднего машиностроения, которые руководили атомными разработками в чрезвычайном режиме, опираясь на почти неограниченные ресурсы. Этот особый режим власти ослаблял позиции партийных инстанций в атомных центрах и затруднял осуществление идеологического контроля над научно-технической интеллигенцией. Предметом статьи стал город Обнинск Калужской области,
возникший вокруг секретной Лаборатории «В». Автор рассматривает историю формирования местной организации КПСС , изолированной от областного руководства, в условиях атомной секретности. Эта замкнутость не была полностью преодолена и после «открытия» города в 1956 г., что проявлялось, в частности, в кадровом составе городского комитета КПСС . Наличие среди партийных начальников либерально настроенных выходцев из научной среды позволило активистам разных институтов создать в 1960-е годы единое городское публичное пространство, нацеленное на свободу самовыражения и дискуссии, используя, в том числе, партийные сети и ресурсы. Эта модель городского развития была разрушена в 1968 г. в результате изменения центрального курса и последовавшего переформатирования локального политического поля.

Research paper thumbnail of Lastouski A., Khandozhko R., Sklokina I. Rethinking the Soviet Memory of the "Great Patriotic War" from the Local Perspective: Stalinism and the Thaw, 1943-1965. - Kharkiv: Kharkivske istoryko-filologichne tovarystvo, 2013. - 65 p.

Research paper thumbnail of Antarctic minerals for the Soviet Bloc? Imagining the South Pole frontier of extractive socialism

Colonialism and Antarctica: Attitudes, logics and practices, 2024

This chapter discusses the USSR’s activities in Antarctica as a continuation of the traditions of... more This chapter discusses the USSR’s activities in Antarctica as a continuation of the traditions of Russian/Soviet continental colonialism, particularly of the practices of exploring the far north. It shows how transfer of people, institutions, technologies and discourses from the Arctic to the Antarctic created an interpolar space of Soviet colonialism. On the other hand, the author examines the representations of the Soviet Antarctic programme within the context of the anti-colonial discourse of the Cold War period. Attention is drawn to the USSR’s particular focus on the mineral resources of the icy continent as a manifestation of its colonialist intentions. The chapter examines both the reflection of Antarctica in the resource imagination of the Soviet era and the history of specific research programmes for geological exploration of the continent and its shelf in the second half of the twentieth century. It employs the concept of extractive socialism to highlight the specificity of the Soviet response to resource challenges of the 1970s.