Revisionism in Soviet History (original) (raw)
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H-Net Reviews in the Humanities & Social Sciences, 2021
How does one make sense of Stalin and Stalinism? This question has been at the heart of heated debates for decades, not only within Western scholarship of Soviet history, but more importantly, within contemporary historiographical debates in Russia and other post-Soviet countries (in particular, Georgia). As editors James Ryan and Susan Grant note in the introduction of this volume, quoting from no less a figure than Nikita Khrushchev, the legacy of Stalin is "complicated" (p. 3). Moreover, as historian David Hoffmann wrote, "for students of Soviet history, no problem looms larger than that of Stalinism" (quoted, p. 7). The current volume seeks to further unpack this "Stalin enigma," challenging the commonly held assumptions and narratives about the Soviet dictator and his regime through new archival re
The Journal of Modern History, 2012
is a prominent Soviet scholar and an important agenda setter in his field. He has a reputation as a revisionist. In this context this is not a pejorative word but a definition of a scholar with a critical attitude towards established "truths" and a commendable striving to refute them through close reading of archival materials. Forty years ago Cohen swam against the orthodox tide in the Soviet studies field, twenty-five years ago he was among those who promoted the social and cultural turns in Soviet studies and broadened the research area. Today he is out swimming again as a revisionist of the second order, that is, he is engaged in evaluating developments in Russia under the regimes of Boris Yeltsin and Vladimir Putin. The volume under review consists of seven chapters and an epilogue, 220 pages in all. There are 104 additional pages of endnotes (761 notes). The book thus has the format of a seminar. In the main text, the author sets forth his conclusions and arguments and in the notes he engages in lengthy scholarly, ideological and political discussions.
Historein, 2004
ments about the past that, while praising the Leninist heritage, were mildly disapproving of Stalinist policies. 10 The interrelation between history and perestroika was increasingly accentuated ("attention to our history… is urgently necessary for our present work" 11) and the boundaries of permissible historical discussion were gradually extended. Gorbachev's speech marking the 70 th anniversary of the October Revolution sounded like a compromise, since he balanced criticism with appraisal of the past, but nonetheless he condemned the Stalinist system with unprecedented intensity and ascribed the country' s past a central role. 12 The same applies to his book Perestroika: New Thinking for Our Country and the World recapitulating the official version of history: "Yes, industrialization and collectivization were indispensable… but the methods applied were not always accord with socialist principles." 13 Similarly, the reassessment of the Soviet Past was the most contentious issue at the XIX Party Conference, 14 at which Gorbachev, defending glasnost, declared, "it is our political and moral duty to restore justice to the victims of lawlessness" and even proposed the erection of a related monument in Moscow. 15 Albeit with caution, "nowhere else in the world has a government argued about its own history as frequently and intensively as did the politburo" 16 throughout this first phase of perestroika. 17 The official policy towards the Soviet past during this period was not confined to formal statements. The leadership was also trying to open up the past through a balanced policy of rehabilitations. 18 Initiated by the rehabilitation of a few NEP (New Economic Policy) economists in July 1987, this process culminated in the rehabilitation of Bukharin in 1988. Moreover, the Council for Toponomy undertook the task of renaming streets, squares, districts, and cities, while prominent figures in Soviet history were discredited and relevant statues removed. 19 Gorbachev's glasnost verbally and symbolically reassessed the past, trying to regulate and orchestrate historical revisionism. Professional historians, however, did not abandon the old conservative formulas of their scholarship until 1988, because they were "psychologically and professionally unprepared." 20 There was, however, a "serious gap between the interest of Soviet people in history… and the ability of historians to satisfy that interest." 21 Yuri Afanasiev, appointed rector of the State Historical Archive Institute in late 1986, played the role of the catalyst. His provocative and radical thinking about Soviet history as a "bombastic pomposity" portrayed "one-sidedly" 22 triggered some debates and roundtable discussions in historical journals. 23 The teaching of history, however, was in great disarray, as interest mixed with confusion among the students ("we are taught blindly to repeat obsolete views of reality…" 24) caused tension in schools, culminating in cancellation of the annual history exams in 1988. 25 Up to the spring of 1988 the official line towards historical reassessment could be summed up in the cliché, "Triumph and Tragedy." 26 "History has to be seen as it is; there was everything, there were mistakes, it was hard, but the country moved forward," 27 observed Gorbachev in 1987, implying that the Stalinist "administrative-command system was a tragic aberration that distorted the triumphant path of socialist construction," 28 an argument seen