The Eternal Legacy of the Great Patriotic War? The Political Instrumentalization of the Soviet Victory over Fascism and its Utilization in Czechoslovakia after 1968 and in the Czech Republic Today

Result code in IS VaVaI

<a href="https://www.isvavai.cz/riv?ss=detail&h=RIV%2F68378114%3A_____%2F22%3A00566866" target="_blank" >RIV/68378114:_____/22:00566866 - isvavai.cz</a>

Result on the web

<a href="https://sd.usd.cas.cz/pdfs/sod/2022/03/01.pdf" target="_blank" >https://sd.usd.cas.cz/pdfs/sod/2022/03/01.pdf</a>

DOI - Digital Object Identifier

<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.51134/sod.2022.020" target="_blank" >10.51134/sod.2022.020</a>

Result language

angličtina

Original language name

The Eternal Legacy of the Great Patriotic War? The Political Instrumentalization of the Soviet Victory over Fascism and its Utilization in Czechoslovakia after 1968 and in the Czech Republic Today

Original language description

Theoretically grounded in memory studies, this article reconstructs how the official Soviet-Russian myth of the Great Patriotic War has been politically instrumentalized and abused to promote and legitimize the Kremlin's power intentions. It examines the forms, mechanisms and actors of this systematically applied politics of history and memory. First in the context of the Soviet intervention in Czechoslovakia in August 1968 and the justification of the subsequent Soviet army's stay in the country, then in the context of the propaganda activities of (pro)Russian activists in the Czech Republic and the current Russian aggression against Ukraine. By the myth of the Great Patriotic War, the author understands the purposefully created, maintained and idealized image of the victorious campaign of the Red Army between 1941 and 1945, the selfless and unprecedented Soviet heroism that saved European nations from German fascism. This sacralized narrative, which suppresses other historical narratives, is monopolized in contemporary Russian state policy as an important tool to shape the historical memory of Russian society and to unite it against new and presumably hostile threats. The author demonstrates the strategy in which during the normalization of the 1970s and 1980s the soldiers of the Soviet army, who allegedly provided “fraternal assistance” in the suppression of the counter-revolution in Czechoslovakia in August 1968, were presented as the successors and “sons” of the heroic liberators of 1945 and shows how they themselves used and participated in this cult in their “comradeship” with Czech society. After the collapse of the communist regime, this official narrative lost its weight, but the “Russian world” (russkii mir) as a conglomerate of ideas linking segments of Russian culture, Orthodoxy and shared historical memory has penetrated the Czech Republic, serving as a "marketing brand" to spread Russia's geopolitical influence during Putin's rule. Through the Russian-language press, web platforms and social media, the author maps the actors and forms of the “Russian world” in the Czech Republic, whose background consists of part of the local Russian minority and local pro-Russian associations or initiatives. She pays particular attention to the nationalist motorcycle club Nochnye volki (Night Wolves) and the originally civic, but gradually becoming a state movement Immortal Regiment (Bessmertnyi polk), which revive and promote the myth of the Great Patriotic War in line with the Kremlin's intentions and which establish their branches beyond the borders of Russia, including the Czech Republic.

Czech name

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Czech description

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Type

J_SC - Article in a specialist periodical, which is included in the SCOPUS database

CEP classification

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OECD FORD branch

60101 - History (history of science and technology to be 6.3, history of specific sciences to be under the respective headings)

Project

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Continuities

I - Institucionalni podpora na dlouhodoby koncepcni rozvoj vyzkumne organizace

Publication year

2022

Confidentiality

S - Úplné a pravdivé údaje o projektu nepodléhají ochraně podle zvláštních právních předpisů

Name of the periodical

Soudobé dějiny

ISSN

1210-7050

e-ISSN

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Volume of the periodical

29

Issue of the periodical within the volume

3

Country of publishing house

CZ - CZECH REPUBLIC

Number of pages

48

Pages from-to

724-771

UT code for WoS article

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EID of the result in the Scopus database

2-s2.0-85146322004