Power and Memory: Soviet Past in the Historical Politics of the Post-Soviet Regimes

The article analyzes the historical policy of power regimes in the post-Soviet space. The author analyzes three components of the public memorial space: history textbooks, toponyms in settlements and monuments. Consistent actions to change the image of the Soviet era in all three components allow us to talk about the implementation of a large-scale «memory policy», which serves as an important means of justifying legitimacy for all post-Soviet regimes without exception. At the same time, the new images of the Soviet past are created on direct forgeries and falsifications of historical facts. The post-Soviet regimes, solving momentary political problems, plunge the population of their countries into a state of anomaly and destroy the prospects for their participation as subjects of «big history», thus preparing the grounds for their own political and historical collapse. By constantly replicating negative images of the Soviet past for their own legitimacy, the post-Soviet political elites demonstrate, contrary to their wishes, their dependence on Soviet history, without which they cannot justify their power claims.