Stalinist Elections as a Soviet Political Ritual: Kyiv, 1946-1953
This event has been relocated
Thursday, January 29th, 2009
Date | Time | Location |
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Thursday, January 29, 2009 | 3:00PM - 5:00PM | Seminar Room 208N, Munk Centre For International Studies 1 Devonshire Place |
Description
The outcome of elections under Stalin was never in doubt – but if so, why did the state insist on holding them? After all, Stalin did not care to convene party congresses for thirteen years. Yet, during the difficult period of postwar reconstruction federal, republican, and local elections were held one after another almost every year between 1946 and 1953, and each election was preceded by an elaborate electoral campaign. What were the authorities getting out of these events? What, if anything, did the voters get out of this? Using the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv as a case study, this paper seeks answers in a close reading of contemporary archival documents.
Serhy Yekelchyk (Ph.D. University of Alberta, 2000) teaches Russian and Ukrainian history at the University of Victoria, where he is also the chair of the Department of Germanic and Slavic Studies. His recent books include Stalin’s Empire of Memory: Russian-Ukrainian Relations in the Soviet Historical Imagination (University of Toronto Press, 2004) and Ukraine: Birth of a Modern Nation (Oxford University Press, 2007).
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