scholarly journals Russia and Other Significant Others in Latvian Caricatures

2021 ◽  
Vol 3 (3) ◽  
pp. 199-212
Author(s):  
Lidia S. Zhirnova
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Public Space ◽  
The Other ◽  
Western World ◽  
Significant Other ◽  
The Public ◽  
National Pride ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
International Environment ◽  
The Eu

After the collapse of the Soviet Union Latvia faced the need to redefine its national identity in a new international environment. Its elite took a clear Euro-Atlantic course, and the image of Latvia in the public space has been largely defined in contrast to the image of Russia ever since. One of the ways to understand how Latvia sees itself and Russia is analyzing political cartoons. The purpose of the study is to bring out the attributes of Russia as a significant Other in caricatures in national newspapers and analyze how they correspond to the characteristics of Latvia, thus defining the outlines of the mental border between the two. The analysis shows two main sets of ideas associated with Russia in Latvian cartoons: one is power, threat and aggression, and the other is propaganda and lies. Although the genre of caricature is meant to be disrespectful, the comparison with cartoons featuring the EU shows that the cartoonists are much more hostile towards Russia. Latvia has succeeded in distancing itself from Russia mentally and uses its image as an antagonist Other, however the cartoons show lack of national pride and doubt that the country has become a rightful member of the Western world.

scholarly journals Xerxes in Mikhail Bulgakov’s Play Adam and Eve

Slovene ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 507-510
Author(s):  
Souren A. Takhtajan
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Capital Punishment ◽  
The Other ◽  
Western World ◽  
Adam And Eve ◽  
The Soviet Union

In his Histories 8:118, Herodotus tells the dramatic story of Xerxes’ return to Asia from Greece by sea. The overcrowded ship was caught in a storm, and the captain advised the king to get rid of most of the passengers. Xerxes called on the Persians to prove their loyalty to the king, and they showed their obeisance by leaping into the sea. After his return, Xerxes awarded the captain of the ship with a golden crown for saving the king’s life—and cut off his head for causing the deaths of so many Persians. In the play Adam and Eve, Bulgakov depicts the outbreak of war between the Soviet Union and the Western world. Nearly everyone in Leningrad dies from a gas attack. But Efrosimov, a chemistry professor and a man of genius, has managed to save the lives of the other characters in the play, the Soviet fighter pilot Daragan included. Nevertheless, Daragan hates Efrosimov for his efforts to prevent the war and then to stop it. The fighter pilot imagines for the professor both an award for his merits and subsequent capital punishment for his alleged crime. In this article, I suggest that Bulgakov has borrowed the motif of award and execution from Herodotus.

Sino-Russian Strategic Partnership

2015 ◽  
pp. 257-273
Author(s):  
Cagri Erdem
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
The Other ◽  
Strategic Partnership ◽  
Western World ◽  
Economic Base ◽  
Regional Politics ◽  
Shanghai Cooperation Organization ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Economic Transformations ◽  
Rise Of China

The colossal economic transformations and political intrusions had been affecting brutally China and the Soviet Union in the final decades of the twentieth century. Currently, Russia is a gigantic power struggling to rebuild its economic base in an era of globalization. On the other hand, the economic rise of China has attracted a great deal of attention and labeled as a success story by the Western world. China and Russia have made a number of efforts to strengthen bilateral ties and improve cooperation on a number of economic/political/diplomatic fronts. Since the mid-1990s, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) has been an important feature of Eurasian politics and a vehicle to forge a new sort of cooperation between China and Russia. A number of issues related to geopolitics, security, the economy, and regional politics have been handled by the SCO member states.

The Challenges to Social Control in Brezhnev’s Soviet Union, 1964-1982

2021 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 160-173
Author(s):  
Fedor L. Sinitsyn
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Social Control ◽  
Soviet System ◽  
State Archive ◽  
Central State ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Russian State ◽  
The Government ◽  
General Secretary

This article examines the development of social control in the Soviet Union under Leonid Brezhnev, who was General Secretary of the Communist Party from 1964 to 1982. Historians have largely neglected this question, especially with regard to its evolution and efficiency. Research is based on sources in the Russian State Archive of Modern History (RGANI), the Russian State Archive of Socio-Political History (RGASPI) and the Moscow Central State Archive (TSGAM). During Brezhnevs rule, Soviet propaganda reached the peak of its development. However, despite the fact that authorities tried to improve it, the system was ritualistic, unconvincing, unwieldy, and favored quantity over quality. The same was true for political education, which did little more than inspire sullen passivity in its students. Although officials recognized these failings, their response was ineffective, and over time Soviet propaganda increasingly lost its potency. At the same time, there were new trends in the system of social control. Authorities tried to have a foot in both camps - to strengthen censorship, and at the same time to get feedback from the public. However, many were afraid to express any criticism openly. In turn, the government used data on peoples sentiments only to try to control their thoughts. As a result, it did not respond to matters that concerned the public. These problems only increased during the era of stagnation and contributed to the decline and subsequent collapse of the Soviet system.

scholarly journals Securing ‘from within’

2008 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 67-93
Author(s):  
Mariya Polner
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
The Political ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Eu Policies ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Push Factor ◽  
Political Settlement ◽  
The Eu

The dissolution of the Soviet Union resulted not only interindependence for Moldova. It also served as a push factor for the secessionist conflict on its territory which due to its unresolved status is referred to as frozen. All attempts of the political settlement since 1990s have ended in deadlock. Interestingly, the EU policies towards Transnistria changed significantly in 2003-2004. From the ‘security consumer’ the EU has been slowly turning into the ‘security provider’. The main goal of this paper is to evaluate the impact of the EU in ensuring security and stability through its involvement in the Transnistrian conflict. For this purpose the study will focus on EU-Moldova relations and the instrument it dedicates to ensuring stability, the EU Border Assistance Mission.

scholarly journals Characteristics of shadow economy in stagnation era in USSR

2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 (1) ◽  
pp. 65-70
Author(s):  
Ilia Valerievich Mametev
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Shadow Economy ◽  
Russian Society ◽  
State Control ◽  
Illegal Activity ◽  
The Public ◽  
Goods And Services ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Public Consciousness ◽  
The 1960S

The article focuses on the problems of shadow economy, such as the illegal activity, as well as a legal activity hidden from the state control, which became an integral part of the life of the Soviet Union in the period of stagnation. The development of the shadow sector was connected, first of all, with the inability of the command-administrative system to take into account the demands of the population for certain goods and services. There have been examined prerequisites for the emergence of the shadow economy and the stages of its development in the society that built communism in the 1960s–1980s. The shadow economy contributed to the growth of corruption and criminalization, initiated the racket in the 1990s and significantly affected the public consciousness of the Soviet citizens and, later, the mentality of modern Russian society

scholarly journals Mental health services in Azerbaijan

2004 ◽  
Vol 1 (3) ◽  
pp. 16-17
Author(s):  
Fuad Ismayilov
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Mental Health Services ◽  
Health Services ◽  
Caspian Sea ◽  
Total Population ◽  
The Other ◽  
The Caspian Sea ◽  
The North ◽  
The Soviet Union

Azerbaijan is a nation with a Turkic population which regained its independence after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. It has an area of approximately 86 000 km2. Georgia and Armenia, the other countries comprising the Transcaucasian region, border Azerbaijan to the north and west, respectively. Russia also borders the north, Iran and Turkey the south, and the Caspian Sea borders the east. The total population is about 8 million. The largest ethnic group is Azeri, comprising 90% of the population; Dagestanis comprise 3.2%, Russians 2.5%, Armenians 2% and others 2.3%.

scholarly journals Activities of Non-Governmental Organisations Aimed at Conflict Settlement in Post-Soviet States

2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexander Nikitin ◽  
Irina Bolgova ◽  
Yulia Nikitina
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
The State ◽  
Soviet Period ◽  
Public Interests ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
International Environment ◽  
International Projects ◽  
The Government ◽  
Public Organisations ◽  
Set Up

This article analyses the peace-making activities of Soviet/Russian nongovernmental public organisations (NGOs) with reference to the Federation for Peace and Conciliation, the successor of the Soviet Peace Committee. NGOs were formed at the initiative of the state and party organs of the Soviet system but were transformed into independent NGOs after the collapse of the USSR with their own active strategy of assistance in conflict resolution. This study is based upon unique archive materials and the personal experience of one of the authors, who used to work for such organisations. The study focuses on the ethnopolitical conflicts which took place between the collapse of the USSR and the mid‑1990s. There is a widespread opinion in academic literature that so-called non-governmental organisations set up by the government do not have their own identity, especially during social crises, and passively follow the government’s political line. However, the study of their activities demonstrates that during the first years after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, these organisations initiated a significant number of practical and political projects with the participation of high-ranked representatives of the governments, parliaments, and political parties of both post-Soviet and foreign states and international organisations, including the UN, OSCE, NATO, CIS, etc. This, in turn, played a role as a substantial supplement to classical interstate diplomacy and practically promoted the settlement of certain ethnopolitical conflicts. The archive materials analysed prove that in the early post-Soviet period, a certain inversion in the direction of political and ideological impulses took place, and a number of non-governmental organisations that used to transmit the interests of the Communist Party and state organs to the international environment were able to create new international projects and consultations in the form of “track one-and-a-half” diplomacy, i. e. the informal interaction of officials in the capacity of unofficial experts. And in such cases, it was NGOs which shaped the agenda and transmitted public interests to the state structures of Russia and the CIS states, mediating between fighting sides and amongst representatives of various states, practically assisting the settlement of ethnopolitical conflicts.

scholarly journals Dal nostro inviato in Unione Sovietica

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alberto Zava
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Travel Literature ◽  
The Other ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Close Relationship ◽  
The Many ◽  
Newspaper Articles

Writings by three Italian journalist-authors provide an evocative picture of the Soviet Union during the ’50s and ’60s, interpreted through different personal styles, analytical systems and reporting techniques. In close relationship with the many-sided reality of the Soviet landscape, the meeting with the ‘other’ (geographically, culturally and in personal terms) allows Enrico Emanuelli, Carlo Levi and Guido Piovene to realise individual volumes of reportage (Emanuelli and Levi) or newspaper articles (Piovene) poised between travel literature and the informative-journalistic dimension.

scholarly journals Política de la supervivencia / Politics of Survival

2017 ◽  
pp. 249 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gabriel Giorgi
Keyword(s):  
Public Space ◽  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Heterogeneous Materials ◽  
The Body ◽  
The Other ◽  
The Public ◽  
Palabras Clave ◽  
Politics Of The Body ◽  
Act Up ◽  
The One

Resumen: Distintas intervenciones desde prácticas activistas y culturales en torno al VIH escenifican poéticas y políticas del resto corporal en las que se juegan, por un lado, una reorganización de los modos en que se dramatiza en umbral entre lo vivo y lo muerto en lo público –redefiniendo así el tejido mismo de lo que llamamos “comunidad”—; y por otro, indican los modos en que estos activismos impulsan una disputa sobre los “marcos de temporalización” desde los cuales lo viviente se vuelve reconocible políticamente y donde la noción de supervivencia adquiere una centralidad decisiva. Combinando materiales heterogéneos el artículo busca iluminar los modos en que los activismos y las culturas en torno al VIH configuran un terreno decisivo para pensar políticas de la supervivencia del presente. Palabras clave: VIH, ACT-UP, Supervivencia, Temporalidades, Biopolítica. Abstract: Different interventions from activist and cultural practices around HIV staged poetics and politics of the body remmant. They implie, on the one hand, a reorganitzation of the dramatization of the threshold between the living and the dead in the public space; and on the other, they indicate the ways in which these activisms mobilize a dispute over the “frames of temporalization” from which the living becomes politically recognizable and where the notion of survival acquires a decisive centrality. Combining heterogeneous materials, the article seeks to illuminate the ways in which activism and cultures on HIV constitute a decisive ground for thinking about the present policies of survival. Keywords: IHV, ACT-UP, Survival, Biopolitics.

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