We are pleased to introduce to you to the site of a project that can have a lot in common with ours, though it is more focused on the late Soviet period. Excerpt from the home page ” The network investigates the relationship between physical violence and state legitimacy in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, addressing the following questions: How did the state control violence after Stalin? How did political legitimation change after 1956? How were these changes related to the repression and to the use of violent force? To what extent did physical violence disappear from politics? How was physical violence in the private sphere dealt with? Did these changes contribute to the decline of communism?” see the site
All posts by Anne Le Huérou
Memorial Announces Release of New Book on Enforced Disappearances in Chechnya
On February 13th, Human Rights Center Memorial will hold a press conference to present its new book on enforced disappearances in Chechnya between 1999 and 2000.
venue : Memorial Society, Maly Karetny pereulok d5/10
Participants :
Oleg Orlov — director of the human Rights center Memorial
Ekaterina Sokirjanskaja — director for the North Caucasus, International Crisis Group.
Rukijat Hadzhieva — “Memorial” HR center
Aslan Hadziev — “Memorial” HR center
Aleksandr Cherkasov,”Memorial” HR center
January 19th 2009 / January 19th 2012 – Remembering Stanislav Markelov & Nastia Baburova
On January 19th, 2009, well-known lawyer and activist Stanislav Markelov was shot dead in the street in Moscow, just after a press conference protesting the release of Colonel Budanov. Nastia Baburova, a young journalist and activist who was also killed in the shooting. Apart from being the lawyer of the Kungaev family (Col. Budanov’s victims), Stas Markelov defended in courts a lot of antifas activists and victims of neo-nazis groups. Giving his activities, several possible origins for the crime were investigated. Two activists from extreme right milieu were arrested in november 2009. in April 2011, a popular jury sentenced Nikita Tikhonov to life imprisonment while his accomplice Evgenya Khais received 18 years, some possible other accomplices remaining unfound.
Meetings and demonstrations in Moscow and in several Russian cities have been since organized to mark the anniversary of the killing and at the same time mobilize antifa activists, human rights defenders against extreme right and racist violence .
News in Brief / Publications – “The New nobility” now in French + New Book & Dictionary on Violence + Newsletter on Extremism and Democracy + Journal Issue on Violence in Politics
The book by Andrey Soldatov and Irina Borogan The new Nobility: the restoration of Russia’s Security state and the enduring legacy of the KGB (see our post) has been translated into French : “Les Héritiers du KGB. Enquête sur les nouveaux boyards”, Paris, François Bourin.
On Thursday 3 November at 7.30PM, presentation of the book with Andrey Soldatov.
Adress : Librairie du Globe 67 bd Beaumarchais, Paris (métro Bastille ou Chemin vert)- New book by French sociologist Laurent Muchielli, leading specialist on police and crime issues – L’invention de la violence: des peurs, des chiffres, des faits (the invention of violence : fears, figures and facts). more on his blog
- The latest issue of the French journal “Culture & Conflits” is dealing with scholarly debates and field research on the problem of political or social struggles and movements resorting to violence. See table of content

European political science network ECPR on Extremism and Democracy (site) is publishing a regular newsletter
- Marzano Michela (dir), Dictionnaire de la violence, Paris, PUF, 2011, 1552p.
Culture & Experience of Violence in Russian History – Workshop in Paris
On September 8th and 9th, CERCEC is hosting in Paris a 2 days Franco-German workshop on Culture and Experience of Violence in the Russian History.
programm and details available on http://lodel.ehess.fr/cercec/docannexe.php?id=1684
5èmes Journées franco-allemandes
Culture et expérience de la violence dans l’histoire russe
5. Deutsch-französischer Workshop
Gewaltkultur und Gewalterfahrung in der russischen Geschichte
Supported by Fritz Thyssen Foundation, Cologne
Thursday, 8 September 2011 14.00-14.30 Welcome and Introduction
- Jörg Baberowski and Alain Blum 14.30-15.00 Mobilising Fighters
- Stefan Wiese: The „Pogrom Paradigm”. A Case Study on the Role of the Black Hundreds and Jewish Self-Defense in 1905
15.00-16.00 Elite Violence
- Tadzio Schilling: Deadly Jokes? Laughing and Dying in Stalin’s Kremlin Andreas Oberender: Stealing from the State. The 1937-1938 Purge of Soviet Economic Officials Reconsidered
Coffee & Tea Break
16.30-17.30 Trickling Down, Creeping Up Botakoz Kassymbekova: Raped by the State? Cases of Sexual Violence in Early Soviet Courts
- Anastasia Gorelik: Violence, Mass Media and the Putin Cult
Dîner
Friday, 9 September 2011 9.30-10.30 Civil Wars and Famines
- Thomas Chopard: The Origins of the Ukrainian Famine, 1919-1923 Robert Kindler: Fear and Loathing in the Steppe. Civil Wars in Kazakhstan, 1929-1931
10.45-11.45 Soldiering for the Motherland
- Masha Cerovic: From Peace to War. Demobilization and Remobilization in German- occupied Soviet Territories, 1941-1942
- Elisabeth Sieca-Kozlowski: From Combat Trauma to Abandonment and Marginalization. State Violence towards Disabled Veterans of the Chechen Wars
12.00-13.00 Grappling with Nature, Human and Other
- Christian Teichmann: Changing Tides on the Oxus. The Lower Amu Daria, 1920s to 1940s Marc Élie: Dessicated Steppes. Droughts, Erosion, Climate Change and the Crisis of Soviet
Agriculture, 1960s to 1980s
Lunch Break
14.00-15.00 Reprisals on Religion
- Ulrike Huhn: Popular Religious Celebrations after the Great War Nikolai Mitrokhin: Persecuting Religious Believers in the Brezhnev Era.
Institutional and Personal Responsibilities 15.15-16.00 Memories and Memorials
- Alain Blum, Isabelle Ohayon and Marta Craveri: The Oral History Project „Archives sonores. Mémoires européennes du Goulag“
16.00-17.00 Comments, Conclusions Susanne Schattenberg and Gabor Rittersporn
Venue
Centre d’études des mondes russe, caucasien et centre-européen 44, rue de l’Amiral Mouchez 75014 Paris
http://cercec.ehess.fr
Organisation
Lehrstuhl Geschichte Osteuropas Institut für Geschichtswissenschaften Philosophische Fakultät I Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin Unter den Linden 6
10099 Berlin
http://oeg.geschichte.hu-berlin.de
Funding
Fritz Thyssen Stiftung Apostelnkloster 13-15 50672 Köln http://www .fritz-thyssen-stiftung.de
Hate Crime in Russia – Monitoring and Support for Victims of Racist Violence
Two German NGOs have issued a report providing legal and factual information about racist violence in Russia and recommandations on the ways to provide support to victims.
The report provides legal analysis as well as results of interviews that have been made in various Russian regions in order to provide an overview analysis and to seek regional partership for building awareness network.
The research project was initiated and financed by the Foundation “Remembrance, Responsibility and Future” (Stiftung „Erinnerung, Verantwortung und Zukunft“) and carried out by ReachOut Berlin.
V.A. Shnirelman’s New Book – “Tolerance Threshold” : Ideology and Practice of the New Racism

Victor A. Shnirelman
“Threshold of Tolerance:” Ideology and Practice of the New Racism. In two vols. Moscow: NLO, 2011 Vol. 1 – 552 pp., Vol.. 2 – 848 pp. ill. (in Russian)
Шнирельман В.А. «Порог толерантности»: Идеология и практика нового расизм. В 2-х томах. М.: Новое литературное обозрение, 2011. — Т.1— 552 с.: ил. / Т.2 — 856 с.: ил. ISBN 978-5-86793-874-1
V. A. Shnirelman, Moscow based anthropologist and specialist on racism, discrimination and far right movements, has just published a new book on racism. The book is published by NLO http://nlobooks.mags.ru/ncd-1-1-139/news.html
The book offers a complete overview of new theorizations and discussions on racism all over the world. Special chapters are dedicated to those problems in Russian contemporary society. it can be also used as a textbook for students.
Contents
Introduction
Part I. Races and racism
Chapter 1. What is racism?
Chapter 2. Racism or racisms?
Chapter 3. Origins and evolution of racism
Chapter 4. Hard struggle against racism
Chapter 5. Race in contemporary science
Chapter 6. UNO and UNESCO declarations on race and racism
Chapter 7. What do “races” mean in various countries?
Chapter 8. Racism changes its face
Chapter 9. New Right and “cultural racism”
Chapter 10. Immigrants, globalization and “cultural racism”
Chapter 11. “New racism” in the USA
Part II. Ethno-racial ideologies in Russia
Chapter 1. Pre-Soviet sources of biological determinism
Chapter 2. Soviet anthropologists against racism
Chapter 3. From class struggle to ethnic discrimination
Chapter 4. From ethnicization to racialization: legacy of the Soviet scholarship
Chapter 5. Traps and dangers of culture-centrism
Chapter 6. Biologization of ethnicity and “national character”
Chapter 7. Racial discourse in society and in politics
Chapter 8. Civilizational approach and xenophobia
Part III. Anti-immigrant attitudes and racism
Chapter 1. Post-Soviet migrations and migrants
Chapter 2. The Kuban’ approach
Chapter 3. Social alarms and discrimination
Chapter 4. Ethnicity and criminality
Chapter 5. Explosions, pogroms and ethnic cleansing
Chapter 6. Crisis of 2008-2009 and migration issue
Chapter 7. “Old racism” is coming back
Part IV. Opinion polls and their results
Chapter 1. The triumph of ethnicity
Chapter 2. Xenophobia and its trajectory
Chapter 3. Anti-Caucasian attitudes
Chapter 4. Media’s role
Chapter 5. Willing for discrimination
Chapter 6. Growth of neo-conservatism and anti-Westernism
Chapter 7. Identity and xenophobia
Chapter 8. Conclusions
Part V. Skinheads
Chapter 1. In the beginning
Chapter 2. Political support
Chapter 3. Cult of violence and its builders
Chapter 4. Skin-culture and its development
Chapter 5. Skinheads and their sympathizers
Chapter 6. Media and migrants
Chapter 7. Skinheads and authorities
Chapter 8. Aryan ideology and skinheads’ identity
Chapter 9. Football fans, skinheads and the police
Chapter 10. “Race war” in the cities
Chapter 11. The police response and activity of the right radicals
Chapter 12. Conclusions
Conclusions. Contemporary xenophobia and reasons for it
Notes
Bibliography
Index
List of illustrations