Canadian Slavonic Papers
Obstacles to the Integration of the Holocaust into Post-Communist East European Historical Narratives Author(s): John-Paul Himka Source: Canadian Slavonic Papers / Revue Canadienne des Slavistes, Vol. 50, No. 3/4 (September-December 2008), pp. 359-372 Published by: Canadian Association of Slavists Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40871306 . Accessed: 18/10/2013 12:56
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This content downloaded from 129.79.13.20 on Fri, 18 Oct 2013 12:56:45 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions John-PaulHimka
Obstacles to the Integrationof the Holocaust into Post-CommunistEast EuropeanHistorical Narratives
Abstract: Factors that have made it difficultfor post-communist East European societies to integratethe Holocaust into theirhistorical cultures include the communist heritage,which downplayedthe specificallyJewish Holocaust; sensitivityto charges that a nationwas complicitin the murderof the Jews; the framingof East European histories as national narrativesinto which it is difficultto incorporatethe experience of other nations; the feeling that Jewish sufferingis recognized, while that of other East Europeans is not; the positive re-evaluationof the interwarand wartime politics and cultureafter the collapse of communism;the survivaland revival of anti-Semitism,with new inputsfrom the Middle East and fromWestern Holocaust deniers; the construction in the West of the Holocaust as a centrepieceof twentieth-centuryhistory; the influence of East European diasporas; the embedmentof the discourse on the Holocaust in the political divide between nativistsand Westernizers;the deploymentof accusations of Holocaust collaborationas an instrumentof foreignpolicy; and debate over the restitution of confiscated Jewish property.Often these factors come togetherinto a reinforcing discursivestructure. The essay's conclusion suggestshow to overcome these obstacles to the integrationof the Holocaust into East European histories.
The integrationof theHolocaust into East Europeanhistory and memoryhas provedto be a challenge.1The issueof local collaborationin themurder of the Jewshas especiallyevoked responses of denial,since East Europeanhistorical self-portraitsgenerally omit what Joanna Michlic calls the "darkpast."2 The purposeof thepresent essay is to identifythe obstacles to theintegration of the Holocaustinto East European historical cultures. Thereare a numberof examinationsof howEast Europeannations have or havenot come to termswith the Holocaust since the collapse of communism.3
I have presentedversions of this paper in a number of venues, most recentlyat the annual conferenceof the Canadian Association of Slavists held in Saskatoon 26-28 May 2007. Afterevery presentation, I revised the paper substantiallyin response to comments I received,and I am gratefulfor all the suggestionsand criticisms.I particularlywant to thankKaryn Ball, Melissa Jacques, WilfriedJilge, Per Anders Rudling,Michael Shafir, Kai Struve, and Felicia Waldman. I also wish to thank Oksana Mykhed for research assistance. JoannaMichlic, Coming to Termswith the "Dark Past ": The Polish Debate about the Jedwabne Massacre, Analysis of CurrentTrends in Anti-Semitism,2 1 (Jerusalem:The Hebrew Universityof Jerusalem,The Vidal Sassoon InternationalCenter for the Studyof Anti-Semitism,2002) 2. E.g., Randolph L. Braham, "Anti-Semitismand the Holocaust in the Politics of East
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These have been helpfulto me in identifyingthe issues thatimpede the internalizationofthe Holocaust, and I willbe citingsome of them below. I have not,however, undertaken an exhaustivereview of thisliterature, since my point is notto describethe situation since 1989,as thisliterature does, but rather to constructa generalframework to understandthe sources of resistanceto Holocaustintegration. Many of the points made below are familiar to scholarsof theHolocaust and its reception, and somepoints made in a fewsentences in this articlecould sustain a muchlonger treatment. But here I am interestedin putting itall togetherin orderto renderthe mutual reinforcement of Holocaust-resistant discoursesmore transparent. Often the existingliterature works with unstated assumptionsabout why the Holocausthas been difficultfor post-communist Europe.This article strives to makethese assumptions explicit. It is interestedin thebroad outline of certain East European subjectivities. AlthoughI attempthere to discussthe factorsin Holocaustresistance in sucha waythat it draws on theexperience of, and refers to, Eastern Europe as a region,4I am mostinformed by myresearch on Ukraine.I am somewhatuneasy aboutthis combination of the generaland the particular,but I hope thatthis rathermakeshift approach can accomplishwhat is essentiallya modestaim: to stimulatethinking on why it has been hard for East Europeansocieties to integratethe Holocaust into their historical consciousness. In myemphasis on commonalitiesand patterns,distinctions among the East Europeanpeoples are notgiven much attention, but that does notmean that such distinctions are not importantand worthy of study in their own right. I do notthink that the resistance to incorporatingthe Holocaust is a simple matter;at play, rather,is a configurationof factors,an overdetermination. Throughoutthe region there are recurringdiscourses about the Holocaust that interlockand shapeand reinforceone another.I believethat reflection on the obstaclesis theprecondition for developing an effectiveprogram for promoting Holocaustawareness in the region.
The CommunistHeritage A readilyidentifiable reason for the tardinesswith which East European countrieshave integratedthe Holocaust into their history is that,by and large, the specificallyJewish Holocaust was downplayedor ignored under Communism.5
CentralEurope ," Holocaust and Genocide Studies 8.2 (Fall 1994): 143-163. As to why I use the old termEastern Europe instead of the new ones (Central Europe, Balkans, FormerSoviet Union, Eurasia, and so on), see John-PaulHimka, "What's in a Region? (Notes on 'Central Europe')," HABSBURG, 8 May 2002 (archived in H-Net Discussion). Zvi Gitelman,"Politics and the Historiographyof the Holocaust in the Soviet Union," in Bitter Legacy: Confrontingthe Holocaust in the USSR, edited by Zvi Gitelman (Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1997) 14-42. Daniel
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East Europeansocieties then were "protected" from having to considerthe Holocaustand itsimplications. This is one of thereasons why, when the fall of communismallowed the issue to surface,some East Europeansreacted with suspicionto thesudden concern with the fate of Jews during World War II.6 It was also difficultfor oppositionists under communism to confrontthe Holocaust because they found it hard to examine criticallyfigures and movementsthat were condemnedby theirauthoritarian regimes. And this hindereda frankassessment of local participation inthe murder of Jews.7
Guilt, Self-Esteem,Reputation An obviousreason why those East European nations with a significanthistory of collaborationin the Holocaustare reluctantto speak aboutit is thatthey are ashamedto. They feel that to bringup suchmatters sullies the reputation of their nation.This reluctanceto publicize the "dark past" is commonenough everywhere,but it is particularlyexacerbated in nations,such as the East Europeannations, with a complexof marginalizationand eveninferiority vis-à- vis the West. The feelingof inadequacyproduces also narrativesof self- glorificationthat make it even more difficult to admitto grievouswrongdoing in thenational past. It sometimeshappens that Westerners know littleabout Ukrainiansand Lithuaniansexcept their reputation as anti-Semitesand willingcollaborators in the Holocaust.This is differentthan the knowledgeabout Germans,which recognizestheir crucial role in launchingthe Holocaust,but also appreciates Germancultural achievements and acknowledgesthat German history consists ofmuch more than the Third Reich. At one timethe same people who held anti- Semiticstereotypes also held anti-Slavicor anti-EastEuropean stereotypes. Sincethe Holocaust, the two prejudices have been decoupled, and an inveterate
Romanovsky,"The Holocaustin the Eyes of Homo Sovieticus:A SurveyBased on NortheasternBelorussia and Northwestern Russia," Holocaust and GenocideStudies 13.3 (Winter1999): 355-382. An enlighteningand originalrecent contribution is MarkA. Wolfgram,"The Holocaustthrough the Prismof East GermanTelevision: Collective Memoryand AudiencePerceptions," Holocaust and GenocideStudies 20.1 (Spring 2006): 57-79. Felicia Waldman,"Holocaust Education in Post-CommunistRomania," Studia Hebraica4 (2004): 92. Kai Struve,"Eastern Experience and WesternMemory: 1939-41 as a Paradigmof EuropeanMemory Conflicts," in SharedHistory - DividedMemory: Jews and Othersin Soviet-OccupiedTerritories of Poland, 1939-1941, edited by Elazar Barkand,Elizabeth A. Cole, and Kai Struve,Leipziger Beiträge zur jüdischenGeschichte und Kultur,5 (Leipzig:Leipziger Universitätsverlag, 2007) 49.
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This content downloaded from 129.79.13.20 on Fri, 18 Oct 2013 12:56:45 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 362 John-PaulHimka anti-Semitismhas beengrafted on to theEast Europeanstereotype as one of its characteristics.8
National Narratives JohanDietsch has pointedout that it is difficultto integratethe Holocaust into a historythat is structuredas a narrativeof a particularnation.9 In sucha narrative thereis no roomfor the experienceof othernations except in relationto the nationthat is the subjectof the nationalhistory. Many historiesare nation- centred,but this is particularlytrue of East Europeanhistories. When the moderndiscipline of historywas beingformed, most of today'sEast European statesdid noteven exist.Necessarily, the histories were framed as narratives aboutpeoples. Generally, too, these were heroic narratives about how the nation survivedin spiteof oppressive foreign rule.
VictimizationNarratives Victimizationnarratives, of course,notoriously interfere with the ability to see membersof one's own group as perpetrators,and they also hinderthe recognitionof others'narratives of victimization.A classic formulationof the victim'sattitude is thatof the Polishjournalist Jan Blonski, contained in his famousarticle "The Poor Poles Look at the Ghetto"{Tygodnik Powszechny, January1987): "When we considerthe past, we wantto derivemoral advantages fromit. Even whenwe condemn,we ourselveswould like to be above- or beyond- condemnation.We wantto be absolutelybeyond any accusation,we wantto be completelyclean. We wantto be also- and only- victims."10Such sentimentsare commonplace in EasternEurope. The introductionto the English translationof a wartimediary that frankly treated Romanian anti-Semitism and complicityin the Holocauststated: "It remainsdifficult if not impossibleto engagein a seriousdiscussion about any challenge to Romania'sself-image and self-definitionas a nationof eternalvictims, never perpetrators."11 The Deputy Directorof theLithuanian Institute of Historywrote: "...The active part played
A popular American filmof 2006, Borat!, made use of this stereotypefor comic effect. For an analysis of East European stereotypes,see Roman Rosdolsky, Engels and the "Nonhistoric"Peoples: The National Question in the Revolution of 1848 (Glasgow: CritiqueBooks, 1986). 9 Johan Dietsch, Making Sense of Suffering:Holocaust and Holodomor in Ukrainian Historical Culture(Lund: Media Tryck,Lund University,2006) 170. Cited in Michlic, Coming to Terms5. Cited in KristianGemer, "Hungary,Romania, the Holocaust and Historical Culture," in The Holocaust on Post-War Battlefields:Genocide as Historical Culture, edited by Klas-Göran Karlsson and Ulf Zander (Malmö: Sekel Bokförlag,2006) 231, 238.
This content downloaded from 129.79.13.20 on Fri, 18 Oct 2013 12:56:45 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Obstacles to the Integration of the Holocaust 363 by some Lithuaniansin the Holocaustundermines the mythembedded in Lithuanianconsciousness that they and they alone are a martyredpeople."12 Self-identificationas victim in EasternEurope is olderthan the Holocaust. The Polishand Ukrainianvictimization narratives go back to the 1830s and 1840s(Adam Mickiewicz and the Brotherhood of Ss. Cyriland Methodius), the Hungarianone to 1920 (theTreaty of Trianon).Since thelate 1970s,the East Europeanvictimization narratives in thediasporas have often been reworked to closelyimitate Jewish narratives of theHolocaust. With the disintegration and collapseof communism,these kind of victimizationnarratives appeared also in the home countries.Elena Ivanova has pointedout that Soviet narratives emphasizedtriumphal victories. But in the periodof Gorbachev'sreforms, victimizationnarratives appeared. They became particularlyprominent in Ukrainewhen the countrybecame independentin 1991: "...The schematic narrativetemplate of a victimhoodhas been chosenas a commonidea uniting societyand one ofthe tenets for the reconstruction ofcollective memory and the creationof a newnational identity."13 Withreference to theUkrainian diaspora I haveargued that the emphasis on victimizationsince the late 1970shas at leastin partbeen the result of effortsto counteraccusations of widespread Ukrainian collaboration in the Holocaust.14
Yet There Is the Issue of Recognition Althoughthe East Europeanvictimization narratives are problematicin many respects,they are usually based on realinjuries suffered. Ukrainians collectively rememberthe famineof 1932-1933that resulted in millionsof deaths.They also rememberthe massivepurges of the 1930s,which claimed hundreds of thousandsof victims,and theNKVD murdersof 1941,which claimed tens of thousands.The Balticnations remember the mass deportations of 1941.All East Europeancountries remember the ferocity of thecommunist security police in theStalinist era.15 The Poles in theGeneral Government and theUkrainians in
Darius Staliunas,"From Ethnocentric to Civic History:Changes in Contemporary Lithuanian Historical Studies," in Emerging Meso-Areas in the Former Socialist Countries: Histories Revived or Improvised,edited by Kimitaka Matsuzato (Sapporo: SlavicResearch Center, Hokkaido University, 2005) 327. ElenaIvanova, "Changes in CollectiveMemory: The SchematicNarrative Template of Victimhoodin KharkivMuseums," Journal of MuseumEducation 28.1 (Winter2003): 19. 14 John-PaulHimka, "War Criminality:A BlankSpot in theCollective Memory of the Ukrainian Diaspora," Spaces of Identity 5.1 (April 2005),
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16 theReichskommissariat remember not onlycommunist persecution, but also theimmense sufferings under Nazi occupation. Even thoughthese narratives have been and are instrumentalized,they do reflectpainful historical experiences. Many East Europeansfeel thattheir sufferingshave been renderedinvisible, as thoughtheir dead are notequal to otherdead, as thoughthey are notrecognized as endowedwith the same human dignityas others.After all thespecial pleading is over,the question remains: "If youprick us, do we notbleed?"17
The Positive Réévaluation of the Pre-CommunistHeritage after 1989 Afterthe fall of communism in EasternEurope (1989-1991) there was a general tendencyoutside the bordersof the pre-1939Soviet Union to overvaluethe politicsof the interwarand wartimeeras, i.e., the immediatepre-communist period.However, many of thefigures prominent before the postwar communist takeovershad been extremenationalists, anti-Semites, or even fascists.Their cultswere particularlyembraced by rightistpoliticians, but theyalso had a largerpopular appeal. The roles thesefigures played in the Holocaustwere deniedor downplayed. Alternately, the cult denied or downplayed the Holocaust itself.A pertinentexample is theglorification of MarshallIon Antonescuthat arosein post-communistRomania. Two East Europeanstates that re-emerged after1989, Croatia and Slovakia,had their first modern historical incarnation as alliesof Hitlerthat cooperated in thepersecution and destructionof theJewish population.Nationalists tend to emphasizethe positive features of these wartime statesas theprecursors of their present independence; liberals are reluctant to do so becauseof the anti-democratic nature and murderous policies of these states. In Ukraine,the populationis sharplydivided in its assessmentof the Organizationof UkrainianNationalists and, in particular,of itswing under the leadershipof StepanBandera. The West and Centreof the countrytend to evaluateit positively,the East and Southnegatively. Although the Ukrainian nationalists'role in theHolocaust is notas extensivelydocumented as therole of theRomanian, Croatian, and Slovakgovernments, it is clearthat they shared
Chodakiewicz, "The Dialectics of Pain: The InterrogationMethods of the Communist Secret Police in Poland, 1944-1955," Glaukopis 2/3 (2004-2005): 1-54. But also see where Chodakiewicz is situated in the historiography:Joanna Michlic, "The Soviet Occupation of Poland, 1939-41, and the Stereotypeof the Anti-Polishand Pro-Soviet Jew,"Jewish Social Studies: History,Culture, Society n.s. 13.3 (Spring/Summer2007): 35-76. Karel C. Berkhoff,Harvest of Despair: Life and Death in Ukraine under Nazi Rule (Cambridge,Mass., and London: The Belknap Press of HarvardUniversity Press, 2003). A recent work exploring the historyand memoryof the Holocaust from a Jewish perspectivemaintains sensitivity to the sufferingsof others in Eastern Europe: Daniel Mendelsohn,The Lost: A Search for Six of Six Million,photographs by Matt Mendelsohn (New York: HarperCollins,2006).
This content downloaded from 129.79.13.20 on Fri, 18 Oct 2013 12:56:45 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Obstacles to the Integration of the Holocaust 365 an ethniccleansing project with the Germans and in variousways participated in themurder of theJews.18 A UkrainianHolocaust survivor, Borys Zabarko, said in an interviewthat without such collaborators the "Final Solution" in Ukraine wouldnot have been as successfulas itwas: "Todaythere are people who want to drawa lineunder that past, which is stillalive, and want to eraseit as muchas possiblefrom memory. Especially unacceptable are attemptsto place victims and perpetratorson the same level, attemptsto make heroes of Nazi accomplices- collaboratorsand anti-Semiteswho destroyedor helped to destroypeaceful inhabitants,prisoners of the concentrationcamps and ghettoes."19Most WesternUkrainians, however, honour the memoryof the nationalists,primarily because of theirarmed resistance to theSoviets in 1944- 1950.They would find Zabarko' s perspectivevery difficult to accept.
The Mixed Heritage of the Interwar Era Not just the politics,but the cultureof interwarEastern Europe outside the SovietUnion was oftensaturated with nationalism, anti-Semitism, and fascism. If one wereto purgethe twentieth-century national pantheon of thepolitically incorrect,not many figures would be left.For example,Romanian intellectual lifein the interwar period was chauvinisticand anti-Semitic, but also vibrantand interesting- the philosopherEmil Cioran and the religiousstudies scholar MirceaEliade were both close to thefascists. Leading West Ukrainian poets of the 1930s,such as Olena Teliha and BohdanKravtsiv, were nationalists with fascistsympathies; Bohdan Ihor Antonych wrote a poemin honourof Francoist heroesof theSpanish Civil War.What does one do withsuch cultural figures? This is, of course,a variantof the question:What does one do withMartin Heideggerand Paul de Man?
The Survival or Revival of Anti-Semitism Traditionalanti-Semitism did not die in the region duringthe years of communistpower. Accusations of ritual murder surfaced shortly after the war in Polandand Ukraine."Everyday anti-Semitism" can be encounteredin manyof the East Europeancountries and theirdiasporas.20 Sometimes the communist
The beststudies are: DieterPohl, "Ukrainische Hilfskräfte beim Mord an denJuden," in GerhardPaul, ed., Die Täterder Shoah. FanatischeNationalsozialisten oder ganz normaleDeutsche? (Göttingen: Wallstein Verlag, 2002) 205-234. FrankGolczewski, "Die Kollaborationin derUkraine," in Beiträge zur Geschichtedes Nationalsozialismus, vol. 19: Kooperationund Verbrechen:Formen der "Kollaboration"im östlichen Europa 1939-1945,edited by ChristophDieckmann, Babette Quinkert, and TatjanaTönsmeyer (Göttingen:Wallstein Verlag, 2003) 151-182. OleksandrKanevs'kyi, "Zhyttia i smeifv epokhuHolokostu," Dzerkalo Tyzhnia 3-9 February2007. For an interestingstatistical study of xenophobiain Ukrainein 1994-2006,see
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This content downloaded from 129.79.13.20 on Fri, 18 Oct 2013 12:56:45 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 366 John-PaulHimka regimesmobilized anti-Semitism for theirown purposes- for example,the "anti-Zionist"campaigns of the 1960s and 1970s. The communistlegacy of "anti-Zionism"has been inheritedby some post-communistprojects, such as theInterregional Academy of Human Resources in Ukraine (generally known by itsUkrainian acronym MAUP).21 The issues of anti-Semitismand the Holocaustin EasternEurope have becomeembedded into the internationalpolitical conflict around the Middle East. The Iranianambassador has appearedat MAUP conferencesand is now involvedin organizinga conferenceon theHolocaust in Warsaw.22The leading activistsat MAUP haveenjoyed visiting professorships in Kuwait. On theother hand,Israeli scholars and institutionshave been promoting the integration of the Holocaustinto East European education and historical research. The openingup of thepublic sphere in post-communistEurope not only allowed the new Middle-Eastern-mediatedanti-Semitism to filterinto East Europeansocieties, but also thenew literatureof Holocaustdenial written by David Irving,Robert Faurisson, and others.23David Duke is a frequentguest at MAUP eventsin Ukraine.
VolodymyrIllich Paniottoand Valerii IevhenovychKhmel'ko, "Dumky naselennia holodomor1932-33 r. ksenofobiiv Ukraini 1994-2006," Ukrainypro " Dynamika Ahenstvo"Ukrains'ki Novyny, 9 November2006. The studywas conductedby the Kyiv InternationalInstitute of Sociology.See also: "ADL Poll Shows44 Percentof Russians Hold StrongAnti-Semitic Views as Politicaland PopularActs of Anti-SemitismRise," Press Release, Anti-DefamationLeague, 21 September1999.
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Anti-Semitismis a factorblocking the integration of theHolocaust into the historicalnarrative, and converselyits incorporationfunctions as a measure againstthe preservation and diffusion of anti-Semitism.
The Centrality of the Holocaust In theWest the Holocaust is consideredto be an eventof universal significance. It is thetopic of a vastscholarly literature and of belleslettres and film.It has becomethe standard to whichall othergenocides and atrocities are compared.It is a centralityin contemporaryWestern thought and culture, "a transnationallieu de mémoirefor the Westernworld," perhaps "the centerof an emergent commonEuropean memory."24 In fact,as a corollary,one formof expressing radicalanti-Westernism is to belittlethe Holocaust, as Irandid by sponsoringa HolocaustCartoon Contest in 2006. The Holocaust'scentrality has notbeen readily accepted in EasternEurope. Partlythis is because nationsthat feel themselvesto be beleagueredare not inclinedto the universal,and nationalismnaturally comes intoconflict with universalities.Furthermore, when the constructionof the Holocaust as a universality/centralityoccurred in the West,the East Europeannations, then undercommunism, were isolated from the process.
Diasporas I use theterm diaspora in a particularway, to referto thegeneration descended fromthe personsdisplaced after World War II. The latterwere émigrés disproportionatelyassociated in one way or anotherwith collaborationist regimesor movementsin EasternEurope. Often, they were evacuated when the Germanarmy was retreatingwestward. In the case of the Poles, where collaborationismas such was not widespread,many émigrésnonetheless maintainedthe rightist,nationalist, and anti-Semiticattitudes that had been widespreadin interwarPoland. The childrenof theseoriginal émigrés were particularlystung by chargesof East Europeancomplicity in theextermination of the Jews.On the one hand,they loved theirparents, knew about their traumaticexperiences in Europe,25and valuedthe cultures transmitted to them; on theother hand, raised in the West and coming of age in the1970s and 1980s,
24 Struve44. Herethe concept of "postmemory"is useful. "Postmemory most specifically describes therelationship ofchildren of survivors of cultural or collective trauma to theexperiences oftheir parents, experiences that they 'remember' only as thenarratives and imageswith whichthey grew up, but that are so powerful,so monumental,as to constitutememories in theirown right.""The childrenof victims,survivors, witnesses, or perpetratorshave differentexperiences of postmemory...." Marianne Hirsch, "Surviving Images: Holocaust Photographsand the Workof Postmemory,"Yale Journalof Criticism14.1 (Spring 2001): 9.
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This content downloaded from 129.79.13.20 on Fri, 18 Oct 2013 12:56:45 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 368 John-PaulHimka theywell understoodthe centrality/universalityof the Holocaust.They often respondedto thisemotional dissonance by rejectingout of handaccusations of theirparents' generation's complicity or, less commonly,by maintaining that the murderof theJews has beenblown out of proportion.Since 1989the diasporas havebeen influencing the original homelands, contributing to the resurrection of pre-communistpolitical trends as well as promotinga narrative of victimization andsometimes their defensive views on theHolocaust. The diasporaoften feels that their side of the storyis not givena fair hearing.26At the same time,the diasporashave been unableto examinethe historyof the Holocaust dispassionately enough to articulatean alternativeview plausibleto outsiders.
Embedment in Issues of Internal Politics (European/Nativist Orientation) There has been a longstandingfissure in East Europeannations between Westernizersand nativists, predating the Holocaust by about a century.The best knownsuch division is thatbetween the Slavophiles and Westernizers in Russia, but similardivisions also existedamong Poles,27 Ukrainians, Hungarians, and otherpeoples in the nineteenthcentury. The discourseover the Holocaustin post-communistEastern Europe is embeddedin that same division. The veryterm Holocaust came to EasternEurope, for the most part, only in thelate and post-communistperiod, and it came fromthe West. With it came theideas about the Holocaust as theyhad been worked up inthe source cultures. The West,and in thiscontext we shouldinclude Israel, was also the chief promoterof Holocaustconsciousness in EasternEurope. Cases in pointare the StockholmForums and the Task Force for InternationalCooperation on HolocaustEducation, Remembrance, and Research.The idea to establisha Commissionon Holocaust Historyin Romania was "not an endogenous phenomenonbut the direct result of influencefrom abroad, primarily the United Statesand Israel."28The cult of Antonescuwas curbedlargely as a resultof pressurefrom the United States and Germany.29In Ukrainethe restoration of a
See Robert Cherry,"Contentious History: A Survey on Perceptionsof Polish-Jewish Relations duringthe Holocaust," in Polish-JewishRelations in NorthAmerica, edited by Mieczyslaw B. Biskupski and Antony Polonsky, Polin: Studies in Polish Jewry, 19 (Oxfordand Portland,OR: The LittmanLibrary of JewishCivilization, 2007) 339-340. JerzyJedlicki, A Suburb of Europe: Nineteenth-CenturyPolish Approaches to Western Civilization(Budapest and New York: CentralEuropean UniversityPress, 1999). 28 Gemer 242. James P. Niessen, "Romania," in Eastern Europe: An Introductionto the People, Lands, and Culture,edited by Richard Frucht,vol. 3 (Santa Barbara: ABC-CLIO, 2005) 788.
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"memory"about the Holocaust is sometimesseen "as a concessionto external pressure(on thepart of the 'civilized' countries of the West)."30 The pro-Europeantrends in EasternEurope are generallymore open to writingthe Holocaust into their national histories than the nativist trends. There is a riftin Romaniabetween a newpost-communist generation of intellectuals, especiallystudents, and a xenophobicand anti-Semiticnew right.31Pro- and anti-integrationistideas generallycorrespond to theurbanist-populist divide in Hungary.One of the populistFIDESZ spokespersonson the issue, Maria Schmidt,argued in 1998 thatthe social democratsand liberalsin Hungaryhad "decidedon theoverexposure of the 'Jewish question'" in order to discredittheir opponents.32During the crosses controversy at Auschwitz, the right-wing Polish activistKazimierz Switoñ displayed banners saying: "Jews out of Poland,""No toNATO," and "Europeans out of Poland."33 The division is complicatedbecause some of the European-oriented intelligentsiais also anti-Semitic.This particularphenomenon can be foundin Romania,Western Ukraine, and the Baltic republics.Here European-oriented can also be understoodto mean anti-Russian.Moreover, it should be rememberedthat the orientation on Europeanvalues in theinterwar period led East Europeanintellectuals to the fascistsand nationalsocialists; where the prestigeof theinterwar era has revived,the idea of Europeis notnecessarily liberal. The differencebetween the two orientationscan oftentake the formof a debateover whose crimes were greater, the communists' or the fascists'.34In this context,emphasizing communist crimes is seen as de-emphasizingthe Holocaustand vice-versa.But thereis no reasonwhy criticalthinkers and scholarsshould accept the dichotomy.The issues of nationalsocialist and communistcrimes against humanity can be uncoupled.35 A variantof theEuropeanist/nativist divide in politicscan also be foundin historicalscholarship. In Ukraine,historians who havebeen trained exclusively in thenative, often communist educational system and who read no Western
30 Elena Ivanova,"Konstruirovanie kollektivnoi pamiati o Kholokostev Ukraine,"Ab imperio2 (2004): 377. Gemer242. Gerner246. JanineP. Hole, "MemoryContested: Jewish and CatholicViews of Auschwitzin Present-DayPoland," in Anti-Semitismand Its Opponents in Modern Poland, edited by RobertBlobaum (Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 2005) 310. 34 See, e.g.,Gemer 249. MichaelShafir has made a particularlypowerful and personalplea forthis after a magisterialreview of Holocaustnegationism in post-communistEast CentralEurope. Shafir36.
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This content downloaded from 129.79.13.20 on Fri, 18 Oct 2013 12:56:45 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 370 John-PaulHimka languageshave been protectingtheir institutional positions against generally younger,Western-trained, and Western-orientedscholars. The formertend to hold fastto an unsulliednational narrative, while the latterare moreopen to criticalreassessments of thepast, including the "dark past."
EmbedmentAlso in Issues of External Politics Accusationsof participationin theHolocaust were regularly used to discredit émigrésin Soviettimes and also to discreditindependence movements during perestroika.In the late 1980s, for example,"Soviet propaganda'recalled' Lithuanianparticipation in themurder of Jews...to frightenthe world with the 'dangerousLithuanians,' who wereseeking independence from Moscow."36 In Croatiathe recognition of theHolocaust is complicatednot only by a certain nationalinvestment in theUstasha, but also by therole accusations of atrocities playedin thewars of theYugoslav succession in the 1990s.37Many in Western Ukraineevaluate positively the Organization of UkrainianNationalists and the UkrainianInsurgent Army (Ukrainian acronym - UPA) becausethey were anti- Russian,anticommunist, and dedicatedto establishingUkrainian statehood. While theirUkrainian admirers, of course,do not wish to recognizethe atrocitiesperpetrated by these groups,Russian publicationsare happy to publicizethem.38 The latterfollow in the footstepsof the Sovietmedia which vilifiedthe nationalistorganizations to discredittheir representativesin emigrationand the diaspora.
Restitutionof JewishProperty The issue of the restitutionof Jewishproperty in post-communistEurope is complicated by, among other things, the communistgovernments' nationalizationsof property.Further, given the massive scale and effectiveness ofthe Holocaust in EasternEurope and the absence of satisfactory records, it has oftenbeen difficultto prove inheritancerights to propertywhose original ownershave perished. The restitutionof Jewishproperty is also tangledup with theissue of the restitution of formerlyGerman property in Polandand the Czech Republic.Although conflicts between Poles and Jewishclaimants, usually from abroad,have done nothingto improveJewish-Polish relations, they have not playeda prominentrole in Polish debates over the Holocaust.39
36 Staliünas 327-328. Kerstin Nyström, "The Holocaust and Croatian National Identity: An Uneasy Relationship,"in The Holocaust on Post-War Battlefields,edited by Karlsson and Zander 259-288. 38 For example, Bogdan Vozniuk, "Ukraina: perelitsovkaistorii. Palachei v geroi natsii?" Morskaia gazeta 16 February2002. 39 Dariusz Stola, "Die polnische Debatte um den Holocaust und die Rückerstattungvon Eigentum," in Raub und Restitutiondes jüdischen Eigentums in Europa, edited by
This content downloaded from 129.79.13.20 on Fri, 18 Oct 2013 12:56:45 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Obstacles to the Integration of the Holocaust 371
The issueof reparationsflared up brieflyin Romania,when President Ion Iliescuspoke against them in an interviewwith Ha 'aretzon 25 July2003. "After all,"he said,"that is liableto generatesentiments not of a positivenature toward theJewish population... Is it worthcontinuing to skinthose who are livingin distresstoday... And just in orderto compensateothers? I don't findthat appropriate."In theaftermath of thiscontroversial statement, Romania declared itsintent to returnconfiscated Jewish property.40 In Ukrainethe issue of Holocaustreparations is marginal.Ukraine had no stateduring World War II, and the mass of Jewishproperty was confiscated under the rubricof socializationrather than aryanization.Moreover, the restitutionof any kindof socializedproperty in Ukrainehas yetto be worked out.41Only extremeanti-Semites have triedto make propagandawith the reparationsissue. According to HryhoriiMusiienko, a professorof philosophy and politicalscience at MAUP, theJews have decidedto makeRussians and Ukrainianspay forthe Holocaust. "After all, youcan't take anything from dead Nazis,but from live Ukrainians there is somethingto filch."42
Conclusions and Prospects The obstaclesto the acceptanceof Holocausthistory in EasternEurope are manifold,and theysometimes connect with one anotherto shoreup a larger structureof resistance.Effective education about the Holocaustin Eastern Europe needs to develop strategiesfor overcomingor neutralizingthese obstacles.Education should proceed from a respectfulstance, avoiding blanket generalizationsand accusatoryrhetoric. In explainingthe Holocaustand its importance,care mustbe takennot to minimizeby comparisonand disparage thesufferings borne also by non-Jewish East Europeanpeoples. In particular, therelation between the recollection of communistatrocities and theresistance to consciousnessof the Holocausthas to be broken.At the same time,the cultivationof victimizationnarratives should not be encouraged.Admittedly, thisis a difficultset of parametersin whichto work.I imaginethat the task wouldbe made easierif East Europeanhistory on its own termswere better integratedinto Holocausthistory. Scholars writing about the Holocaustin
ConstantinGoschler and PhilippTher (Frankfurt am Main: FischerVerlag, 2003) 205- 224. Butsee also Struve52, n. 34. Waldman91-93. I am citingIliescu fromLaurence Weinbaum, "The Banalityof Historyand Memory:Romanian Society and theHolocaust," Post-Holocaust and Anti- Semitism(Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs) 45 (1 June2006): 9. Foran excellentsurvey of the issue almost through 2001, see IosifZisel's, "K voprosu o evreiskoisobstvennosti v Ukraine (Popytka predstavleniia temy)," http ://www judaica. kiev.ua/Conference/Conf59.htm(Accessed 12 January2008). HryhoriiMusiienko, "Babyn lar: reanimatsiiaholokostu i pryvatyzatsiiaUkrainy," PersonalPlius 39 (190) (29 September-5October 2006).
CanadianSlavonic Papers/Revue canadienne des slavistes Vol. L, Nos. 3^, September-December2008
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EasternEurope should develop a deeperknowledge of thelanguages, histories, and culturesof the region.The knowledgeof the Germanlanguage and of modernGerman and Jewish historyare not sufficientfor a sensitive investigationof East Europeanaspects of the Holocaust.And onlyinformed, sensitiveinvestigations have any prospect of being acceptable to East European populations. The analysisabove has also shownthat the discourse about the Holocaust has been developingin particularrelations to other,larger discourses about domestic,European, and internationalaffairs. Let me riskthe predictionthat suchissues as theconflicts in theMiddle East and immigrationtoEurope from Asia andNorth Africa will probably exercise a greatereffect in thefuture on the discourseover the integration ofthe Holocaust legacy.
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