University of Richmond UR Scholarship Repository History Faculty Publications History 2000 Soviet Social Mentalité and Russocentrism on the Eve of War, 1936-1941 David Brandenberger University of Richmond, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: http://scholarship.richmond.edu/history-faculty-publications Recommended Citation Brandenberger, David. "OrgSoviet Social Mentalité and Russocentrism on the Eve of War, 1936-1941." Jahrbücher Für Geschichte Osteuropas 48, no. 3 (2000): 388-406. This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the History at UR Scholarship Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in History Faculty Publications by an authorized administrator of UR Scholarship Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. David Brandenberger,Harvard University SovietSocial Mentalitéand Russocentrism on theEve ofWar, 1936-1941* In January1939, the theatercritic V. Blium wroteto Stalin in despair that: "Socialistpatriotism sometimes and in someplaces is startingto displayall thecharacteristics ofracial nationalism... [Our people] don't understand that to beatthe enemy fascist, we must - underno circumstancesuse hisweapon (racism), but a farsuperior weapon internationalist socialism."1 What had provoked such a letter?Soviet society witnesseda major ideological about-face duringthe mid-to-late1930s as russocentricetatism superseded earlier internationalist slo- gans. Nevskii, Peter,Kutuzov and Pushkinhad joined Lenin, Stalin, Molotov, Voroshilov, Frunze and Dzerzhinskiiin a newly-integratedSoviet pantheonof heroeswhich aimed to co- - opt charismaticelements of thetsarist past.2 Blium foundthis shift oftenreferred to as the - "great retreat"3 to be a betrayalof Communistideals. Despite wide-spread awareness of this ideological transformationin scholarly circles, manyrecent works on the 1930s contendthat at leastuntil the outset of war in 1941, socialist ideals (internationalism,class, "Soviet patriotism")functioned as the principlesignifiers of Soviet social identity.4One recentstudy observes that"what standsout about the powerful * Researchfor this article was supportedin partby a grantfrom the International Research & Ex- changesBoard (IREX), withfunds provided by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the UnitedStates Department of State,which administers the Russian,Eurasian, and East European ResearchProgram (Title VIII). Earlierversions of this article were presented at theRussian and East EuropeanHistory Workshop at HarvardUniversity and at theMidwest Russian History Workshop at theUniversity of Torontoon October1, 1998 and April10, 1999,respectively. This piece has also benefitedfrom suggestions from Terry Martin, Sarah Davies, JeffreyRossman, Sheila Fitzpatrick, StephenKotkin, Jochen Hellbeck, Serhy Yekelchyk, Peter Blitstein, Katia Dianina and Francine Hirsch. Conclusionsand errorscontained herein remain the sole responsibilityof theauthor. 1 "GlubokouvazhaemyiIosif Vissarionovich! (from Blium)" (31 January1939), in: Rossiiskiitsentr khraneniiai izucheniia dokumentov noveishei istorii (hereafter RTsKhlDNI), fond 1 7, opis' 120, delo 348, listy63-65. See myforthcoming publication (with Karen Pétrone) of theletter in: Voprosy istorii. 2 The evolutionof theofficial historical line reveals that this era s relianceon Russianimagery, myths,and artifacts was a pragmaticmove to constructa single historical narrative on thepre-revolu- tionaryera. The party hierarchy viewed the co-option of imperial charisma and even Russian nationalist rhetoricas themost expedient way to mobilizepopular patriotic sentiments and loyaltyamong the USSR's poorly-educatedcitizenry. Chauvinistic aspects of this campaign, which have been frequently usedto labelStalin, A. A. Zhdanovand othersas closetRussian nationalists, are in factbetter under- stoodas fall-outfrom the party hierarchy's perhaps excessively cynical and calculatingrehabilitation oftsarist heroes, legends and regalia; see D. L. Brandenberger,A. M. Dubrovsky 'The PeopleNeed a Tsar': theEmergence of NationalBolshevism as StalinistIdeology, 1931-1941, in: Europe-Asia Studies50 (1998) No. 5, pp. 873-892. For a moreinstitutional interpretation, see Gerhard Simon Nationalismusund Nationalitätenpolitik in der Sowjetunion: Von dertotalitären Diktatur zur nach- stalinschenGesellschaft. Baden-Baden 1986, pp. 153-194. 3Nicholas TimasheffThe GreatRetreat: The Growthand Decline of Communism in Russia.New York 1947. Lowell Tillet The Great SovietHistorians on theNon-Russian Nationalities, unapei Friendship: - Hill 1969, pp. 49-61; Christel Lane The Ritesof Rulers:Ritual in IndustrialSociety theSoviet Case. Cambridge1981, p. 181; Alexander Werth Russia at War, 1941-1945.New York 1984, pp. 120,249-250; TimothyDunsmore SovietPolitics, 1945-1953. New York 1984,p. 128; Vera S. Dunham In Stalin'sTime: MiddleclassValues in SovietFiction. Enlarged and updatededition. Jahrbücherfür Geschichte Osteuropas 48 (2000) H. 3 o FranzSteiner Verlag Wiesbaden GmbH, Sitz Stuttgart/Germany SovietSocial Mentalité and Russocentrism onthe Eve of War, 1936-1941 389 new nationalidentity developed under Stalin was its Soviet,rather than solely Russian, character,"ethnic and nationalidentity being subordinated to "a senseof belongingto the SovietUnion."5 Such analysisrequires nuancing in orderto acknowledgethe full effect of russocentricpropaganda in thesecond half of the1930s. This articleseeks to examinethe resonancethat the above-mentioned ideological turn-about elicited among Soviet citizens by lookingto an arrayof accounts(letters, diaries, secret police reports) that provide glimpses ofpopular opinion under Stalin.6 Admittedly anecdotal, this approach nevertheless holds the mostpromise for such reception-oriented discussions as thereare few other sources available whichcan detailpopularly-held sentiments during the period.7 SarahDavies arguesin her recent monograph on popularopinion in prewar Leningrad that Russiannational identity before the mid- 1930s was a ratheramorphous entity. Noting that itwas "definedin implicitopposition to othergroups such as Jewsand Armenians, but was Durham,London 1990, pp. 12, 17, 41, 66; Stephen K. Carter RussianNationalism: Yesterday, Today,Tomorrow. New York 1990,p. 5 1; JohnBarber, Mark Harrison The SovietHome Front, 1941-1945:A Social andEconomic History of the USSR in WorldWar II. London1991, p. 69; Nina TumarkinThe Livingand theDead: The Rise and Fall of theCult of WorldWar II in Russia.New York1994, p. 63. A recentbook considers the formation of popular Russian national identity to be an even laterphenomenon - see Yitzhak Brudny ReinventingRussia: RussianNationalism and the SovietState, 1953-1991. Cambridge, MA 1999,pp. 3, 7, etc. 5 Stephen Kotkin MagneticMountain: Stalinism as a Civilization.Berkeley 1995, pp. 215-230, 235-237,21-23, herep. 230; Idem 1991and the Russian Revolution: Sources, Conceptual Categories, AnalyticalFrameworks, in: Journalof ModernHistory 70 (1998) No. 2, pp. 385^425, herepp. 419- 421; IdemPopular Opinion in Stalin'sRussia, by Sarah Davies [review],in: Europe-Asia Studies50 (1998) No. 4, pp. 739-742, especiallyp. 741. 6 Pioneeringwork on Sovietpopular opinion includes E. Iu. Zubkova Obshchestvoi reformy, 1945- 1964. Moskva 1993; E. Iu. Zubkova Mir mneniiSovetskogo chelo veka, 1945-1948 gody: po materialamTsK VKP(b), in: Otechestvennaiaistoriia (1998) No. 3, pp. 25-39; No. 4, pp. 99-108; G. D. Burdei Bytovanieistoricheskikh znanii v massovomsoznanii v godyVelikoi Otechestvennoi voiny, in: Rossiiav 1941-1945:Problemy istorii i istoriografíi- mezhvuzovskii sbornik nauchnykh statei. Saratov1995, pp. 39-54; N. A. LomaginNastroenie zashchitnikov i naseleniia Leningrada v period oboronygoroda, 1941-1942 gg., in: Leningradskaiaepopeia. S.-Peterburg 1995, pp. 200-259; Idem Soldiersat War:German Propaganda and the Morale of theSoviet Army during the Battle for Lenin- grad,1941-1944, in: The CarlBeck Papers in Russian& East EuropeanStudies 1206 (1998) passim; S. A. ShinkarchukObshchestvennoe mnenie v SovetskoiRossii v 30-egody (po materialamSevero- zapada). S.-Peterburg1995; Lesley RimmelAnother Kind of Fear- theKirov Murder and theEnd of BreadRationing in Leningrad,in: Slavic Review56 (1997) No. 3, pp. 481-499; Sarah Davies PopularOpinion in Stalin'sRussia: Terror, Propaganda and Dissent, 1933-1941. Cambridge UK 1997; E. A. Osokina Za fasadom"stalinskogo izobiliia": raspredelenie i rynok v snabzheniinaseleniia v gody industrializatsii,1927-1941. Moskva 1998; and Ol'ga Velikanova The Functionof Lenin'sImage inthe Soviet Mass Consciousness,in: SovietCivilization between Past and Present. Ed. byMette Bryld and ErikKulavig. Odense 1998,pp. 13-38. See also myreview of Shinkarchukin: RussianReview 58 (1999) No. 2, pp. 338-339. 1differ with Shinkarchuk and Davies on thedegree to whichany source is representativeenough to reliably characterize Soviet public opinion as a whole(even within Lenin- gradenvirons). Nevertheless, anecdotal evidence is usefulas a meansof identifyingvoiced opinions in theSoviet and circulating7 public privatespheres. Althoughone commentatorhas recentlyquipped that "the plural of anecdoteis notdata," such standardsare unrealistic for discussions of mentalité anywhere in theworld at mid-century,systematic public opinionresearch being a postwarinvention of thewestern democracies. In theabsence of reliablestatistical surveys, extensive accumulation of admittedlyimpressionistic accounts remains the onlyprofitable way of assessingpopular reception during the Stalin era.