The struggle for history

the past as a limited resource

Ilja Kalinin

pp. 255-265

in: Uilleam Blacker, Alexander Etkind, Julie Fedor (eds), Memory and theory in Eastern Europe, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2013

Abstract

The Russian economy relies on the exploitation of the country's natural resources, such as oil and gas. Having placed them under state ownership, the Russian government also strives to control a whole variety of other resources, both natural and discursive. What is less often noted is the extent to which other spheres of Russian life are permeated and shaped by the ideas and practices associated with what I call a resource imaginary. This applies especially to the attitudes displayed toward Russia's past in the state politics of memory.