The Transformation of ‘Holiday’ in Post-Soviet Space: Celebrating Soviet Victory Day in Latvia

Abstract

This article discusses the celebration in Latvia of the victory of the Soviet Union in World War II. Since the restoration of Latvia’s statehood, 9 May has not been an official holiday, but it has become—as ‘Victory Day’—the most important history-linked celebration for the Russian-speaking community in Latvia. The post-1991 history of ‘Victory Day’ makes it possible to track changes in: policies toward history and memory in Russia and Latvia; how political groups have used these celebrations to further their own agendas; and the organisation of events on public holidays.

Notes

¹ Regulations on weekly leisure and celebration days adopted by the People’s Commissariat of Soviet Russia on 2 December 1918 stated that working people would have days off on 1 January (New Year’s Day), 22 January (a commemoration of ‘Bloody Sunday’, 9 January 1905), 12 March (the date when the previous regime was overthrown), 18 March (Parisian Commune Day), 1 May (Internationale Day), and 7 November (Proletarian Revolution Day) (see Malysheva 2005, p. 53).

² Public holidays were 22 January (from 1929, a combined Day of Memory for V. I. Lenin and Bloody Sunday, 1905; this had the status of a public holiday until 1951); 1 and 2 May (Mayday); 7 and 8 November (Great October Revolution Day); 5 December (Constitution Day, from 1936 to 1977) (Binns 1979, pp. 604–5).

³ In the last years of Stalin’s rule, the public holidays were 1 January (New Year’s Day, a public holiday from 1948); 1 and 2 May (May Day); 7 and 8 November (Great October Revolution Day); 5 December (Stalin Constitution Day). A public holiday for 9 May (Victory Day) existed in 1946 and 1947. Included in the holiday calendar during the 1940s were the International Students’ Day (1941), Day of the Artillery (1946), All-world Youth Day (1945), and the All-World Day of Health (1948) (Lane 1981, pp. 289–90). The list of public holidays was supplemented in 1965 by decrees from the Supreme Soviet, with the status granted to 9 May (Victory Day, from 1965) and 8 March (International Womens’ Day, from 1966) (Pudovina 2006, pp. 27, 32). With the promulgation of the new constitution on 7 October 1977, public holiday status was removed from 5 December while 7 October was granted it (Jērāns 1987, p. 318). The Soviet holiday calendar was supplemented during the 1950–1970 period with several holidays noting important social groupings and professions, such as International Day of Solidarity of Youth and Day of the Construction Worker (1955), Day of the Metallurgist (1957), Day of Soviet Youth (1958), Day of Astronautics and Day of Soviet Police (1962), Day of the Rocket Forces (1964), Day of the Worker in the Medical Services and Day of the Liberation of Africa (1963), Day of the Worker in the Chemical Industry, Day of the Teacher and Day of the Fisherman (1965), Day of the Geologist and Day of the Worker in Light Industry (1966), Day of the Radio (1967), Day of the Drivers (1976), and Day of Oil and Gas Industry Workers (1980) (Lane 1981, pp. 289–90; Ritenberga 1989, pp. 396–97).

⁴ For more about World War II veterans in the Soviet Union and their relationship with the regime, see Edele (2008), Dale (2015). For more on the veterans of the Latvian Red Army, see Rozenšteine et al. (2013).

⁵ For more about Victory celebrations in the Brezhnev era, see Turmarkin (1994, pp. 125–57), Druzhba (2000, pp. 88–145), Jahn (2005), Gill (2011, pp. 207–8), Senyavskiy and Senyavskay (2010, pp. 682–84), Danilova (2015, p. 186), Gabovich (2015, pp. 99–105).

⁶ Gudkov (2004, p. 148) also points to the fact that the absence of a moral evaluation of the past helped to create a positive image of Stalin in Russian social thinking. In a 1989 survey of important figures in the Russian past, Stalin was placed tenth (first place: Lenin). In similar surveys in 1994, Stalin was fourth (behind Peter I [the Great]), Lenin, and Pushkin); in 2008 in third place (behind Peter I and Pushkin); in 2012 in first place (with Lenin and Peter I sharing second); and in 2017 in first place (with second shared by Putin and Pushkin) (see, ‘Vydayushchiesya lyudi’, Levada Centre, 26 June 2017, available at: https://www.levada.ru/2017/06/26/vydayushhiesya-lyudi/, accessed 12 February 2018).

⁷ The news media reported that the celebration in the Latvian SSR lasted until sunset and that 275,000 people took part in the demonstration in Rīga (78% of all of the city’s residents). See Padomju Latvija, 9 November 1940.

⁸ For sample programmes for Soviet holidays in the Latvian SSR setting see, Brēde (1972, 1979).

⁹ Holidays in the Republic of Latvia in 1939 included Lutheran and Catholic religious holidays, New Year’s Day on 1 January, National Restoration Day on 15 May (in honour of the authoritarian coup of 1934), Victory Day on 11 August, and Independence Day on 18 November.

¹⁰ Literatūra un Māksla, 18 November 1989.

¹¹ The Supreme Council (Augstākā Padome) of the Latvian Republic was in effect the Latvian parliament from 1990 to 1993. The Supreme Council was elected on 18 March 1990, as the Supreme Soviet of the Latvian SSR. On 4 May 1990, this body voted to declare the renewal of the Republic of Latvia and with it a change in its name to ‘The Republic of Latvia’. This step included a name change as well for the Supreme Soviet, which became the Supreme Council (Jubels 2002, p. 380). On 22 October 1991, the Supreme Council passed the ‘Law about the elections to the 5. Saeima’ which foresaw a further name change for the main parliamentary body. With the name ‘Saeima’ the Latvian parliament became a successor of the legislature that had existed from 1922 to 1934. The elections for the Fifth Saeima took place on 5–6 June 1993, and this body then began its work in June (Hirša 2009, p. 73).

¹² The 11 November holiday which before World War II was celebrated in rememberance of the decisive victory of the Latvian national army in the Independence War of 1919 acquired a poetic name in the 1920s as ‘Lāčplēsis Day’. Lāčplēsis was a mythological figure created by the poet Andrejs Pumpurs (1841–1902) in an 1888 epic poem that bore the hero’s name—Lāčplēsis—the Bearslayer. Lāčplēsis quickly became for Latvians a symbol of military heroism and victory. In 1920, for example, the highest military award in Latvia became known as the Lāčplēsis Order. His image appeared on various military victory monuments and in the names of publications, such as the magazine meant for invalided war veterans, and in 1923 one of the main streets of Rīga was renamed Lāčplēsis Street (Cimdiņa & Cimdiņa 2010, pp. 270–72).

¹³ ‘Lielai daļai Latvijas iedzīvotāju 18. novembris ir parasta brīvdiena’, Kantar TNS-Latvia, 2005, available at: http://www.tns.lv/?lang=lv&fullarticle=true&category=showuid&id=2292, accessed 19 November 2015; ‘Lielākā daļa Latvijas iedzīvotāju zina 18. novembra svētku nozīmi’, Kantar TNS-Latvia, 2006, available at: http://www.tns.lv/?lang=lv&fullarticle=true&category=showuid&id=2506, accessed 19 November 2015.

¹⁴ ‘Lielākā daļa Latvijas iedzīvotāju zina 18. novembra svētku nozīmi’, Kantar TNS-Latvia, 2008, available at: http://www.tns.lv/?lang=lv&fullarticle=true&category=showuid&id=2864, accessed 19 November 2015.

¹⁵ ‘Nacionālās identitātes, pilsoniskās sabiedrības un integrācijas politikas pamatnostādnes 2012.–2018. gadam’, Kultūras ministrija, 2011, available at: https://www.km.gov.lv/uploads/ckeditor/files/Sabiedribas_integracija/KM_130515_Prec_Nac_ident_pilson_sab_un_itegr_polit_pamatnost_2012-2018.pdf, accessed 14 February 2018.

¹⁶ Survey of Population of Latvia, 2014, carried out at the Special Order by University of Latvia and financed by ‘National Identity’, the State Research Programme of Latvia.

¹⁷ Survey of Population of Latvia, 2014, carried out at the Special Order by University of Latvia and financed by ‘National Identity’, the State Research Programme of Latvia.

¹⁸ For a review of scholarly literature on this issue, see Cheskin (2015).

¹⁹ Simonyan (2005, p. 118) also acknowledges that the tension between the titular inhabitants of the Baltic states and the incoming Russian-language users was not only ethnic or political in nature but also had strong elements of the cultural (intercultural) dissonance that arises from the friction between cultural characteristics, such as uneducated and highly educated, urban dwellers and rural persons, and natives and incomers. Similar tensions also existed in the large cities of the Russian Federation, where the extensive development of the Soviet economy saw the arrival of large numbers of poorly educated persons with almost no professional qualifications.

²⁰ For a comparison of the Latvian and Russian-speakers’ assumptions about Latvian history see Broks et al. (2001, pp. 78–91), Dribins (2007, pp. 44–64).

²¹ An absolutely strict line cannot be drawn between the two ethnic groups. Cheskin studied the attitudes of various generations of Russian speakers toward Latvian history: ‘on the one hand we may therefore be optimistic about the prospects of Russian speakers being able to better integrate into Latvian discourse and narratives and for the prospects of a democratisation of history. On the other hand, we should be cautious about these findings and bear in mind that the views of young Russian speakers still diverge greatly from their “Latvian” counterparts. In order to achieve societal harmony, it is necessary for both groups to make concessions, and listen to the other group’s point of view’ (Cheskin 2012, p. 580).

²² After 1994, in Latvia the Skrunda Radio Complex—a Russian Federation military object—continued operations. On 4 May 1995, a US company called ‘Controlled Demolition’ blew up (on live television) the unfinished 18-story building housing the ‘Dar’yal-UM’ antenna. The Skrunda Radio Complex closed down entirely on 31 August 1998, and was fully demolished by the end of 1999, which was also the time when the Russian army departed in its entirety from Latvia (Upmalis et al. 2006, p. 193; Purs 2012, pp. 103–4).

²³ The 1985 monument with its official name, ‘Monument to the Soldiers of the Soviet Army—liberators of Soviet Latvia and Riga from the German fascistic invaders’, lost its status as a state-recognised landmark after the renewal of Latvian independence. In public discourse it continunes to be referred to as the ‘Victory Monument’ (Uzvaras piemineklis) (Spārītis 2007, p. 41; Čakstiņa & Pētersons 2017, pp. 335–36).

²⁴ On 15 November 1991, the Baltic Military District, formed in 1940, was transformed into the Northwestern Army Group by a decree of President Gorbachev. The Group passed into the jurisdiction of the Russian Federation, as decreed by the President of the Russian Federation Yel’tsin on 27 January 1992 (Upmalis et al. 2006, pp. 130, 184).

²⁵ The Latvian Socialist Party was founded on 15 January 1994, and defines itself as the heir to the Communist Party of Latvia. Its identity slogan from 1994 to 2002 was ‘For social security and equal rights for all’ and from 2002 on ‘Power to the people, not capital’. The chair of the Party from 1999 to 2015 was the former First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Latvian Communist Party Alfreds Rubiks (b. 1935). The Party’s homepage is available at: https://socparty.lv. For the history of this Party see Rubiks (2006).

²⁶ The alliance included the Latvian Socialist Party, the Equality movement, the People’s Harmony Party, and the Russian Party. It defended the rights of non-citizens, Russian speakers and the poor, and insisted that there were two different communities in Latvia and that the status of the Russian language should be strengthened.

²⁷ Vesti segodnya, 10 May 2005.

²⁸ The radically nationalist National Bolshevik Party (Natsional-bol’shevistskaya partiya) of the Russian Federation was founded in 1993 and outlawed there in 2007. Its offshoot in Latvia was led by Vladimirs Lindermans and in the Saeima elections supported the ‘For Human Rights in a United Latvia’ coalition.

²⁹ See Vesti segodnya, 10 May 2005; Chas, 10 May 2005; Diena, 10 May 2005; Rīgas Balss, 10 May 2005; Vakara Ziņas, 10 May 2005; Latvijas Avīze, 10 May 2005.

³⁰ See Vesti segodnya, 10 May 2007; Chas, 10 May 2007; Neatkarīgā Rīta Avīze Latvijai, 10 May 2007; Latvijas Avīze, 10 May 2007; Diena, 10 May 2007.

³¹ Harmony Centre included the People’s Harmony Party (Tautas Saskaņas partija), the New Centre Party (Jaunais Centrs), Daugavpils City Party (Daugavpils pilsētas partija), and the Latvian Socialist Party. Harmony Centre defined itself as a left-oriented political coalition. In 2010, the Social Democratic Party ‘Concord’ was established on the foundations of Harmony Centre. See, http://www.saskana.info.

³² See http://www.9may.lv, which is in Latvian and Russian, with more information in Russian.

³³ See Chas, 11 May 2009; Vesti segodnya, 11 May 2009; Telegraf, 11 May 2009; Latvijas Avīzes, 11 May 2009; Neatkarīgā Rīta Avīze Latvijai, 11 May 2009.

³⁴ See Chas, 10 May 2010; Vesti segodnya, 10 May 2010; Neatkarīgā Rīta Avīze Latvijai, 10 May 2010.

³⁵ Concord was established as a reult of the Harmony Party’s desire to contest the 10th Saeima elections in 2011 without the participation of the Latvian Socialist Party.

³⁶ This announcement was replaced during the event with the evasive texts ‘There are no more St George ribbons’ and ‘Sadly, St George ribbons are not available’.

³⁷ ‘9 maya 2015 goda v Rige. Prazdnichnaya rech’ mera goroda Nila Ushakova’, MIX TV, 9 May 2015, available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zRyeZPENQeA, accessed 10 December 2015.

³⁸ Survey of Population of Latvia 2015, carried out on the Special Order of the University of Latvia and financed by ‘Innovation and sustainable development: Latvia’s post-crisis experience in a global context (SUSTINNO)’, the State Research Programme of Latvia.

³⁹ My personal observation of the episode around the Victory Monument in 2015 suggested that the march of the Eternally Living was only partially the result of the efforts of relatives of those fallen in battle. In the tent of the event’s organisers there were boxes of standardised portraits of World War II Soviet soldiers, each portrait having a handle for easy carrying in a procession.

⁴⁰ Annual Reports by Latvian State Police, available at: http://www.dp.gov.lv/en/useful/annual-reports/, accessed 9 March 2018.

⁴¹ The Federal Agency for Commonwealth of Independent States Affairs (Federal’noe agenstvo po delam Sodruzhestva Nezavisimyh Gosudarsv), Compatriots Living Abroad (sootechestvennikov, prozhivayushchih za rubezhom), and International Humanitarian Cooperation (mezhdunarodnomu gumanitarnomu sotrudnichestvu), established in 2008.

⁴² ‘Kremlin’s Millions’, Re:Baltica, 27 August 2015, available at: http://www.rebaltica.lv/en/investigations/money_from_russia/a/1257/kremlins_millions.html, accessed 1 December 2015.

⁴³ ‘DP: Ap 100 organizāciju Latvijā realizē Krievijas tautiešu politiku un saņem Kremļa naudu’, Nekā personīga/TV3, 1 March 2015, available at: http://www.tvnet.lv/zinas/latvija/549814-dp_ap_100_organizaciju_latvija_realize_krievijas_tautiesu_politiku_un_sanem_kremla_naudu, accessed 10 December 2015.

⁴⁴ In October 2017, the leader of the Social Democratic Party ‘Concord’ Nils Ušakovs announced to the Latvian media that ‘Concord’ had unilaterally discontinued its agreement with United Russia. The reason for this break was said to be Concord’s entry into the European Socialist Party which forms relations with outside (‘third’) parties only on the basis of centralised decisions (Delfi 2017). Political experts in Latvia explain the move with reference to the approaching 2018 elections for the 13th Saeima, because discontinuing direct relations with Vladimir Putin’s party in the Russian Federation would make it easier for Concord to compete for Latvian votes and perhaps allow ‘Concord’ to enter a coalition cabinet.

⁴⁵ The observations involved visits to the event and the taking of notes and photographs. For a report on the commemorative day in 2010 and 2011, see Ardava (2011).

⁴⁶ On 20 June 2013, the Saeima amended the law on ‘Security in public celebrations and leisure activities’, making revisions to the paragraph that prohibits ‘the use, even in a stylised way, of the symbols of the former USSR, the former USSR republics, and Nazi Germany: flags, coats-of-arms, anthems, and the Nazi swastika, SS insignia, and such Soviet symbols as the five-pointed star’. Exceptions are allowed in cases where the said symbols are not being used to glorify their respective totalitarian regimes or to justify the criminal acts of the respective regimes (Saeima 2013). Observations at the 9 May celebrations at the Victory Monument reveal that this law is not being enforced in its entirety. Policemen present at the celebration to enforce public order take a tolerant attitude toward Soviet-era symbols if they are being used as parts of clothing or in minor decorations.

⁴⁷ The ‘T-34’ is a Soviet-era medium tank that was built between 1940 and 1958. It was frequently referred to as the best tank of World War II.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Vita Zelče

Vita Zelče, Professor, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Latvia, Lomonosova Str. 1A, Rīga, LV-1019, Latvia. Email: [email protected]