Remembering and forgetting: the state policy of memorializing Stalin's repression in post-Soviet Kazakhstan

Abstract

The general perception of Western analysts and observers is that the nation-states created as a result of the breakup of the Soviet Union all treat the memory of the dark, repressive aspects of the Stalinist regime in public spaces as a symbolic element in the creation of a new post-Soviet identity [Denison, Michael. 2009. “The Art of the Impossible: Political Symbolism, and the Creation of National Identity and Collective Memory in Post-Soviet Turkmenistan.” Europe-Asia Studies 61 (7): 1167–1187]. We argue that the government of Kazakhstan employs non-nationalistic discourse in its treatment of Stalinist victims’ commemoration in a variety of forms, through the creation of modern memorial complexes at the sites of horrific Soviet activity (mass burial places, labor camps, and detention centers), purpose-built museum exhibitions, and the commemorative speeches of its president and other officials. Kazakhstan's strategy in commemorating its Soviet past is designed to highlight the inclusiveness of repression on all peoples living in its territory at that time, not just Kazakhs, thereby assisting in bringing together its multinational and multiethnic society. Thus, the official stance treats this discourse as an important symbolic source of shaping the collective memory of the nation, based on “a general civil identity without prioritizing one ethnic group over another – a national unity, founded on the recognition of a common system of values and principles for all citizens” [Shakirova, Svetlana. 2012. “Letters to Nazarbaev: Kazakhstan's Intellectuals Debate National Identity.” February 7. Accessed July 28, 2015. http://postsovietpost.stanford.edu/discussion/letters-nazarbaev-kazakhstans-intellectuals-debate-national-identity].

Keywords:

• Kazakhstan
• Soviet repression
• memorialization
• commemorative narrative
• the non-nationalistic discourse

Notes

1. The final version of the composition consists of seven cubes with two stelae on each side. The words of the president have been placed on the left stela; on the right one there is an inscription titled “Eternal memory,” written in 40 languages.

2. A shroud is a swath of linen or white cotton that wraps a dead man's body in Islamic funerals.

3. Four high granite posts are symbolic of mothers bowing their heads to the innocent victims on their iron prison stools under the cold light of a cell. A gun muzzle looks out of the stylized cell as a symbol of violence and annihilation, and the prison bars symbolize the hopelessness and deep trauma.

4. This monument comprises bronze wings on a black-and-white pedestal, with a background of red prison bars, and barbed wire twining round the wings to prevent them from taking off. The monument is crowned by a flower.

5. The mission and objectives of the museum were defined in the following way:

The main task of the museum is to accumulate and disseminate knowledge about that unprecedented tragedy; preserve the memory about those who suffered; and induce its visitors to ponder over moral issues that those tragic events pose before us, and over their civic duties and responsibility as citizens of the democratic states.

6. In the Republic of Kazakhstan, the Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Political Repression is an annual commemorative celebration decreed by the Kazakhstani President, Nursultan Nazarbayev, since 1997.