THE ISSUE OF “THE TURBULENT 1990s” IN DISCOURSES OF RUSSIAN COMMUNISTS AND NATIONAL-PATRIOTS
Keywords:
political uses of the past, framing collective memory, political discourse, the hard 1990s, analysis of historical narratives, the Communists, the National-Populists and the National-PatriotsAbstract
The article analyzes how the events of the 1990s – the collapse of the USSR and the period of economic and political reforms – are represented in the contemporary discourses of political forces that opposed to Boris Yeltsin and the Democrats/the Liberals – the Communists, the National-Populists and the National-Patriots. The materials for research were publications of the leaders of CPRF, LDPR, and public intellectuals who have a reputation of national-patriots in the central media. The research has revealed that all considered discourses share a negative assessment of the 1990s but use different ways of including this period to their historical narratives. For the Communists, the 1990s is a story about the tragic consequences of the lost “golden age” – the Soviet period. For the National-Populists, it provides a background for constructing their identity as the only defenders of the Russian people, whose interests were neglected by the Soviet, as well as by post-Soviet elites. For the National-Patriots, it is a challenge that needs a response. The image of “the turbulent 1990s” plays an important role in shaping watersheds In Russian politics, as it facilitates constructing common enemies – “the Liberals”, “the oligarchs”, and “the West” – for political groups with rather different programs. The research has also revealed that in spite of the fact that the Communists, the National-Populists and the National-Patriots share negative interpretations of the 1990s, they do not support the idea of strict contrast between “the turbulent 1990s” and “the stable 2000s” that is typical for President's rhetoric. DOI: 10.17072/2218-1067-2020-2-53-63References
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