Guest: Edyta Bojanowska on A World of Empires: The Russian Voyage of the Frigate Pallada published by Harvard University Press.
For the past few weeks, protests for fair elections in upcoming municipal polls have become weekly in Moscow and St. Petersburg as thousands have defied authorities to attend unsanctioned rallies. The police crackdown has been particularly harsh in Moscow. Protests on July 27 and August 3 resulted in over 2000 detentions. Images of police in riot gear wrestling citizens to the ground and beating peaceful protesters were reminiscent of the mass protests against election fraud in 2011-2012.
Members of the Russian Socialist Movement, a small Marxist, anti-Stalinist organization active in the Russian left, have been participants in local electoral campaigns and in the protests. Two RSM activists, Valeria Kovelishina and Ilya Budraitskis talk about the Russian Socialist Movement, their electoral work, the protests for democracy in Russia and what they might mean for the future.
Roundtable discussion marking the 30th anniversary of the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe. Participants include Timothy Garton Ash, Bridget Kendall, and Jens Reich.
Guest: Doug Smith on Rasputin: Faith, Power, and the Twilight of the Romanovs.
Around Moscow, there’s a whole industry of so-called “black creditors” — microfinance institutions (or MFOs) that swindle and seize debtors’ homes. Ivan Golunov’s investigation for Meduza has discovered that almost 500 apartments have been seized from their owners over the past five years without so much as a court order. In fact, this scheme involves more than simply “squeezing” people from their homes. It is possibly part of a wider, international money-laundering system. Here’s Meduza special correspondent Ivan Golunov on the ins and outs of this industry.
Guest: Anna Krakus on the stories Polish police files tell us.
Guest: Paul Hanebrink on A Specter Haunting Europe: The Myth of Judeo-Bolshevism published by Harvard University Press.
Partial transcript of my interview with Tony Wood about his excellent new book, Russia Without Putin: Money, Power and the Myths of the New Cold War published by Verso.
Partial transcript of the event “Shaping National Memory: Ukrainian Secret Police Archives and WWII” at the University of Pittsburgh featuring Jared McBride.
Partial transcript of the event “Peering Under the Rug: Sources of Information about Russia” at the University of Pittsburgh featuring Mark Galeotti, Kevin Rothrock, and Maxim Trudolyubov.
Partial transcript of an interview with Lara Douds on the formation, functioning, and decline of the Lenin’s Council of People’s Commissars, or Sovnarkom.
Partial transcript of an interview with Natalia Telepneva on Soviet and Czechoslovak intelligence in African national liberation movements.
Partial transcript of my interview with Katherine Reischl on the intersection of photography and Russian literature.
Partial transcript with my interview with Paula Michaels on the Soviet origins of Lamaze.
Partial transcript of my interview with Marlene Laruelle on Russian nationalism.