Remembering the War, Forgetting the Terror: Appeals to Family Memory in Putin's Russia

Russian state propaganda has framed the invasion of Ukraine as a liberation mission by invoking the Soviet-era myth of the Great Patriotic War (1941–45), in which the Soviet people, led by Russia, saved the world from the greatest evil of the twentieth century. At the same time, the Russian government has banned civil society institutions and initiatives that remind the country of the legacy of Soviet political violence.

Remembering the War, Forgetting the Terror explores the appeal of the c...