The war as a golden age
Remembrance as longing for the Brezhnev era
Deutsche Fassung
Abstract
During the 1990s, victory in the Great Patriotic War became the central symbol of collective memory. However, this is not really a matter of remembering the war; what is actually involved is a longing for the Brezhnev era. This was the period in which the image of a heroic war without any suffering was created, and after a decade of social decline this era is now being seen as a golden age of material prosperity and national glory. Today, a new generation is seizing upon this image and adapting it to its own current needs. Like the old representation of the war in collective memory, the new form of remembrance is based on great power fantasies, social passivity, and isolationism, which are the ingredients of authoritarian regimes.
(Osteuropa 4-6/2005, pp. 219–234)