Cold war heritage dissonance and disinheritance as a heritage alternative: the case of soviet military remnants in the Baltic states

Despite the ongoing efforts towards Cold War heritage-making in Europe, the ambiguities in meaning and the cultural status of certain materialities from the second half of the 20th century across different national contexts highlight a heritage dissonance at play. Focusing on the case of the Baltic states, we analyse the engagements with Soviet military remnants since the early 1990s in the context of changing political regimes. We approach the prevailing practices of disinheritance along the same conceptual lines as heritage-making and highlight how disinheritance has contributed to shaping national identities and future-oriented landscape relations. We argue that disinheritance can be a legitimate alternative strategy for dealing with difficult legacies. In addition, we shed light on how the fragmented attempts to preserve and re-narrativize certain Soviet military remnants reflect the constrained relations between the political agendas of post-1990s nationalism and European integration.