The Soviet Past as Myth and Agenda

The article attempts to look at the theme of the Soviet past through the lenses of the political myth making. According to the starting premise of the study, any ideology from the point of view of mass consciousness is first and foremost a set of myths. At the same time, the article assumes that myths are most effective when they remain implicit and impact mass consciousness by implication, rather than directly. When explicated, myths are subject to intensive criticism and become less persuasive for a significant part of the audience. The author states that during almost the whole post-Soviet period, the topic of the Soviet past was present in the inter-party discussion more in the background and therefore acted mainly like mythology. The discussion around it largely resulted in the confrontation between the communists and the rest of the political spectrum (“communists against everyone”). In 1993—2003, that confrontation had a significant impact on mass political consciousness and occupied at least second place in its importance. Since the 2010s, this confrontation has been replaced by another one e.g., “everyone against the liberals”, which also manifested in the discussion on the issues of the Soviet past. Bearing the imprint of the imperial-patriotic mythology, the new confrontation was not clearly explicit, and at the level of the political agenda it was camouflaged by the theme of the Soviet past. The transformation of the latter from a “myth” into an “agenda” put Soviet mythology under the fire of criticism, diverting attention from the imperial-patriotic mythology.