Propaganda, Immigration, and Monuments. Perspectives on Methods Used to Entrench Soviet Power in Estonia in the 1950s–1980s

Physical and psychological terror implemented in the spirit of communist ideology generally accompanied the Soviet Union’s self-assertion in occupied territories. Yet the long-term administration of society by way of terror and violence alone is not sustainable. Part of the subjugated population was more willing to collaborate and conform. The regime had to offer this population segment a positive programme that they could go along with.

This edition of the Proceedings of the Estonian Institute of Historical Memory examines some of the methods that were used to establish and shape the new social order, including information policy and migration policy, putting together a pseudo-assembly of people’s representatives, and propaganda work in the sphere of history policy. The latter was, among other things, manifested in the destruction of monuments from the period of Estonian independence and in the erection of new monuments.

The selection of articles in this edition takes a step closer to uncovering the inner workings of the Soviet regime’s ideological manipulation, an inseparable part of which was the demolition of the social structure and consciousness of Estonia’s period of independence, which were meant to be replaced by an ordering of the affairs of life designed in the spirit of Soviet doctrines.