East European History

14-23

Authors: Artyom Y. Peretyatko

The historiography of the Cossacks is experiencing an unprecedented quantitative rise at the present time. However, there is no similar qualitative growth in new research. Many works talk about the introduction of new concepts and ideas into scientific circulation. But often such works do not live up to expectations: their authors simply rename already known processes, without introducing anything fundamentally new in the interpretation of these processes. A reverse example of the successful application of a relatively new research concept (the concept of frontier) is the book by D.V. Sen' « Russian-Crimean-Ottoman borderlands: area, phenomena, people (late 17th – 18th centuries)». In it, the use of a new concept is not an end in itself, but a tool to «change the necessary research optics». As shown in the review, such a «change optics» not only puts fundamentally new, little-studied plots at the center of the narrative, but also changes the logic of the author's narrative. As a result, the book is characterized by increased attention to «people of the borderlands», whose history is valuable in itself, regardless of the connection with Russian history. The inevitable payment for this is the pushing back of the more traditional plots for historiography to the periphery of the narrative.

14-24

Authors: Olga Yu. Larionova

A cultural value analysis of pre-revolutionary time buildings is necessary stage in determining of the material basis of the cultural capital of Votkinsk. The study focuses on the reconstruction of the history of the Kutuzovs family, entrepreneurs of the 19th century from Votkinsk, their business, private and public life. As a result, the houses of Kutuzovs family were found, including the house of a merchant Ivan Mikhailovich Kutuzov, which is now the part of the complex of buildings in the Tchaikovsky museum-estate in Votkinsk, and it is still nameless. The article also describes the life lines of the merchant Kutuzov’s children and their different entrepreneurial abilities, as well as the history of the occurrence and destruction of St. Nicholas Mirlikiysky’s church, for the construction of which I.M. Kutuzov invested a significant amount of his own funds.

41-50

Authors: Artyom Yu. Peretyatko

General of the Infantry Nikolai Alekseevich Maslakovets was one of the most influential officials of the Ministry of War of the Russian Empire at the late nineteenth century who was engaged in the management of Cossack Hosts. The general proposed a number of reforms and led the work of several commissions, which played some role in the history of the Cossacks (in particular, one of these commissions is associated with the destruction of the zemstvos on the Don, and the second recognized the serious economic crisis of the Don Cossacks). However, a specific study about N.A. Maslakovets is very little, and his ideological evolution was not traced by historians. In the Don historiography after S.G. Svatikov, N.A. Maslakovets is considered an extreme reactionary and opponent of elective bodies that violate the "harmonious organization" of the state machine. But, turning to the fund of N.A. Maslakovets in the department of manuscripts of the Russian National Library, which is little known to historians, we found that this interpretation is greatly simplified. We tried to trace the ideological evolution of the general, which seems to be important both for a better understanding of the decisions he adopted that influenced the history of the Cossacks, and so also in the study of the ideology of the Russian military bureaucracy of the late XIX century. We found that in youth N.A. Maslakovets held liberal views and was a supporter of demilitarization of the Cossacks. But the disappointment in the results of liberal reforms in the Cossack Hosts forced him to move to a conservative position. Conservatism of N.A. Maslakovets was more pragmatic than ideological: he believed that government policy should not aspire to liberal or conservative ideal, but be based on "historical grounds or government needs", "meeting the local needs" and "strong organization of societies, as well as government institutions". Nevertheless, until the end of his career, the general advocated the "call of public forces to serve the state."

19-31

Authors: Dmitry V.Liventsev

The article deals with the organization of military propaganda on the worker-peasant red fleet in March 1918–1919). Examines the confrontation between the Bolshevik and white guard military propaganda during the Civil war. In conclusion, the author notes the reasons why the Bolsheviks succeeded in attracting to their side the revolutionary sailors and managed to organize the discipline on the worker-peasant red fleet.

43-50

Authors: Andrei V. Dyukarev

The articleactualizesthe crisis mechanism "translation – transformation – continuity" of historical memory the Kuban Cossacks as one of ethno-social groups in Russian society. Kuban Cossacks actively integrating into russian society, reborn after a long period of latent existence in the Soviet state and political system. In trying to find their identity Kuban Cossacks refers to the historical memory in the face of problems of its translation, transformation and continuity due to the peculiarities of development of modern Russian society.

7-16

Authors: RoinMetreveli, Zurab Papaskiri

Throughout nearly 2 centuries Georgia was a part of the Russian state space. Despite it, the research of the problems of actually Russian history was never the priority direction in the Georgian historiography. Historians of Georgia presented several theses relating to especially Russian topics, but, their achievements in the field of the Russian history very modest and the main thing, in Georgia the school of sciences of historians-specialists in Russian studies having any weight in science was not created. The Georgian historians nevertheless found the niche — they were engaged in exploring of the Georgian-Russian relationship and, having created powerful scientific heritage in this area, enriched considerably the knowledge not only specifically in the field of the Georgian-Russian relations, but also in the scales of foreign policy of Russia in the Caucasian direction in general.

23-39

Authors: Michal Smigel

The paper provides insights into the practical implementation of the Soviet repatriation operation in Slovakia between 1944 and 1952. It reveals mechanisms employed to carry out the repatriation, the degree of coercion, the role of the Slovak party and its security agencies.The paper offers a general analysis of the methods and fields of action that the bodies involved in the repatriation of Soviet citizens worked in. Materials used include documents of central, military and several regional archives in Slovakia. Additionally, it makes use of modern foreign and Russian scientific publications on the research topic. To address research goals, the work applies general scientific and traditional methods of analysis, synthesis, induction, deduction and the historical ad comparative method. Particular importance in the paper is attached to the methods of concretization and generalization, which allowed us to extend the general framework of the Soviet repatriation operation in 1944-1952 using the example of one country – Slovakia with the focus on the operation's practical implementation. In conclusion, the authors point out that the Soviet authorities performed arbitrary actions, first of all, in the march of the front when actual Soviet citizens and people of “Soviet origin” from Slovakia (including opponents of the Soviet system and communist ideology) were forcibly taken away. As the war ended, the situation in the country normalized and the Soviet troops withdrew from Czechoslovakia, repatriation was already conducted in the interpretation of the Slovak security agencies and army authorities (often with numerous violations in a gross and hostile manner). It was aimed to clear the territory of Russian emigrants and all sorts of wartime refugees from the USSR (in a broader sense, all foreigners who did not have a residence permit) and it was brought about by the country's subordinate and lackey relations with the USSR and the influence of the left forces in society that generally accepted a concept of an ethnically pure national state of Czechs and Slovaks, which had no minorities and various foreign elements.

51-57

Authors: Sergey I. Degtyarev

The article is devoted to illegal actions of the civil officials in the Russian Empire, such as bribery and extortion. Relying on the works of the past and modern researchers, as well as on the archival materials, the authors came to the conclusion that one of the sources of bribery in the Russian Empire was the feudal system of "feedings", which lasted until the second half of the XVIII century. The government measures taken against bribery and extortion were ineffective and often were declarative, which led to the "conservation" of a negative image of the officialsin the society.These offenses were so deeply ingrained in the bureaucratic and social systems of the Empire, that many of the contemporaries perceived them as a necessary component of the relationship between people and the representatives of the authorities. The officials who were suspected of bribery were rarely punished for this crime.

66-78

Authors: Peter Mičko

Foreign trade represented highly important role in the Slovak economy in the years 1939 – 1945. Ironically, when compared with the present days, where we face problems with passive trade balance, Slovakia had to cope with danger of unlimited export abroad. Majority of Slovak products found their place within the empty European markets with no major difficulties. Since, for Slovakia, foreign trade represented very important factor, at the very beginning of the state was passed the act which continued the trade treaties of the former Czechoslovak Republic. By passing the Act No. 2/1939 the first Slovak Republic also accepted all trade treaties which had been signed by the Czechoslovak Republic and other states. Doing so, the new state clearly declared rules of the foreign trade policy at its very beginning.