„Institute of National Remembrance Review”
annual publication
‘The damage done by both totalitarianisms in this part of the world does not simply come down to the crimes committed; it also consists of deep destructive processes causing permanent changes in consciousness and identity; the deformation of social bonds, and the degradation of culture. Understanding these processes, studying their conditions and mutual relations, is the only way to understand the threats that violence and totalitarian dictatorship pose to humanity as a whole and nations in particular’, wrote the President of the Institute Jarosław Szarek, PhD in the first edition of the Review.
The journal, whose editor-in-chief is Anna Karolina Piekarska, is dedicated to academics, opinion leaders and other interested circles, and intends to present the results of Polish research and the Central European point of view on problems of contemporary history.
‘Each issue of the journal will present a collection of interdisciplinary studies on a selected problem from the history of the former Communist bloc countries. In addition to research papers, it will include presentations of memorial sites and historical museums in Central and Eastern Europe commemorating the war, occupation, and Communist dictatorships. Discussions and reviews of historical books and papers will also be published,’ says the editorial by Anna K. Piekarska and Franciszek Dąbrowski, PhD.
The first and the second issue of ‘Institute of National Remembrance Review’ discuss the matters of politics of history and politics of memory in the countries of the former Soviet Union and of former Soviet bloc.
The first edition contains eight main articles:
-) On the Historical Identity of the Estonians and the Politics of Memory in Estonia (by Toomas Hiio)
-) Culture of Memory and Politics of History in Lithuania in 1989–2018 (by Alvydas Nikžentaitis)
-) Lithuanian Politics of History in 1990–2018. Legal Solutions (by Jaroslav Volkonovski)
-) The Militia and the Special Services in the Contemporary Politics of History of Belarus (by Aliaksandr Laneuski)
-) Between the Politics of History and Practice: Ukrainian Struggles with the Past. The Example of the Permanent Exhibition of the National Museum of the History of Ukraine in the Second World War (by Olga Gontarska)
-) Politics of Memory in Independent Georgia. Selected Aspects (by Wojciech Górecki)
-) History as an Apology for Totalitarianism (by Andrzej Nowak)
-) The History and Politics of the Russian Federation: a War for Memory, or a War against Memory? (by Jolanta Darczewska).
The aim of the Institute of National Remembrance Review is to become a reliable source of information for English speaking readers about the recent history of Poland and Central Europe.
Paweł Sawicki