Munk School of Global Affairs

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Daria Dumbadze

Description

The talk seeks to explain the oft, although unsurprisingly ambiguous record of Soviet surveillance on the ground, which was torn between totalitarian aspirations and institutions and the corresponding quota system, collateral damage, and constant pressure for immediate results on the one hand, and the aspiration to professional pride and ethos of its police officers on the other. What did the Soviets initially know about populations on which they imposed their rule? What did they want to know? How did they obtain their information and recruit informants? How did the surveillance system cope with the political and socio-economic turbulence and changes of the post-Stalin era, and, in particular, the challenges of the spillover of unrest from the restless satellites and the loss of monopoly over information? How did the organs in charge of gathering information react and adjust to the simultaneous decline in the party-state authority and the rise of dissent, restless youth and secessionist national movements? How successful was the surveillance enterprise according to the Soviets’ own goals and evaluation? And finally, what do the surveillance methods tell us about the nature, goals and distinct features of the regime when compared with other systems?

Main Sponsor

Centre for European, Russian, and Eurasian Studies

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