THE CONCEPT OF NEOCOLONIALISM: SOME STUDY QUESTIONS

DOI: 10.47026/1810-1909-2025-1-13-22

УДК 930+323.1

ББК 63.3(2)

Dina A. AMANZHOLOVA

Key words

history, historiography, the Soviet national policy, the concept of neocolonialism.

Abstract

Studying the concept of neocolonialism in relation to the Soviet experience in national politics is relevant in the interests of criticizing the so-called postcolonial studies of the USSR and Russia as a colonial power.

The purpose of the study is to analyze the concept of neocolonialism, which opposes the evidence–based study of complex problems of the essence of national politics.

Materials and methods. The research is based on the latest foreign historiography, which is analyzed on the basis of the methods of contextualization, classification, the problem-chronological and comparative methods.

Results. The articles examines the approaches of modern foreign historiography of the Soviet national policy that have developed in recent years, related to promotion of both the concept of neocolonialism, which spread as a so–called decolonial turn, and postcolonial studies of situations in former colonies of the West – Africa, Asia and Latin America, which have become popular since the end of the XX century. This concept is shown to be formed on the basis of an array of postcolonial literature and the so-called “decolonial” discourse about Russia as an imperial power. The author points out the most common interpretations of the USSR as a colonial empire, thematic blocks and plots from the history of the Soviet national politics, which are used in attempts to justify the need to “decolonize” the history, the culture and the social memory of the Soviet past in Russia. The author notes rejection to study the basic factors of development and vital activity of ethno-social communities related to the state, the socio-economic development and the essence of the Soviet modernity project, which is alternative to the Western one. Examples of neocolonial historiographical practices are given, their characteristic features and techniques are pointed out, including ignorance or unwillingness to take into account the factual basis of the Soviet history and national policy, first and utmost in economics and social development; substitution of grounded research involving archival and other verified sources with an apology for the subjective experiences of “subalterns” with the search for colonization in symbolic violence, intimate experiences, self-identification and all kinds of representations; discrediting the state and calling for the creation of communities of change through decolonization of consciousness, thinking, art, education, subjectivity; criticism of static identities and territorial identifications as opposed to the Soviet construction of ethnic identity.

Conclusion. The analysis of examples on neocolonialism concept promotion indicates the tendency to select “incriminating” facts and politicized subjectivism in study the multiculturalism in Russia/ the USSR with neocolonial attempts to prove the need for “decolonization” of the post-Soviet space. It is proposed to update the grounded study of modernization processes in the economy, political and socio-cultural spheres as the actual basis of nation-building.

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Information about the author

Dina A. Amanzholova – Doctor of Historical Sciences, Professor, Chief Researcher, Institute of Russian History of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Russia, Moscow (amanzholova19@mail.ru).

For citations

Amanzholova D.A. The concept of neocolonialism: some study questions. Vestnik Chuvashskogo universiteta, 2025, no. 1, pp. 13–22. DOI: 10.47026/1810-1909-2025-1-13-22 (in Russian).

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