The dictatorial regimes are characterized by violence, terror and repressive bodies, historian Valentin Constantinov stated in an interview with IPN News Agency. According to him, the dictatorial regimes are born in poor societies in which the survival is the main preoccupation, while revolutions start in societies in which there is a middle class able to doubt the government’s actions, IPN reports.
Historian Valentin Constantinov said that through the agency of propaganda, terror and repression, Joseph Stalin was turned into the father of the nation and it took at least ten years to destroy this myth after Stalin died.
“When the cult of Stalin’s personality was exposed, this happened in several stages and the whole process lasted for approximately ten years. In 1953, Beria was arrested and was charged with all the evil things witnessed then. But Beria was the one who tempered the repression. Much later, Stalin was even taken out of the mausoleum. So, ten years were needed to reverse critical thinking. For a period, it was believed that if Stalin died, everyone would die. Only later the people started to think that Stalin was an executioner,” said the doctor habilitate of history.
Valentin Constantinov also said that the Russian Federation is an authoritarian regime in which any authentic opposition attempt is suppressed. The lower are the living standards of the people, the easier do the people accept dictatorial practices.
“The dictatorial regimes are characterized by violence and terror. To exist these need to eliminate any opposition. There is no dictatorship without repressive bodies. In dictatorial regimes, any opposition needs to be suppressed. In the Russian Federation, there is opposition but this is controlled opposition that is told when it can criticize. Those who pass the limits are eliminated. There are societies that sympathize with such a regime. It means the people there are satisfied they have a job and do not starve. Revolutionary situations appear where the people die from starvation and have nothing. A revolutionary situation arises when a middle class with objections to the government appears and the government neglects these objections,” stated Valentin Constantinov.
The interview entitled “Where does nostalgia for dictator and autocratic leaders of the USSR come from and what effects does it produce?” was held by IPN News Agency in the framework of the project “100 years of USSR and 31 years without USSR: Nostalgia for Chimeras” that is supported by the Hanns Seidel Foundation.
