“The Process of Four” in the context of “petition campaigns” of Soviet non-conformists of the 1960s: the formation of an identity “human rights activist”

The author analyzes the behavioral strategies of Soviet nonconformists of the 1960s and 1970s, tested during defensive actions on the “Sinyavsky and Daniel case” and “the process of four”. The purpose of the article is to trace the dynamics of the collective consciousness of the liberal intelligentsia. The material was composed by the “defensive letters” collected by Alexander Ginzburg in the “White Book on the Sinyavsky and Daniel case” and Pavel Litvinov in the proceedings “The Process of Four” and sent to various state institutions. Their analysis allows us to identify the specifics of the non-conformist position and to detect the transformation of behavioral strategies. Show political trials of the 1960s and 1970s became the method of preventing intellectuals sympathetic to non-conformists. The liberal Soviet intelligentsia saw in them a symptom of the country's return to Stalin's methods of legal proceedings and took non-conformists under protection. The author characterizes the “Sinyavsky and Daniel's case” (1966 у.)as the “literary” case. The writers were accused of the wrong behavior of the Soviet writer, specifically of the publication abroad the works of anti-Soviet nature. The defenders were mainly creative intelligentsia, in solidarity with Sinyavsky and Daniel in demanding freedom of creativity. Defensive actions included collective letters to the Government. Their authors sought to give a complimentary assessment of the personality and creativity of writers, to convince the authorities in the innocence of the accused. The trial of Ginzburg, Yuri Galanskov, Vera Lashkova and Alexei Dobrovolsky (1968 у.) cannot be called “literary”. The authorities gave it an emphatically criminal character. Defensive actions rallied the intelligentsia not only of the capital, but also of other major cities. The scale of the petition campaign can serve as evidence of wideness of protest moods in the society. The addressees experienced alienation from the state, lost faith in the viability of the system. “Letters of Defence” were transformed into “letters of Protest.” The authors of the letters did not ask for, but demanded to review the results of the “process of four”, to release the arrested on nationalistic and religious matters in various cities of the USSR. Arguments have shifted from the moral sphere, which was characteristic of the first process, to the legal field. The authors of the letters sought to demonstrate to the authorities the moral firmness of the opposition. Defensive rhetoric in the letters was replaced by a human rights one. The rights of a citizen, according to the authors, was the best form of personal protection. During the “petition campaigns”, nonconformists practiced behavioral strategies, asserted the right to social existence and expanded the scope of functioning.

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