Anti-cosmopolitan campaign in Khakassia (1949-1953)

The anti-cosmopolitan campaign was unleashed in the USSR in 1949-1953. It was directed primarily against the Jewish intelligentsia. The key ideological narrative of the campaign was the ideas of Soviet patriotism. In the ethnic regions of the country, this campaign had its local peculiarities. The purpose of this study is to serve the preparation of a summary generalizing work reconstructing of the events of the anti-cosmopolitan campaign in Khakassia throughout the period of its implementation. The source base for the study comprised the documents of the Russian State Archive of Socio-Political History, the State Archive of the Krasnoyarsk Territory, the National Archive of the Republic of Khakassia, materials of the periodical press (publications of the Pravda and the Sovetskaya Khakassia newspapers). The author restores the history of the campaign against cosmopolitanism on the territory of the Khakass Autonomous Region, which was part of the Krasnoyarsk Territory. The analysis conducted made it possible to conclude that the anti-cosmopolitan campaign in Khakassia, which took place in 1949-1953, was characterized with some specific features. The development of events in that Siberian autonomy does not allow us to confirm a high degree of activity in launching the campaign. It had no clear anti-Semitic nature in the region. These factors were due to the modest number of intelligentsia in general and few members of Jewish intelligentsia, in particular. Representatives of the creative, academic, pedagogical and scientific intelligentsia of the region experienced an oppressive attack. In Khakassia, the following forms of attack on the intelligentsia were used: control over the formation of personnel, supervision over the ideological content of creative, research, academic and pedagogical activities, working staff “cleansing”. The presence of intelligentsia with indigenous background in the region made it possible to bring accusations of nationalism, the wording of which turned out to be connected with the main ideological attitudes of the campaign. During the campaign, the government paid particular attention to ideological work. The publications of the regional newspaper Sovetskaya Khakassia contributed to the formation of the necessary public opinion in the region. The main events of the campaign developed in Abakan, the center of the autonomy, where the intelligentsia was concentrated. At present, there are prospects of further study in the topic through addressing the issues of political repressions in the region that followed the anti-cosmopolitan campaign, the “doctors' case” (1953), and the reconstruction of the biographies of people affected by the campaign.

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