Should there be a Holodomor memorial on the National Mall?

Below is an op-ed I recently wrote in response to an article in the Washington Post that argued against the construction of a national memorial to the victims of Ukraine's famine-genocide - the Holodomor, as it is called by many Ukrainians. This is a topic very close to my heart, as I wrote my doctoral dissertation on the efforts of Ukrainian diaspora activists in North America and the UK to achieve "official" genocide recognition for the Holodomor. In my research, I explored the long-term impact of trauma and victimization, the meaning of recognition, diaspora-homeland relations, and post-Soviet nation-building. In the process, it became very clear that the politics of memory, which includes the construction of memorials, is always as much about the future as the past - in particular, defining identities and boundaries and policy priorities and staking moral and political claims. It is sometimes noble, and sometimes not. But is is important to study memory politics in a broader context and to focus on positive outcomes that can come from resurrecting the past.

I am fully aware that this op-ed does not address controversies surrounding the collaboration of some Ukrainians with the Nazis in the persecution of Jews during World War II, or the failure of some elements of the Ukrainian diaspora community to meaningfully confront the abuses of the past. However, in arguing in favor of the Holodomor memorial, I take the position that the famine does not deserve any less attention because of these facts. I believe there are important lessons to be learned from studying the famine, and the victims of the Holodomor should not be used as a bargaining chip in forcing Ukrainians to confront their crimes against Jews. Indeed, if we are to take seriously the claims of many diaspora activists that the Holodomor should be commemorated in the broader context of the world history of genocide, then Ukrainians' commemorative efforts should come hand in hand with a reckoning with an ugly chapter that occurred in their history just a decade later - and was not without precedent.

So without further ado, here is the op-ed:

In a recent article in the Washington Post, Philip Kennicott raises important questions about Public Law 109-340. This 2006 law empowers the Ukrainian government to build a monument on the National Mall memorializing Stalin’s 1932-1933 famine-genocide against Ukrainians. Kennicott laments the growing disarray of the memorial landscape in our nation’s capital and encourages Americans to more clearly define our parameters for who, or what, should be memorialized within our borders. But in this case, his chief concern is that we cannot count on Ukraine to continue paying for the monument’s maintenance in the future, since it is “a conspicuous if not unprecedented example of an unstable, democratically challenged foreign government in charge of memorializing an event about which its own population is divided”.

Kennicott is correct that the political climate in Ukraine has shifted dramatically since 2006, when the U.S. was still hopeful that the outcome of the 2004-2005 Orange Revolution would be a reform-minded government committed to transparent, accountable governance and the protection of human rights. I, like many others, am deeply disappointed that the Orange forces proved ineffectual and that the current President, Viktor Yanukovych, has shown little respect for democratic values.

Throughout the political turmoil of the 2000s, attitudes to the famine have been a useful lens into Ukraine’s contested nation building process. Disputes over historical responsibility highlight unresolved questions about the country’s relationship with Russia as well as its own Russian-speaking population. An American famine memorial can never definitively resolve these debates, nor should it try to. But the state of Ukraine’s democracy should not be a deciding factor in whether this memorial deserves space on our National Mall.

Indeed, such a monument can show that Americans are committed to exposing the public about gross human rights violations whenever and wherever they occur and to educating generations to come about the consequences of despotism - an ongoing problem in international affairs. Just as the U.S Holocaust Memorial Museum highlights present-day genocides such as Srebrenica and Darfur within its walls, so too can our National Mall serve as a reminder that genocide against one people is really a crime against all humanity.

There is a legitimate debate to be had about the most effective ways to accomplish this, both for this famine and for other mass atrocities. However, it is worth recognizing and appreciating the fact that President Yanukovych has neither blocked the progress of this memorial nor the inscription that explicitly lays blame at Stalin’s feet, as many feared he would.

Given this backdrop, the absence of public discussion about the purpose of the famine memorial is beside the point. For many Ukrainian Americans, the goal of such a monument is precisely to provoke conversation about one of history’s forgotten atrocities. Although there is now a general consensus among scholars that between three and four million Ukrainian peasants starved to death, the vast majority of Americans have never heard of the famine and are shocked to learn of such a massive death toll in such a short period of time. For those who are aware of the starvation, there is often a failure to distinguish its unique causes in Ukraine from the general scourge of collectivization and dekulakization in the wider Soviet Union. This is despite the fact that the U.S. government knew about the devastating famine as it was occurring, and despite diaspora efforts to call public attention to it in the press.

In the years I spent interviewing diaspora Ukrainians throughout North America and the UK for my doctoral dissertation, I learned that many are motivated by the desire to educate the general public about why the famine happened and what its consequences were. They point to North Korea and to Zimbabwe to show that food continues to be used as a weapon in peacetime, arguing that raising awareness of the Holodomor can help ensure that we pay more attention to famine crimes in the future.

In fact, the memorial on the National Mall is simply one of many attempts to achieve a form of recognition for the famine that transcends official genocide recognition by the U.S. Congress and in fact, transcends Ukrainians themselves. Ukrainian Americans have educated teachers and designed high-school social studies curriculums that describe the famine in the broader context of genocides throughout human history; they have held canned food drives to help alleviate hunger both at home and abroad; and they have constructed memorials and held commemorative services in conjunction with other historically persecuted ethnic groups in both small towns and large cities across the Western world.

The National Mall should never serve as a blank canvas for foreign governments to make political statements. However, the undemocratic nature of a foreign government is not a convincing argument against engaging in an important form of civic education - reminding the public that gross human rights violations come in many different forms and reiterating our desire to mean it when we say “never again”.

News Round-Up

Three articles caught my eye today:

1. Serbian film director's 'theme park' echoes The Bridge on the Drina (The Guardian)
 
2.  Bali bombings: 10 years on, families remember their loved ones (The Guardian)

3. Emory University owns up to dental school’s anti-Semitic history and offers regrets (CNN)

The return.

There have been some interesting news items on the politics of memory front lately. These include the vandalization of a memorial to Stalin-era victims in Belarus and the destruction of a controversial Stalin statue in Zaporizhzhya, Ukraine, in what members of the Communist Party are calling a 'terrorist act'. Also in Ukraine, President Yanukovych has officially revoked the 'Hero of Ukraine' award that the former president Yushchenko gave posthumously to Stepan Bandera (a controversial WWII partisan leader).

But there's another story I want to discuss in a bit more detail. In recent weeks, some members of the Ukrainian Canadian community are protesting the new Canadian Museum of Human Rights because the Holocaust (along with the First Nations) will have its own exhibit among 12 thematic 'zones'. Although other tragedies (such as the Holodomor) will be heavily emphasized, their stories will be integrated into the thematic zones rather than given their own space. Many Ukrainians believe that this is an example of the museum elevating the suffering of one group over another.

This is a tricky issue to comment on. On the one hand, this exemplifies criticisms of the Ukrainian community's 'competitive victimhood' mentality. The Holocaust is the 'archetypal' genocide, and if done well, the exhibit could serve a strong pedagogical function - perhaps even confronting some of the debates over the uniqueness of the Holocaust and thus weaving in other stories of victimhood, including the Armenian massacres and the Ukrainian famine. Indeed, many believe that impunity for these crimes is what made Hitler think he could 'get away with his own genocidal policies - 'who remembers the Armenians/the Ukrainians?'.

On the other hand, perhaps the Ukrainians are right. Perhaps this museum should deal with a series of prominent genocides, both acknowledged and contested ones, as well as other forms of human rights abuses, but solely in a thematic way. Special exhibits could be dedicated to human rights abuses that have occurred on Canadian soil, such as the treatment of the First Nations, the internment of Ukrainian Canadians during World War I and of Japanese Canadians during World War II, and the residential schools system. If the reasons for a special Holocaust exhibit are sound, maybe it could focus on exploring the interconnections between and the influence of the Holocaust on how we understand a range of genocides.

A UN probe of Burma - what's in everyone's best interest?

In todays' Washington Post, David Steinberg of Georgetown's School of Foreign Service argues that the US should not support the the creation of a UN commission of inquiry into the Burmese military regime's crimes against humanity and war crimes. He notes that such commissions, along with war crimes trials, sanctions, and embargoes, are popular tools for nations to 'express moral outrage' and can lead to positive outcomes, such as liberalization, increased human rights, or even regime change. But in his opinion, things are starting to look up in Burma, and we may be beginning to see 'the transformation of a "soft authoritarian" state into one that is more pluralistic'. Thus, to quote Steinberg in full,

imposing additional sanctions on Burma's regime or forming still more commissions will only salve our consciences. Neither will help the Burmese people, persuade the government to loosen its grip on the population, or even assist the United States in meeting its strategic or humanitarian objectives. In fact, such moves would hinder negotiations and relations with a new government that, even if far from a model for governance, would probably give the Burmese more political voice and freedom than they have had in half a century. If our concerns are for the well-being of the people and U.S. national interests in the region, then we might well wait for the elections and whatever government comes into power. Then will be the time to judge whether there has been a step forward and how to achieve our goals.

So in Steinberg's opinion, supporting a commission would undermine the slight cracks that may or may not be appearing in the Burmese military's grip on power. This is basically a 'wait and see' position, and a trade-off approach to the problem - let's put justice on the back burner until we can get the country in a more stable, favorable position internationally. We have to prioritize and avoid jeopardizing the ultimate goal of regime liberalization for the sake of immediate moral imperatives. But what if Steinberg is wrong? What if the slight 'indicators' of progress he notes are not sustainable, and the 'new' Burmese government is no more vulnerable to Western ideals or influence than the current one? What does it mean for the US to sacrifice a moral opportunity for a realpolitik calculation that is extremely risky at best?

In fact, there are arguments that it is indeed in the US national interest to take the moral high road here, and that a justice-first policy may actually be a better interpretation of realpolitik. An editorial in yesterday's Washington Post took exactly the opposite position from Steinberg's, recalling President Obama's Nobel Peace Prize speech in which he stated that 'when there is genocide in Darfur, systematic rape in Congo, or repression in Burma, there must be consequences'. The piece argues that 'backing a UN commission does not supplant previous US policy' and does not preclude continued pragmatic engagement. What it does, however, is signal to younger officers that hitching their futures to policies of mass killing may not be the best idea, as well as to other offensive dictators around the world that they cannot get away with behavior like Than Shwen's. Moreover, and in my opinion every bit as important as the potential deterrent effect of a commission (and of proving that Obama's got follow-through), US backing can 'provide a ray of hope and moral support to the unimaginably brave fighters for democracy inside Burma'. I think we can take this statement even further, and say that such a 'ray of hope' will extend beyond Burma's democratic activists and touch other oppressed peoples.

If it's not already clear, I'm in the editorial's camp, and not in Steinberg's....

The News Feed

A few interesting articles worth checking out:

Rob Miller writes in the Guardian about the 'Preventiva' in Bosnia and how they're obstructing the search for justice, in light of the discovery of over 50 bodies in a lake near Visegrad...

For RIA Novosti, Nikolai Trotsky recalls Gorbachev's attempts to rehabilitate Stalin-era victims of repression, and how economic 'shock therapy' unfortunately got in the way...

And from RFE/RL, a description of the 'March of Life' in Kyiv, an attempt at reconciliation between descendants of Nazis and descendants of Holocaust victims...

As the start of the ICC review conference draws near, Michael Gibbs calls our attention to the potential role of sport in reconciliation and peace building. In a comment in today's Guardian, he emphasizes that transitional justice institutions need to do a better job engaging victims in their work and suggests a novel approach:

An important first step towards meeting these challenges is moving our characterisation of victims beyond the mere fact of their "victimhood". While their rights as victims must never be ignored, it is important also to recognise victims as survivors and as stakeholders in the court's work. If our understanding of victims is limited merely to what they have suffered in the past, it will be near impossible to fully engage them in a process that aims, first and foremost, to combat impunity and secure a sustainable peace for the future of their communities.

This is why, on the eve of the review conference, victims of conflict in Uganda, Sudan, and Kenya have challenged ICC delegates to a football match. The match offers victims a unique opportunity to interact with delegates on a stage that is truly their own, and to present themselves as more than victims, ahead of their more formal role in the conference that follows.

I'm guessing some people will find this condescending, and there may be some merit in that. But I find the idea of transcending 'victimhood' and claiming 'survival' really appealing. In my own work on Ukraine, and in trying to understand how the Holodomor compares to the Jewish or Armenian genocides, I come across a lot of criticism about how these groups 'exploit' their suffering for instrumental purposes - claiming resources like territory or membership in international institutions, for example, or deflecting criticisms of human rights abuses. These are obviously controversial ideas, but they raise a legitimate question: how can we commemorate our dead, the murdered members of our identity groups, without mortgaging their memory to achieve future goals? I think notions of 'victim empowerment' can potentially help here. Our dialogues and discourses should point to overcoming - to preserving what is worth preserving at all costs. Then, perhaps, we can move beyond the 'competitive victimhood' scenarios that hold us back by causing resentment and fear - turning remembrance into a zero sum game.

The Blue Book

On Friday night I attended a screening of The Blue Book, an event jointly organized by the Oxford University Armenian Society and the Oxford branch of the Aegis Society. The documentary film, made by Gagik Karagheuzian, follows the British Armenian historian Ara Sarafian as he refutes a Turkish petition to the British Government denying the authenticity of archival documents related to the Armenian genocide.

What really struck me was how little mutual ground the Armenians and the Turks share in this debate. At one point, the film shows Mr. Sarafian at a major forum on Turkish-Armenian relations at Istanbul University in 2006, and then again, debating a Turkish historian on a Turkish television program. On both occasions, Mr. Sarafian is unfailingly polite and refuses to be baited. But whereas in the Russian-Ukrainian case, the 'genocide thesis' is often a matter of interpretation of evidence, for the Turks this dispute is twisted into an attempt to undermine the evidence itself. This makes academic debate seem like an almost impossible task - how can you debate someone when you're talking about two different things?

Although a brave effort and very educational, the film is a bit slow at times. I'm not sure it would appeal to wider audiences, because it's often too academic - for example, there are long segments of Sarafian in the archives, explaining in meticulous detail how the methodology of the Blue Book refutes the falsification claims. This can feel like listening to an paper at an academic conference. I don't think this is a problem in itself, but it's something to think about if the film were ever to be used to 'sell' the Armenian cause to a wider variety of audiences. But then again, I don't think that's the film's purpose.

During the question and answer period following the screening, I asked Mr Sarafian what he feels is the value of third-party official recognition, such as the genocide resolutions recently struck down in the US Congress. He answered that such recognition is 'vitally important,' for two reasons. One is that in such polarized circumstances, you sometimes need an external point of reference, someone who can put pressure on the deniers. And the second is that genocide does not belong to any one ethnic group - each example is, literally, a crime against all of humanity. I definitely agree with the latter point, and it's something I often hear among Ukrainians. I also agree with the first point in principle, but I think there are problems. Britain can certainly apply moral pressure, because of it's 'democratic' credentials, and even political pressure because of its role in the EU and as a world power. But because Turkey views the British Government as complicit in the 'falsification' of documents from 1915, I worry that this could undermine its credibility as an external point of reference.

In response to another question, this one from an Armenian, Mr. Sarafian also mentioned that Armenians in the diaspora have to careful of their language to avoid confirming popular fears that Armenians are going to 'come back' and repossess their lands from the Turks. This is an interesting perspective on diaspora-homeland relations, because so many definitions of diaspora privilege the desire to return to the homeland. But for groups like the Armenians and the Ukrainians (with the possible exception of the 'fourth wave'), the desire to return does not equate to a desire to 'move back'. These diasporas are often several generations removed from the homeland, and in the case of the Armenians, the homeland they were dispossessed of as a result of the genocide has been superseded by an independent republic. But this is a dilemma - how does a diaspora express its connection to a homeland that is often more 'there' than 'here', in a way that communicates emotion without possessiveness?

One final rambling from me: during the question and answer period, two people raised their hands to mention the recent 'rapprochement' between Russia and Poland over Katyn. One suggested that Russia's approach could be seen as a corrective to Turkey's view that the Armenian 'genocide thesis' is an insult to the Turkish people as a whole, given that Russia is the legal successor to the Soviet Union and yet through Katyn, appears to have found a way to condemn the Soviet regime without condemning the current Russian people or government. I don't agree with these comments. I think Katyn is the anomaly in Russia's approach to its past - Russia has certainly not moved closer to many Ukrainians' desire to discuss Holodomor, nor has the country resolved its own conflict over the role of Stalin in its national history. The recent debates over whether to include Stalin's image on Victory Day posters is emblematic of this. I think the contradictions in Russian approaches to the past should intrigue us as much as these occasional moments of historical 'openness' - under what conditions is denial a sustainable position?