TCDS Alumna Publishes New Book, “The Role of Civil Society in Transitional Justice: The Case of Russia”
About the book: This book examines how civil society engaged with transitional justice in Russia, demonstrating abroad range of roles civil society can undertake while operating in a restrictive political context.
Based on socio-legal research, the study focuses on three types of civil society groups dealing with the legacies of the Soviet repression in Russia – a prominent organisation that works on recovering historical truth, the International Memorial; a parish of the Orthodox Church of Russia operating at a former mass execution and mass burial site, the Church at Butovo; and contentious groups that could hinder attempts at reckoning and promote state narratives built on the Stalinist and World War II victory myths. This book explores an often-overlooked case of Russia’s transitional justice ‘from below.’ It provides insights into how even in authoritarian contexts, civil society can adopt imaginative, piecemeal, and, at times, unconventional ways of seeking justice outside and in the absence of official and institutionalised transitional justice measures.
This book will appeal to scholars of transitional justice, memory studies, human rights, and democratic and civil society theory, as well as policymakers and practitioners in these fields, and others with interests in Russian and post-Soviet studies.
Author bio: Selbi Durdiyeva is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Center for Conflict Studies, Philipps University Marburg, working on the Postcolonial Hierarchies in Peace and Conflict project.
Durdiyeva is also an alumna of the Transregional Center for Democratic Studies’ 2018 Democracy & Diversity Summer Graduate Institute in Wrocław, Poland and of recipient of TCDS’ 2019 Global Dialogues Fellowship.
Forthcoming: September 1, 2023 by Routledge. More info here.
