Title: The Resurgence of ‘Denunciation’ in Russia: A Modern Take on Stalin‘s ‘Hero’
In the 1930s, during Stalin’s purges in the Soviet Union, a young boy named Pavel Morozov, nicknamed ‘Pavlik’, became a national hero. His story, deeply mythologized, tells of him denouncing his father for selling state documents to "bandits and enemies of the Soviet state". Pavlik’s tale was used to encourage other Soviet children to report on their parents, sparking a culture of denunciation that continues to resonate nearly a century later.
The Rise of Denunciation in Putin’s Russia
Recently, news reports have indicated a significant resurgence of denunciation in Russia under President Putin’s leadership. A suspiciously prolific informant has been sending thousands of denunciations to various Russian authorities, including the Main Prosecutor’s Office, military prosecutors, the Federal Security Service, the penitentiary service, and the Ministry of Justice.
Identified as ‘Anna Korobkova’, a woman supposedly dedicated to reporting those "discrediting the Russian armed forces", this individual has boasted of sending 1357 denunciations between February and September 2023 alone. The law enabling such denunciations was signed by Putin following his invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
Unmasking the Serial Denunciator
Russian anthropologist Alexandra Arkhipova led the investigation into ‘Korobkova’, who had written to her employer, a Moscow university, demanding that a staff member be fired for referring to the conflict in Ukraine as a ‘war’, instead of using Putin’s euphemism ‘special military operation’. Soon after, Arkhipova left Russia for France, but ‘Korobkova’ claimed victories: six people had been fired from their jobs, and 15 others had been fined as a result of her denunciations.
Using comparative linguistic analysis of ‘Korobkova’s’ writings, Arkhipova and linguist Daniil Scorinkin concluded that the prolific informant was, in fact, Ivan Abaturov, a former lecturer at an Ekaterinburg college and Stalin admirer. The BBC reports that correspondence from Abaturov and ‘Korobkova’ shares the same IP address, confirming they originated from the same device.
The Dark Legacy of Pavlik Morozov
The true story of Pavlik Morozov, and his supposed heroism, has been called into question since the 1980s. However, the cult of denunciation lives on, sending hundreds of thousands of people to labor camps like the Gulag.
Since Putin’s invasion of Ukraine two years ago, the practice of denunciation has regained pride of place in Russian society. As Putin exhorts "the scum and traitors" to be "spat out like a fly" as part of society’s "necessary detoxification", volunteers eager to denounce their fellow citizens abound.
Real-Life Consequences
In one chilling example, a 46-year-old hairdresser named Anna Alexandrova from Saint Petersburg was prosecuted for "publicly distributing false information" about the Russian army after a neighbor filed a complaint. Similarly, a 68-year-old pediatrician in Moscow was sentenced to five years in a penal colony for reportedly telling a patient’s mother that her husband, who died in combat, was a "legitimate target" for Ukraine.
Like Morozov in the 1930s, children too are participating in this modern-day witch hunt. Irina Gen, a teacher in the city of Penza, received a five-year suspended sentence and was banned from working in schools after her 13- and 14-year-old students reported her for "spreading false news" during a lesson.
The Organized Nature of Denunciation
Konstantin Sonin, an economist and political commentator at the University of Chicago, tells The Times that the intricate nature of the ‘Korobkova’ case suggests that denunciation in Russia may be more organized than previously thought. "The simple conclusion is that denunciations are not written by everybody or by many Russians, but by a small group of activists," he says.
