Nikolay Koposov
Nikolay Koposov is a Distinguished Professor of the Practice in the School of History and Sociology and the School of Literature, Media, and Communication. Prior to joining the faculty at Georgia Tech, he worked at Emory University, Johns Hopkins University, Helsinki University (Finland), and École des hautes études en sciences sociales (France). In 1998-2009, he was Founding Dean of Smolny College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, a joint venture of Saint-Petersburg State University (Russia) and Bard College (New York). He specializes in modern European intellectual history, modern France, post-Soviet Russia, historiography, historical memory, and comparative politics of the past.
He has authored six books including Memory Laws, Memory Wars: The Politics of the Past in Europe and Russia (Cambridge University Press, 2017) and De l’imagination historique (Éditions de l’EHESS, 2009), and edited four collective volumes and translations. His works have been published in English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Polish, Russian, Spanish, and other languages.
His lectures were invited by Woodrow Wilson Center, Princeton University, Harvard University, Columbia University, Cornell University, George Washington University, the universities of Paris, Geneva, Strasbourg, Vienna, Tokyo, and Kyoto, Ewha University in Seoul, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Korea, Hebrew University in Jerusalem, Ukrainian Catholic University in L’viv and other schools. He participated in expert groups on the politics of historical memory coordinated by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, the US Holocaust Memorial Museum, Jacob Blaustein Institute for the Advancement of Human Rights, the International Federation for Human Rights, and Körber Foundation (Germany).
Public lecture - Memory laws: Using the past to serve the present
March 22, 2024 | From 15:00 until 16:30 | Salle de conférence, ISIS, Strasbourg (FR)
The speaker, Nikolay Koposov, is a Distinguished Professor of the Practice in the School of History and Sociology and the School of Literature, Media, and Communication at the Georgia Institute of Technology (US).
The lecture, based on his book Memory Laws, Memory Wars (Cambridge University Press, 2018), will present new insights into the recent proliferation of memory laws, aimed at regulating what can be said about the past, and about their effects on democracy.
The lecture is open to the public and will be given in English.
Programme
| 15:00 | Opening words - Jean-Louis Mandel, USIAS Chair of Human Genetics |
| 15:05 | Introductory remarks - Bjørn Berge, Deputy Secretary General of the Council of Europe |
| 15:15 | Lecture - Nikolay Koposov, Georgia Institute of Technology |
| 16:10 | Discussion |
Using the past to serve the present
Is legislation of memory good for democracy?
A memory law is a legal provision governing the interpretation of historical events, in order to consolidate and protect a certain narrative about the past. This legislation and, more generally, history politics – the use of the past as a political tool for the present – have proliferated in recent decades and have become important instruments of political mobilization and “memory wars” within and between many countries, from China and Russia to Europe and the US. The Russian aggression against Ukraine, justified by false historical claims, is an extreme example, although by no means the only recent case of a memory war leading to a shooting war. In many instances, the dynamics of violence seem to follow a vicious circle: violence – memory wars – new violence.
The rise of memory legislation in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, with the prohibition and criminalization of holocaust denial as the most notable example, was part of the effort to consolidate democracy and celebrate its triumph over totalitarian regimes. However, according to many observers, the humanistic cosmopolitan memory of the Holocaust is in decline now. With the rise of populism and neo-authoritarianism, history politics and legislation about the past have been largely intercepted by anti-democratic forces.
Should we think that those laws and politics are just neutral instruments that can be used to legitimize any social and political agendas? In this case, the fact that populists and authoritarianists increasingly use them does not need any other explanation than that both populism and authoritarianism are on the rise. Alternatively, one can suppose the existence of internal, logical interconnections between history politics and memory laws on the one hand and certain types of ideologies, regimes, and movements on the other.
I will argue that, beyond a certain point, using the past for political legitimation favors anti-democratic political projects and undermines the precarious balance between universalism and particularism on which liberal democracy is founded. Pursuing large-scale history politics and legislating about the past liberal democracy has contributed to creating a cultural atmosphere in which it is likely to lose to its challengers.
