Polls Show Many Russians Favor Putting Up Statues of Stalin but Few Residents of Volgograd want His Name Returned to Their City

 Paul Goble

            Staunton, Nov. 24 – Forty-eight percent of Russians say they support putting up statues of Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin while 20 percent oppose such actions, a change from a decade ago when only 25 percent backed erecting such monuments and 36 percent said they were opposed (levada.ru/2021/08/04/stalin-tsentr-i-pamyatnik-stalinu/).

            But in Volgograd, independent surveys suggest, the population is opposed to restoring Stalin’s name to their city and making it again Stalingrad, as it was called between 1925 and 1961 (t.me/vashdozor/3590 and t.me_vig/26897). Nonetheless, officials are pressing ahead with plans to do just that (kavkazr.com/a/dremuchee-proshloe-prihodit-na-pomoschj-volgogradu-hotyat-vernutj-imya-stalina/32146841.html).

            Activists say that few people want to change the name as they have gotten used to Volgograd but that the authorities, both to curry favor with the militarism of the Kremlin and to hide their own failures feel they have no option but to try to shore up their positions by drawing on figures from history.