The University of Wisconsin Press
History / Slavic Studies / Politics / Cultural Studies
Hooligans in Khrushchev’s Russia Swearing, drunkenness, promiscuity, playing loud music, brawling—in the Soviet Union these were not merely bad behavior, they were all forms of the crime of “hooliganism.” Defined as “rudely violating public order and expressing clear disrespect for society,” hooliganism was one of the most common and confusing crimes in the world’s first socialist state. Under its shifting, ambiguous, and elastic terms, millions of Soviet citizens were arrested and incarcerated for periods ranging from three days to five years and for everything from swearing at a wife to stabbing a complete stranger. Hooligans in Khrushchev’s Russia offers the first comprehensive study of how Soviet police, prosecutors, judges, and ordinary citizens during the Khrushchev era (1953–64) understood, fought against, or embraced this catch-all category of criminality. Using a wide range of newly opened archival sources, it portrays the Khrushchev period—usually considered as a time of liberalizing reform and reduced repression—as an era of renewed harassment against a wide range of state-defined undesirables and as a time when policing and persecution were expanded to encompass the mundane aspects of everyday life. In an atmosphere of Cold War competition, foreign cultural penetration, and transatlantic anxiety over “rebels without a cause,” hooliganism emerged as a vital tool that post-Stalinist elites used to civilize their uncultured working class, confirm their embattled cultural ideals, and create the right-thinking and right-acting socialist society of their dreams. Praise: “Adds significantly to our understanding of crime and justice under Khrushchev. It also provides rich food for thought as scholars take on the challenge of fully understanding what living in the workers' state actually meant for members of the urban proletariat some forty years into the experiment and in the wake of a devastating war.” “Elegantly written and judiciously argued. . . . LaPierre's work stands as an important contribution to a growing body of literature that seeks to present the Khrushchev-era Thaw as more multifaceted and contradictory than the golden age that Soviet intelligentsia imagined after the fact.” “LaPierre's work stands as an important contribution to a growing body of literature that seeks to present the Khrushchev-era Thaw as more multifaceted and contradictory than the golden age that Soviet intelligentsia imagined after the fact.” “This is a superb piece of scholarship, written in a fluid, accessible style and based on a myriad of primary source materials.” “LaPierre’s book, a tightly argued and well-researched monograph, adds significantly to our understanding of crime and justice under Khrushchev. It also provides rich food for thought as scholars take on the challenge of fully understanding what living in the workers’ state actually meant for members of the urban proletariat some forty years into the experiment and in the wake of a devastating war.” “Hooligans in Khrushchev’s Russia provides a rich and at times beautifully constructed portrait of how the Soviet hooligan was depicted in the public imagination and it shows how, at a time of major transition and uncertainty, the Soviet administration turned to deviancy as a mirror image that could be used to affirm its core civilizational values.” “Situates the anti-hooliganism campaign of the late 1950s in the context of Khrushchev’s attempt to ‘socially engineer’ the new Soviet man, which aimed at implementing certain behaviour codes. . . . Thus, the regime “produced” deviance by punishing people for forms of behaviour that had not been deemed deviant before.”
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Brian LaPierre is assistant professor of history at the University of Southern Mississippi.
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