The 1947 Soviet Military Trial at Chernihiv and Some Reflections on the Nature of Soviet Postwar Justice.

• In Event: Law and Legality III: New Histories of Soviet Law

Abstract

The second paper, by Franziska Exeler, based on the 1947 Chernihiv trial, asks what counted – and counts – as a reliable historical source – and for whom? It assesses what types of information on the war were available to members of the 1947 Chernihiv military tribunal, what was selected by the procurators as evidence, and what status can be assigned to these materials by scholars today? The paper connects the trial to more theoretical discussions on law in authoritarian regimes – and what could be called degrees of “legal illiberalism”– as well as to questions of knowledge production.

Author

• Franziska Exeler, Freie U Berlin (Germany)