Food and the Transition from Communism to Capitalism across the Soviet and Post-Soviet Space

Session Submission Type: Roundtable

Brief Description

This roundtable showcases food as a productive, and underused, lens on the collapse of the Soviet Union and the transition from communism to capitalism. Nataliia Laas discusses widespread panic in Soviet society over toxins in food during perestroika, at a moment when Soviet citizens were asserting new rights as consumers. Kristy Ironside looks at an early example of privatization, focusing on Mosobshchepit, the division of the Moscow city soviet responsible for public catering, which emerged as a strong proponent of privatization as the solution to the woefully under-resourced and poorly managed restaurant sector's problems, and well before 1992. Anna Sokolova looks at gathering wild edibles as a survival strategy in Karelia and Armenia, two very different parts of the Soviet Union, before, during, and after the collapse of the planned economy, highlighting a wide variety of practices in both urban and rural milieus. Finally, Elena Kochetkova explores the phenomenon of nostalgia for Soviet food from the collapse to the present, emphasizing that much of it draws upon cultural myths about the Soviet past that do not match reality. All four contributions to this roundtable emphasize that food production and consumption reflected broader social, economic, and cultural anxieties during this turbulent time.

Sub Unit

• History: Since 1990

Chair

• Juliet Johnson, McGill U (Canada)

Roundtable Speakers

• Kristy Ironside, McGill U (Canada)

• Elena Kochetkova, U of Bergen (Norway)

• Nataliia Laas, Washington U in St. Louis