Stalin Statue in Novosibirsk

In 2019, a bust of Soviet leader and dictator Joseph Stalin was unveiled in Novosibirsk, Russia’s third-largest city. The erection of this statue followed decades of lobbying by a local grassroots initiative. It was met with some pushback by local individuals and institutions who highlighted Stalin’s role as perpetrator of mass violence, repression, and terror. Despite demands by the pro-Statue lobby to celebrate Stalin and his wartime leadership with a monument on a public site, the bust was installed on a private site. This case study outlines the controversy in Novosibirsk and argues that it speaks much more broadly to a battleground at the heart of contemporary Russian memory politics: the memory of Stalin and Stalinism in the context of authoritarian revival in Russia.