A gap in the law for ethical acts: Russian theories and practice of illiberal modern life
Lots has changed in Russia since Soviet times, but private rights are still non-absolute. Building on my recently published book, Gleaning for Communism, I argue that this baseline property relation presupposes and entails a particular moral economy, in which ethical obligations to social collectives are valued above a blind obedience to regulations and rules. People rely on their personal ties to make social ventures viable, often in irregular ways: these informal relations help keep a poorly legislated society functional, and they ground the state’s ideological image in socially-situated relationships, giving concrete personification to such patriotic slogans as “we do not abandon our own.”
Date:
3 May 2024, 15:15 (Friday, 2nd week, Trinity 2024)
Venue:
64 Banbury Road, 64 Banbury Road OX2 6PN
Speaker:
Xenia Cherkaev (Institute of European Ethnology, Humboldt University Berlin)
Organising department:
School of Anthropology and Museum Ethnography
Organiser contact email address:
information@anthro.ox.ac.uk
Part of:
Anthropology Departmental Seminar Series: Trinity 2024
Booking required?:
Not required
Audience:
Public
Editor:
Kate Atherton
