Denunciations as Means of “Intimate” Interaction with the State Authority

Abstract

The present article reviews the phenomenon of denunciation during the reign of Nicolas I. Due to the ultimate authoritarian regime, representative bodies and any form of the political opposition were virtually non-existent. So was the possibility to publicly express an opinion different from the official one. Hence various covert forms of communicating with the state authorities, denunciation in the first place, were flourishing, especially after the notorious Third Section was founded in 1826. Being a means of direct, one-to-one contact with the power, detouring official bureaucratic routes, denunciation notes developed into a certain form of private, almost intimate messages. They acquired, on the one hand, a resemblance to an appeal to a deity and a confession, and on the other hand, definite features of love letters, imposing traditional patriarchic relations of the almighty masculine power figure and a “womanly” humble but admiring petitioner. Denunciation as a form of a soft power was one of the few possible ways to make an influence on the decision-making of the state authorities. After the death of Nicolas I this intimate and amorous communication with the power ceased although to the genre of denunciation stayed.