Let’s Talk about Archives. Archival Gordian Knot in the Soviet Ukrainian-Polish Scholarly Collaboration (the 1950s-1960s)

Abstract

The article explores an unknown aspect of Soviet Ukrainian-Polish scholarly rela-tions: the collaboration between historians on issues pertaining to archives during the Thaw (1950s-1960s). At the core of this academic collaboration was the desire of Polish scholars to access the former Polish archives, the main bone of contention be-tween the PRL and the USSR. In this paper, I will reveal the mechanism of the Krem-lin’s control over the archives, as well as the politics of access to them by Poles, which provoked multiple crises at the highest levels. The Soviet politics of scholarship, and particularly of the most ideologized social science, history, differed from that of other countries and other forms of state politics in its tight control and censorship. However, despite the tight control and numerous obstacles, Soviet authorities failed to impose their rules on Polish scholars. Ukrainian historians played an important role as they could procure the necessary archival inventories and provide their Polish colleagues with access to the archives. The foregoing produced results quite opposite to Mos-cow’s expectations, fostering the creation of an informal collaborative network.