PoliticsHow a 1965 Moscow protest helped launch the Soviet dissident movement

Sixty years ago, several dozen people gathered in Moscow’s Pushkin Square to demand that the Soviet state follow its own Constitution and respect citizens’ right to an open trial. Authorities dispersed the brief rally, which sought neither regime change nor political reform. The protest nonetheless helped launch the Soviet dissident and human rights movements. The article places it alongside earlier Bolshevik repression, the 1962 Novocherkassk massacre, and the limits of the Khrushchev Thaw.

Soviet dissident movementMoscow protesthuman rightspolitical repression

MMeduza★★☆☆☆2026-10-06 22:26Original