Continuation of the story with the textbook by I. Dolutsky

An unexpected continuation was received by the scandal connected with the prohibition of the textbook on the history of Igor Dolutsky.

In January 2004, RAS President Yuri Osipov received a letter from the president with instructions to check the development of all history textbooks for secondary schools and report on its results by February 1.

And Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov ordered the Ministry of Education to study how all "current" history textbooks correspond to federal standards.

Leaving aside the commercial aspect of the problem, we recall that during a visit to the Russian State Library in November 2003, V. Putin said: "We continue to rejoice that we have moved away from the one-party system and mono-ideological coverage of the history of our country ," which some experts regarded as an answer to the phrase of the director of the Institute of Russian History A. Sakharov: "When I receive a letter from Varennikov, I shudder ... History must be presented as a whole, not only as the history of workers and peasants" - and as "an attempt to maintain the status quo in teaching , which the communists once again encroach on . " Recall that the veterans' letter expressed indignation at the tone of the author's narration, the lack of a patriotic spirit, the biased interpretation of the course of the Great Patriotic War and the recent history of Russia as a whole.

However, the President's letter to the Russian Academy of Sciences forces us to recognize the fallacy of such an assessment of the President's statement. In particular, the letter to Yu. Osipov says: "I share the feelings and opinions of veterans of the Great Patriotic War expressed in their appeal. I instruct to review the state of affairs with the development of textbooks as soon as possible with the involvement of historians ... Report the results on February 1" .

After the Russian Ministry of Education announced in January 2004 that all school history textbooks would be revised, the discussion shifted towards the commercial interests of publishers. However, some media continue to follow the ideological component of the scandal.

Thus, Novye Izvestia notes that "none of the numerous observers noticed the main thing, namely, literally the other day, by order of President Putin, the Russian Academy of Sciences was appointed to oversee the ideological content of history textbooks. " For our part, we note that within the framework of the "patriotic" interpretation of Russian history, the Institute of Russian History of the Russian Academy of Sciences is already trying to make its "patriotic" contribution to the "Norman" theory of Russian statehood.

For its part, Izvestia expresses fear that the revision of textbooks will be reduced to the fact that they will present a "transformed version of" Orthodoxy, autocracy, nationality " /

Kachurovskaya Anna. Textbooks made history // Kommersant. 2004. January 12.
Sergeev Yuri. I would close the story, clean it up a bit... // Komsomolskaya Pravda. 2004. January 13th.

Sources

• Sergeev Yuri. I would close the story, clean it up a bit ... // TVNZ. 2004. January 13
• Zverev Anton. A country with an unpredictable past // New news. 2004. January 28.
• Konygina Natalia. History textbooks will be rewritten // News. 2004. January 27.