Education as Indoctrination: Mnemonic Constitutionalism and History Teaching in Russia
In January 2023, Russia adopted new amendments to the Law "On Education in the Russian Federation" which will become effective by September 1st, 2023. The amendments establish mandatory, federal curricula for the following school subjects: "Russian language", "Literary reading", "The world around", "Russian language", "Literature", "History", "Social science", "Geography" and "Basics of life safety". The content of the curricula was developed and pre-approved by the Ministry of Education in November 2022, and aims to establish a single, uniform standard of teaching for these subjects. The amendments are emblematic of Russia’s increasingly aggressive pursuit of mnemonic constitutionalism. This article will detail how its legislative governance of memory in the context of history teaching violates the right to education enshrined in international human rights law.
