SUMMARY:

The paper is centered around the recent crisis triggered by the Estonian government’s decision to remove from the city’s center the Soviet World War II monument, the “Bronze Soldier.” Since the decision led to the eruption of belligerent rhetoric in Russia and open violence in Tallinn, most of the media coverage, as well as immediate commentary, was in one way or another focused on interstate or interethnic relations. These relations, in turn, were presented as plagued by the insurmountable differences in the interpretations of history.
Without denying the importance of the aforementioned aspects of the events, this paper highlights the crisis within Estonian society. It argues that the “Bronze soldier” is best seen as located in the contested zone of indistinction between historical consciousness and memory, while the contestation in question concerns the transformation of the mythical Estonian “nation” into a modern technocratic “society.” By drawing on Pierre Nora’s analysis of lieux de mémoire, the paper outlines the confrontation between Estonian nationalists and increasingly technocratic governments, placing this confrontation within the context of Estonia’s integration into the European Union.