Urban aesthetics, materiality and leadership : Depictions of Soviet mass housing in post-Soviet Moscow during urban regeneration

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Urban aesthetics, materiality and leadership:

Depictions of Soviet mass housing in post-Soviet Moscow during

urban regeneration

Emmirosa Ihalainen 11777257

Master's thesis for Urban Sociology Graduate School of Social Sciences

University of Amsterdam 8/2019

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Cover page:

A truck transports a prefabricated part of a khrushchevka to its construction site in Moscow, Soviet Union in the 1960s.

Picture: TASS, retrieved from Trudolyubov (2017).

Word count: 26 600

Summary

This thesis is a study of the connections between urban aesthetics, materiality and leadership in the contestation over urban regeneration in post-Soviet Moscow. I will ask the following research question; how do mass residential buildings mediate political meanings in post-Soviet Moscow? My case is the demolition of a particular Soviet-era building stock in Moscow, associated with the Moscow Renovation Project, announced in February 2017. Currently, under Vladimir Putin's regime and Sergei Sobyanin's mayoral term, Moscow is under an extensive housing renovation program, which aims to modernise housing conditions. The Soviet-era housing stock of

khrushchevki was built as a temporary housing to alleviate the post-war housing crisis, and they have outlived their original life-span. Studying perceptions of the Khrushchev-era mass housing buildings through the lense of the renovation project allows for interesting interpretations of the built environment as a materialisation of the Soviet past. Mass-construction residential buildings are a highly visible materialisation of the Soviet past in Russian cities, and some of these buildings are commonly associated with political leaders.

Urban development in Moscow has to be understood in the specific historical and political context, and in the context of the authoritarian regime. Urban forms in the city are affected by complex legacies of the socialist past, and in post-Soviet times by neoliberal rhetoric.

In Russia, urban mobilisation tends to form around common places rather than common ideas (Yurchak 2011). Political participation is generally low, however, many of the recent protests have revolved around built environment projects and urban aesthetics. Recently, the Moscow Renovation Project has prompted protests against the allocation of residents of the khrushchevki from their homes, and against the demolition of the buildings.

My theoretical framework consists of sociological approaches to the built environment. On one hand, I have made use of Bartmanski and Fuller's framework of materiality and meaning, which is an approach to buildings by making use of concepts of style, substance and scale. On the other hand, I have made use of the conceptualisation of urban aesthetics. For politics of urban aesthetics, I

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am referring to Alexei Yurchak's thought on aesthetic politics.

The empirical section of this thesis is concerned with political meanings of housing. Firstly, I have examined the history of Soviet mass housing and Soviet leader's legacies on housing by secondary sources. This section elaborates on the significance of residential mass construction waves under Khrushchev's and Brezhnev's leadership. During those eras, between the 1950s to 1970s,

prefabricated forms of housing became the most common forms of housing in the Soviet Union. My primary research consists of two parts; firstly, the analysis of regime and critical media discourses on the khrushchevki and on the Moscow Renovation Project. Discourse analysis is divided to positive and negative discourses on the khrushchevki, and positive and negative discourses on the Moscow renovation program. As my interest is in materiality, I have further analyses how materiality, understood through Bartmanski and Fuller's nexus, is addressed in discourses on the khrushchevki and the renovation project. Secondly, I have done a visual analysis on two films which depict Soviet mass housing; the Irony of Fate from the 1976, and The Fool from 2014. I have analysed and compared how these two films depict Brezhnev-era mass housing, by looking into the films' depictions on interior, exterior, surroundings and the city.

My analysis chapter comprises of three parts. It begins with introducing my results. Next, I form narratives of the case of Soviet mass housing in the ongoing urban regeneration, informed by my empirical research results. I find five main narratives; regime's demonising discourse of mass housing, Moscow renovation program as a part of a wider modernisation discourse, khrushchevka as an unwanted materialisation of the Soviet past, nostalgia towards the khrushchevka and criticism of leadership through criticism towards the renovation program.

In the chapter, I find that a demonising discourse towards the Khrushchev-era mass housing is used politically to legitimize the regime and to consolidate Moscow's modernisation. I argue that political discourse used among others by Putin, Sobyanin and Medvedev, contributes to stigmatisation of mass housing buildings. I find that the demolition plans have prompted a nostalgic discourse towards the khrushchevka as a symbol of post-war hope, but also that regime-critical media are using criticism towards the housing program, as a proxy for wider criticism towards President Vladimir Putin and the Mayor Sergei Sobyanin. By film analysis, I find that Soviet mass housing buildings are used as a proxy for criticism in film, due to the multitude of collective meanings attached to them. I also find that a shared aesthetics of prefabrication and standardisation are a

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cultural legacy, implications of which the authorities have neglected.

The last two sections of my analysis are concerned with applying my theoretical framework into the narratives of the case. I demonstrate how contestation over urban aesthetics in Moscow's housing regeneration is connected to Putin's authoritarian rule, and how housing is used as a political tool in the rules of Putin and Sobyanin. I describe how meanings are attached to materiality of Soviet mass housing, and I argue that perceived material contexts play a role in the demolition of the

khrushchevka and in the design of the replacing housing stock. Urban aesthetics, together with materiality, legitimize the regime and consolidate the desired transition of Moscow into a global city, by removing traces of the Soviet past, which the political elite associates negatively.

Having approached Soviet mass residential buildings as individual elements of the built

environment, using ideas of Bartmanski and Fuller, I argue that materiality plays an important role in mediating various meanings of housing. This also contributes to my argument of the Moscow renovation program as consolidating Moscow's urban development to a direction desired by the current regime.

My study on the demolition program illuminates usage of housing as a tool for Putin's authoritarian regime, on Moscow's prominent neoliberal rhetoric and how political leaders perceive the

khrushchevka as an unwanted materialisation of Soviet past. Furthermore, this thesis is a contribution to the criticism towards sociological thought which merely focuses on the human relations, and neglects the reciprocal relations towards non-human. With this thesis on everyday urban aesthetics, I aim to show that looking at housing as mundane built environment, it is possible to make conclusions about wider political, social and economic trajectories.

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1 Introduction

This research originates from an interest towards how everyday urban aesthetics demonstrates political meanings in the former Soviet Union. Cities manifest power, as power needs representation in order to maintain the legitimacy of its rule, and to indicate the direction of desirable change (Therborn 2015). The aim of this research is to examine how power is manifested in specific types of residential architecture. Following the notion of urban aesthetics and an approach of meanings of materiality in buildings, I aim to study political meanings in the built environment.

I will approach meanings of mundane housing with a specific case of Moscow Renovation Project. The project is an extensive, currently ongoing housing regeneration program which aims to

modernise the capital. In the program, a large housing stock of 5-storey mass housing buildings from the Soviet-era are being demolished, and replaced with new mass housing towers as over a million people will be allocated. The demolition concerns a housing stock of Khrushchev-era residential buildings, which were built to alleviate the post-war housing crisis in the 1950s and 1960s.

This case allows for a specific focus on the role of political leaders in manifestation of power in architecture. It is common that political leaders and major ideologies are associated with and manifested in monumental architecture, but that is not often seen in residential buildings. However, in Russia, there are four types of residential buildings, that are widely referred to with names of political leaders of the time of construction; the stalinka, khrushchevka, brezhnevka and an emerging discourse of putinka. These types of mainly mass-construction residential buildings, named after Soviet and post-Soviet leaders Josif Stalin, Nikita Khrushchev, Leonid Brezhnev and Vladimir Putin, have distinctive visual characteristics and architectural details, and are associated with different meanings.

Urban aesthetics refers to how material contexts produce individual and collective imageries and practices in the city, which contributes to how the city is envisioned and experienced. Urban aesthetics can be contested over, especially in times of transition. Housing is a large part of the urban environment and for many, housing buildings constitute the majority of their daily sensory experiences in the urban environment. Often, the aesthetics of housing is more relevant to many citizens in their daily life than monumental buildings and iconic architecture. This brings my focus

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to the everyday urban environment, which housing represents. I argue that by studying the

mundanity of residential buildings, it is possible to make conclusions about wider political, social and economic traectories and about how housing mediates power.

Russia makes an interesting case for studying contestation over urban aesthetics. In Russia, political participation and indicators of civil society have typically been low. (e.g. Robertson 2014:123) However, recent protests in contemporary Russian cities have shown that the built environment appears politicised. Urban aesthetics works as a proxy for politics in Russia (e.g. Yurchak 2011). Looking at how Soviet has been preserved into post-Soviet will allow for interpretation of how past and modernity can be perceived through materiality of the built environment. I will examine these material contexts with Bartmanski and Fuller's ideas on how to approach meanings in materiality with a nexus of scale, substance and style.

I will ask the following research question; How does housing mediate political meanings in the built environment? I will look into it by a sub-question; How is political leadership manifested in the Russian everyday urban aesthetics?

I will approach developing my argument by studying depictions of Soviet mass housing. I will do this firstly by studying discourses of critical media and of Putin's and Sobyanin's regime towards the Moscow renovation project and the khrushchevki through their demolition. Secondly, I will analyse depictions of Soviet mass housing in film. My analyses aim to demonstrate the variety of meanings attached to these buildings with historical and cultural significance on one hand, and the

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Case: Housing regeneration and contestation in Moscow

Renovation Project

Demolition of the khrushchevka

Prefabricated mass housing estates play a large role in the urban form and aesthetics of many cities of the former Soviet Union. Currently, under Vladimir Putin's reign and supported by the current Mayor Sergei Sobyanin, Moscow is under an extensive housing renovation program, during which Khrushchev-era housing is being demolished, and new highrises are being constructed so that over a million people can be allocated new apartments1_{. This vast ongoing renovation program was} announced2_{by the Mayor Sobyanin, with the permission of President Putin, in February 2017. The} program is referred to as ”renovation” (or renovatsiya in Russian), or ”demolition” (or snos). In this research, I am using Moscow housing regeneration program as a lens to analyse discourses around Soviet mass housing in the post-Soviet era.

The khrushchevka is a legacy of the Khrushchev-era. The building stock was a part of the first wave of Soviet-era residential construction campaigns which shaped living in Russian cities for the masses. Mass housing construction was commenced under Nikita Khrushchev's regime and implemented in the 1950s and 1960s. Campaigns were continued under Leonid Brezhnev's regime in the 1970s. These residential construction campaigns were projects of standardisation, which transformed Soviet everyday urban aesthetics and urban forms, making prefabricated housing the dominant form of housing. Prefabricated urban forms continue to shape the appearance and composition of post-Soviet cities to this day.

In the present day, the khrushchevki have outlived their lifecycle of 25 years. Since the beginning of the 2000s, having survived their originally intended life-span, khrushchevka buildings all over Russia have been considered problematic. Policy-makers have recognized the mass housing estates as in need of immediate action. (Trumbull 2014: 495) However, multiple researchers have recently believed that post-socialist mass housing estates could be rehabilitated (Trumbull 2014: 498). The problematique of mass housing is not uniue to the former USSR. The Western countries have

1 Official portal of Moscow City and Mayor. URL: https://www.mos.ru/city/projects/renovation/ 2 President of Russia 2017b

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seen a discourse of middle-class tenants perceiving large housing estates as unpopular since the 1970s. (e.g. Trumbull 2014: 497) Among the influential studies on the subject is Stephen Graham's article Luxified skies (2016). In the article, Graham addresses Western discourses on housing for the masses - luxification of highrises on one hand, and demonisation of vertical social housing on the other. Graham elaborates on how social housing, particularly vertical social housing built between the 1930s and 1970s, has become stigmatised in many Western cities. The demonising stigma is harmfully directed towards the occupants, which connects cases of mass housing to problems of inequality.

Due to their unpopularity in many cities, demolishing mass housing estates out of the way of new development is not unpreceded. However, the post-socialist countries have had a different

development in terms of the popularity of mass housing. In the former socialist cities, similar housing estates did not lose popularity or experienced particular stigmatization. Multiple

researchers have argued that they continued to be viewed as acceptable by their residents, although large housing estates will not be on highest demand in the housing market. The complexes have however remained relatively popular due to their affordability and social mix, although in some cases, due to the lack of alternatives. (Trumbull 2014: 497)

There are several trends in the perception of mass housing estates in post-socialist cities. These perceptions vary by location, even up to a neighbourhood scale. Elements of stigmatization are appearing around mass housing, as the perception of ”normal” and socially acceptable housing is changing, which may contribute to the declining of a neighbourhood (Wassenberg 2013: 187–216, quoted in ibid. 498). (ibid.) The gradual process of more well-off residents moving up on the housing market will eventually lead to residential segregation in these housing complexes.

Simultaneosuly, ineffective and poor-quality construction leads to increasing maintenance costs as public subsidies are withdrawn. The physical condition is gradually deteriorating or its deterioration is accelerating at varying paces. Trumbull claims that among the trends is a loss of public and green spaces, being replaced by infill techniques with housing structures and parking facilities. (ibid. 2014: 498)

According to Trumbull, the buildings have also become known as khrushchoby, referring to

trushchoby, a slum. (Ruble 1993, quoted in ibid. 495) High energy costs and low energy efficiency, the buildings are not always considered ideal. Buckley and Gurenko describe: ”Their floor plans do not correspond to most residents’ views of either ideal or acceptable modern architectural plans

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(Buckley & Gurenko 1997; quoted in ibid. 495). Residents have low trust on city government and commercial developers or firms in housing estate restructuring. (Trumbull 2014: 495-496)

However, in Moscow, their demolition has awakened protests, as citizens have protested against the allocation from their homes. The demolition has not only also prompted a set of wider critiques against governmental actions, authorities or the regime, but also produced a wave of nostalgia towards the khrushchevka (e.g. Luhn 2017).

Redevelopment of land occupied by mass housing estates which are coming towards the end of their life span is problematic, as it can awake contestation between various actors on who has the power to define the direction and nature of new development. In this research I will mainly address contestation of housing regeneration between political leaders who represent the regime, and citizens or residents. Urban space is also an interest of multiple other actors, such as developers who are among significant stakeholders in contestation over urban land.

Characteristics of Moscow's urban development

Trendsetter for Russian cities

Moscow represents Soviet legacies and a post-socialist city, and simultaneously global and international influences. Urban regeneration projects in Moscow have to be analyses within the unique context of the city. As the capital city of Russia and with its population of 12 million, Moscow of the largest and wealthiest of Russian cities. It dominates the financial flows into and out of Russia, and is described to be among the world financial centres and ”global cities”. These characteristics of Moscow distinguish it from other Russian cities, however, Moscow has also been referred to as a representation of Russia and a model for other Russian cities. There have been recent trends of tightening of central control, which varies from trends of governance in European megaregions (Argenbright 2013).

Moscow works as the interconnection between Russia and other countries. As a capital in the Soviet era, Moscow was considered one of the most important ”world cities” for business, and could be considered a global city for the financial sector, in terms of Saskia Sassen (1991) (Argenbright 2013). This development is manifested in the city as a pursuit of global architecture.

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Moscow is a primate city; a city that works as a dominant political, economic and social centre of the country, but is also affected by urban problems more flagrantly. Moscow has a lot of control over the rest of Russia, and it has been argued that recently there has been tightening of central control over Russia through Moscow, for example by the agglomeration of ”New Moscow” area in 2012. (Argenbright 2013) In the project, the area of the capital more than doubled when the territory was expanded beyound its existing boundaries in the oblast. Architecturally, Moscow is a mixture of modern and traditional styles. It is characterized by historical monuments, massive scale,

modernism, monumental skyscrapers and on the other hand, legacies of various leaders in the Soviet era.

Legacies of built socialism in post-socialist cities

The context of the socialist past as a part of the Soviet Union is a significant legacy in Moscow. Urban development and regeneration differs from that of the West, and many urban concepts work differently. One of the Soviet legacies to Moscow is the microraion; a model of constructing dense residential areas that provide basic services, shaping the urban formation and dynamics of the city. It also has to be noted that all urban infrastructure and housing was centrally planned and state-dominated until the collapse of the Soviet Union. A lot of the housing stock in Russia was privatized after the transition from socialism to market economy, which has also affected restructuring of socialist mass housing (Trumbull 2014: 495).

The collapse of the Soviet Union affected urban planning, development and housing situation in Moscow in multiple ways. Urban planning and development had been controlled by the state, and under the communist regime there was an extremely high level of state control (Hirt & Stanilov 2009:32-33). There are multiple trajectories linked to housing reforms in Moscow, such as the housing shortage after the Second World War, and privatization of real estate and housing brought by the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Among the differences between cities with different-length paths of capitalist past are the state control over urban development, land, property market, planning and the aim of a classless society. The city differs from cities with a longer capitalist past also by the history of social composition. Socialism aimed for a classless society, however, income inequalities and segregation did exist during socialism, but became contrasted after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Extremes of both ends are especially visible in Moscow. Moscow is a high-density city, and the ethnic composition consists of over 90 percent of Russians, with some minorities most notably from other regions of

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the former Soviet Union3_.

In studies of post-socialist cities, there is discussion on the characteristics of the urban environment associated with socialism, and a debate whether or not there is a distinct socialist and post-socialist city. Sonia Hirt argues that there are distinct spatial features and processes of spatial production in cities that were under state socialism in comparison with Western cities. However, she argues that there are several types of post-socialist city, similarly as there is no single model of a capitalist city. (Hirt 2013)

Hirt argues that post-socialist urban aesthetics is the antithesis of socialist tradition, and that there are spatial differences which are undergoing change. (Hirt 2013) There is a second generation of post-socialist change that entails the recasting of the conception of public and the public space. The renovation of the Gorky Park in Moscow park promoted Europeanized lifestyle and consumerism as a product of neoliberalism. (Kalyukin et al. 2015)

Understanding the context of a post-socialist city will be further beneficial to my research in terms of understanding the backlash towards socialism and its built legacies. Murawski argues that the argument of ”socialism failed” has become normalized in a discursive form, overly determining how socialist architecture and planning is framed in literature. A lot of what was planned remained unbuilt, and paradoxically, a lot of what eventually was built was unbuilt. It has been argued that only in the very end of the Soviet era, the Soviet city-building may have achieved some of its basic goals. (Murawski 2018: 908)

Murawski addresses how drawbacks of built socialism have shaped the understanding of material cultures of modernity. The failure-centrist discourse has been connected to persistent Cold War -rooted ideology, where socialist-based modernity would be failure-bound from the beginning (Murawski 2018: 909). Modernity in the Soviet Union was shaped by narratives of failure in material and infrastructural terms. Murawski argues that failure-centrism towards built socialism is misleading and affected by idologies, as a lot of living and other spaces built under socialism continue to be appreciated by residents and users of the spaces. (Murawski 2018: 909-910)

3World Population Review (2019) Moscow Population 2019. URL:

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Moscow in Putin's Russia; authoritarianism and neoliberal rhetoric

The perceiving of housing by the political elite has drastically changed after the transition from socialism to market economy. In the Soviet Union, housing was considered a social good rather than a commodity, and since the 19th_{century, adequate housing was among the fundamental goal} and demand of the worker's movement. (Urban 2012: 127-143) The post-Soviet era has been characterized by neoliberal rhetoric in urbanism. Neoliberalism assumes that laws of economics apply accross space and time in a uniform manner, which has been criticised for not taking into account the role of other conditions such as culture and historical legacies (Rutland 2013: 346-47). Neoliberal ideas have shaped the transition of Russia to a market economy, although the logic of neoliberalism in Russia has not followed the exact processes of those of some other neoliberalising economies. The decision-making has been in the hands of certain political elites, and the policy implementation has been shaped in their interests. Rutland describes Russia's economy as corrupt, dependent on oil and state-centered, which is different from the competitive and decentralised system that was originally embraced in the initiation of neoliberal reforms. (Rutland 2013: 332) Putin has had substantial power in shaping the political regime and logic of economy. The creation of a state-capitalist system under Putin's first era of presidency coincided with a shift in political trajectories from a hybrid semi-democracy to centralised authoritarianism (ibid. 351).

In Moscow, implementation of urban development has been linked with neoliberal market

principles. (e.g. Aidukaite & Fröhlich 2015, Büdenbender & Zupan 2017). Büdenbender and Zupan (2017) argue that Moscow has underwent urban regeneration driven as a part of authoritative neoliberal process of city restructuring. The key driving forces affecting Moscow in this process have been the global financial crisis, the rise of a local protest movement, and contention between the federal and Moscow elites in 2000s. Recently, there has been a shift to re-regulating urban economy, creating conditions for increasing commercialisation of urban space, competition and de-politicisation of authority. (Büdenbender & Zupan 2017)

Particularities of mobilising around the built environment in Russia

In this research, the relevance of studying politics-human-buildings relations in Moscow is derived from the interesting relationship of mobilisation and the built environment in Russia. Although

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protests are generally rare in Russia, they tend to form around urban places and building projects. (e.g. Robertson 2014:123, Yurchak 2011) Many of contemporary protests have recently

demonstrated against various urban building projects, and politicisation tends to form around common places instead of ideas (Yurchak 2011: 4). The demolition of the khrushchevka buildings in Moscow is a particular case, as it is associated by name to the former leader of the Soviet Union, and also because protests have revolved around the demolition of the building stock.

Urban protests, politicisation and activism have taken various forms in post-socialist Moscow. In Moscow, urban grass-roots movements are characterised with informality and opposition from local authorities (Aidukaite & Fröhlich 2015), and although residential neighbourhoods are not traditional sites for political identity or participation, social activism is higher in privileged neighbourhoods (Shomina et al. 2002). Urban protesters in Russia are often working class who have been affected by economic slowdown. Social transformations and the emergence of middle class in cities also play a role. (Dmitriev 2015)

Aidukaite and Fröhlich note that little attention has been paid towards grassroots urban mobilisation in post-Soviet cities. Associated privatisation and marketisation of public space and housing have caused grassroot level movements in Moscow and Vilnius. In Moscow, mobilisation is informal and opposed by local authorities. Although distinct political and economical regimes, urban

mobilisation evolves as opposition against housing privatisation and marketisation, and due to the authoritarian regime in Russia, protests in Moscow take a more creative shape. (Aidukaite & Fröhlich 2017)

Dmitriev (2015) suggests that the middle class in Moscow is characterised by a weak demand for democracy, and demobilisation, and proters are mainly working class are affected by economic slowdown. Wide economic discontent might eventually facilitate linking protesters in the provinces with urban political protesters in Moscow into a more diverse or a cross-class movement. Dmitrev even predicts a possibility for the mobilisation in Russia to begin resembling that in Latin American countries. (Dmitriev 2015)

There are multiple processes which indicate asymmetry and discontent in control over different elements in the built environment. In Moscow, there have been various forms of struggle over public space. Contestations over monuments are often characterized by elite competition, and some monuments have changed from symbolising Soviet identity into becoming symbols for Russian

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identity (Forest & Johnson 2002). Forest & Johnson suggest that interests of political elite preferences have affected the formations of narratives of history and memory, and constructing identities through symbols. Monuments have allowed for political elites to attempt to gain influence and prestige via engaging in a symbolic dialogue with each other in public. (ibid.). Transformations of urban public space in Moscow have been connected to for example promoting neoliberalism (Büdenbender & Zupan 2017, Kalyukin et al. 2015) and Europeanized lifestyle and consumerism (Kalyukin et al. 2015).

Dmitriev points out that protests in Russia have been affected by current ways of social

transformation, affected by the increase of consumption and the emerging middle class, thus linking it to social modernisation. There have also been rapid foreign political changes. He argues that there is a lack of spatial continuity of value systems in Russia, and that in the case of shifts in social priorities, the protest geography in Russia might change. (Dmitriev 2014)

Soon after the announcement of the Moscow renovation project in 2017, there have been protests against the associated urban developments. Some of the protestors are against the demolition of the khrushchevki, some of the criticism associated with the Mayor of Moscow, Sergei Sobyanin's, term in general (e.g. Kovalev 2017). Murawski argues that the protests in Moscow in 2017 demonstrated that the Soviet prefabricated mass housing buildings are also sites of class-based contestation and conflict (Murawski 2018: 929).

Objectives of research

The demolition of the khrushchevka in the Moscow renovation program is an interesting case for studying mass housing and its meanings and contestation over it, particularly because of the

legacies of the Soviet and socialist past, Moscow's current neoliberal rhetoric, the trend in otherwise apolitical Russia to mobilise around built environment projects, and the manifestation of leadership in the names of Soviet mass housing. Multiple political, social and economic trajectories appear to be linked to mass housing. With these in mind, I will study how housing mediates politics.

I will ask the following research question; How do mass residential buildings mediate political meanings in post-Soviet Moscow? To answer my research question, I will conduct a historical review, literature review and empirical research.

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In the empirical section, I will make use of two methodologies and types of data. Firstly, with discourse analysis on political and media discourses around the Moscow renovation program:

(1) How do regime media and critical media portray the khrushchevka in the Moscow demolition scheme?

(2) How do regime and critical media portray the aims of the Moscow renovation project? (3) How is materiality used in arguments regarding the old and new building stocks in the

Moscow renovation project?

(4) How does critical media discourse perceive Putin and Sobyanin through the Moscow renovation project and the demolition of the khrushchevki?

Secondly, with visual analysis on a Soviet and a contemporary Russian films, I will focus on the following:

(1) How is Soviet mass housing depicted?

(2) Which cultural narratives are found around Soviet mass housing?

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2 Theoretical framework

Approaching meanings in housing and the built environment

Framing the approach

In this research, I will be looking at how meanings are given to non-human or the material, inspired by the wide range of literature on the multiple ontology of the city, and on the established

significance of studying architecture and the built environment in social sciences. This section aims to elaborate how I will theoretically address, assess and approach the built environment. I will treat mass housing buildings as a part of the mundane, everyday built environment and as a

materialisation of the Soviet past.

Material properties of the built environment have implications to meaningful human action, in addition to reflecting it. The signifigancy of social science research on architecture and the built environment lies in expressing there are reciprocal connections between materiality and meaning. (Bartmanski & Fuller 2018: 203-205)

For the past decades, social sciences are increasingly theorizing buildings and employing the social signifigance of the built environment into an object of study. Social research has been criticised for ignoring non-human aspects, such as materiality (Baxter 2016: 34). Several frameworks and concepts have been developed to approach materiality as a vibrant matter that has agency, rather than passive and inactive material in the social reality (Bennett 2010). In my approach, I have drawn inspiration from material semiotics and ANT (Law 2009, Latour 2005), and assemblage theories (e.g. Farías 2011, Farías 2016), in addressing how in the intersection of the social and the built environment, material practices generate the social (Law 2009: 148) and ontologically heterogenous actors are co-functioning assemblages (e.g. Farías 2011, Farías 2016, Baxter 2016). I will study how the non-human or the material is spoken of and given meanings to, by examining how housing as a part of the built environment in Moscow mediates the politics of Putin's

administration and Sobyanin's Mayoral term, and how Moscow residents' attitudes towards urban regeneration reflect attitudes towards the associated political terms. I will use the concept of urban aesthetics to approach how the city is experienced and perceived through the aesthetic characters of the built environment. In my research, Soviet-era mass housing buildings such as khrushchevka and

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brezhnevka represent a part of Moscow's urban aesthetics, as these building stocks are widespread in masses, in various parts of city, and the simplicity and monotony make it a distinct, collectively recognised characteristic of Moscow's urban aesthetics.

In this study they will also be conceptualised as Soviet mass housing buildings that have survived to the post-Soviet time, and are examined as individual elements within Moscow's built environment. To approach Soviet mass housing buildings as individual elements instead of an aesthetic

constituting the experience of the city, I will use Bartmanski and Fuller's (2018) nexus of scale, substance and style, regarding materiality and meaning. Soviet mass housing buildings are

associated with various historical, political, cultural and social meanings. I will be looking at how scale, substance and style are used in political and media discourses around the Moscow renovation project and the demolition of the khrushchevka buildings. Following the framework of Bartmanski and Fuller will allow me to approach meanings of materiality in the Moscow renovation project. I will elaborate on each theory in their respective sections.

Experiencing cities through everyday urban aesthetics

Urban aesthetics is an approach to the study of aesthetic characteristics of cities. (Williams 1954: 95) The concept deals with human-environment relations. People living in cities are exposed to and affected by all of the urban environment, from single elements to the city as a whole (ibid.). The built environment is not defined by its material domain, but rather by its spatial usage. Here it is conceptualised by its role as the living environment of people; representing the city. Comprehension of the city considers far more than what can be seen and experienced at a given location at once, as it pertains collective and individual memories and imageries.

Urban aesthetics refers to how the city is envisioned, experienced and assessed (Debord, quoted in Visser 2010: 4). Conceptualisation of urban aesthetics is another approach in understanding how built environment is not an autonomous element of the society. Rather, it is economic and social field entangled with the political field. (Visser 2010: 4) Similarly, architecture is not merely byproduct or a feature of social life (Bartmanski & Fuller 2018: 203).

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contribute to both individual and collective imageries and practices in the city, which in turn produces urban aesthetics. (Visser 2010) Addressing aesthetic characteristics of a city allows for treating the city as a ”continuum of sensory experience” (Williams 1954:96) in which stimulations on different senses blend into a whole. Visual qualities of surroundings affect people although they might not be aware of it. (Williams 1954: 96, 112)

Degree of contentment to various aspects of the city includes the need for aesthetic contentment. This has been connected for ecample with civic pride. Civic consciousness includes also local pride; conceptualised as an affection towards certain features in a particular location. (Williams 1954: 96-97)

Looking at the city as a whole, the aesthetics consists of multiple features, such as underlying repetitive structures throughout the city, civic consciousness on the visual comprehension of the city, and visual emphasis on socially, culturally and economically important functions. There are formal relations for assessing desirability for visual expression for certain aspects of urban life. (Williams 1954: 96)

Aesthetics can also be used in political purposes, to contribute to wider political or economical goals. In Russia, urban aesthetics appears be engaged for political usages, which Yurchak calls aesthetics politics. Aesthetic politics has an important role as a form of politics in Russia, and it has a long history. Yurchak's research renders how citizen movements and protests against government actions tend to form around common places rather than common ideas (Yurchak 2011: 4) Yurchak occupies aesthetics as a political category, as aesthetics works as a proxy for politics. By addressing a debate over skyline politics in St Petersburg, he illuminates how a debate of urban aesthetics extends beyond matters of aesthetics as beauty, into a contestation over power, and on who has the power to define and own the city. (Yurchak 2011: 3-4)

Politicisation of urban aesthetics is not a new phenomenon in Russia. Yurchack emphasises how in the late socialist period, the urban environment played a significant role especially in offering alternatives for Soviet identities. The lack of formal political interest pointed towards the emergence of alternative political actions and identities, which aesthetics shaped during late socialism, due to pursuing non-Soviet identities (Yurchak 2011).

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Hastaoglou-Martinidis (2011) in the Mediterranean cities, where urban aesthetics has been connected to state- and nation-building processes. Hastaoglou-Martinidis studies the transformational period of 1900 to 1940 in Eastern Mediterranean cities and argues that city design can consolidate new national identities by establishing urban forms which are nationally relevant. (Hastaoglou-Martinidis 2011: 154)

Aesthetics can be a means of consolidating transitional processes of a society, and contribute to debates on modern and tradition by visually erasing signs of any undesirable past or present

(Hastaoglou-Martinidis 2011: 157) In her study, Hastaoglou-Martinidis shows how urban aesthetics was used to modernize cities with unwanted past to achieve new urban form. Architectural and urban design were determined by political purposes. (ibid. 177)

In the empirical section, I will use the concept of urban aesthetics to describe contestation over the built environment. The concept is used to illuminate how the sensory experience of living in Moscow is changing within urban regeneration, as the administration of the Moscow renovation project is prompting changes in the aesthetic characters of the city, along with meanings attached to them.

Soviet-era mass residential buildings are a significant part of the urban aesthetics in Moscow, and have important meanings and implications to experiencing the city. Their distinct features, such as monotony, and their colors and materials, make these mass housing buildings a collectively recognised part of the built environment in Moscow, which contributes to Moscow's urban aesthetics. Demolishing these distinct features of Moscow's urban aesthetics, and replacing them with new with another building stock with its own, different characteristics will change the sensory experience of Moscow urban aesthetics. For many, the current experience of urban aesthetics has a sense of familiarity, and upon implementation of the Moscow renovation proect, this familiarity will be replaced by something new, which will give a different experience to Moscow residents.

Materialities and meanings in the built environment: an approach to

buildings

This research considers housing as a part of the built environment which represents mundane, everyday urban aesthetics. I consider Soviet mass housing both as a materialisation of the Soviet

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past, which has survived to the post-Soviet era and is now perceived in a new context, and as a major housing stock in the current housing situation of Moscow. I consider Soviet mass housing, the khrushchevka and the brezhnevka, to be a part of the features that constitute Moscow's urban aesthetics as a whole, however, they should also be looked at as individual buildings which are individual elements of the built environment and have their own material contexts. Combining these theoretical approaches will allow me to treat the case of Soviet mass housing as a set of elements which are experienced within urban aesthetics, and as material contexts with significant meanings as materiality.

In my analysis, I will look at Soviet mass housing buildings as architectural elements of the built environment, making use of Bartmanski and Fuller's (2018) framework of materiality and meaning, where a three-fold nexus of scale, substance and style described how meaning is materially

expressed. In my discourse analysis chapters, I will look how these three elements are used in media and political discourse around Moscow renovation project and the demolition of the khrushchevki. In my analysis, I will further refer to these concepts as Bartmanski and Fuller have suggested in their article, to concretisize how different meanings are materially expressed in Moscow's post-Soviet housing regeneration.

Following a notion of sociology of architecture, Bartmanski and Fuller treat materiality and meaning as intertwined. Bartmanski and Fuller address Latour's actor-network theory, which is among the most influential frameworks for connections of materiality and the social, and propose a dialogue on approaching the built environment. They argue that Latour's approach forces to choose between a social theory of either materiality or meaning. They propose an approach which aims to take account the ”double reality of buildings”, as phrased by Gieryn (2002: 41, quoted in ibid. 205). In this approach, materiality and meaning can be interpreted through one another; a conclusion posed by a number or social scientists researching architecture. (Bartmanski & Fuller 2018: 203-205)

Bartmanski and Fuller's research on post-socialist Berlin illuminates the capacity and specifically the joint power of scale, substance and style in re-constituting the East German Palast, a

reconstruction site for an unfinished palace. They argue that the cultural sociological and urban studies perspectives are productive when combined, as they are able to illuminate recurring cultural patterns and their material forms. In their research, they show how ”grand concrete objects” can consolidate and legitimate collective interests in the Berlin site. (Bartmanski and Fuller 2018: 203)

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They emphasise how ”buildings are, of course, never isolated from their surroundings. Instead they are nested in specific sites that are constituted through a series of morphological relations and layered historical meanings.” (ibid. 205).

Bartmanski and Fuller propose the framework of scale, substance and style, which are used as analytical concepts. Understood in their relational contexts vis-á-vis other elements of the built environment, and in relation to each other, these concepts form a nexus to analyse the social significance of buildings. (ibid. 203, 205) The three categories are concerned with interrelatedness of materiality and meanings, and are used to define and stabilize social meanings to differentiate ideological systems. The relational concepts explain how ”discourses, collective feelings, practices, objects and things are intertwined in architecture” (ibid. 205). (ibid. 205-207)

The first of the concepts is scale. Scale of buildings is understood relationally, in relation to the scale of other architectural objects in the given location and given city. The scale of architectural objects matter, and there is power in scale, as long as it is understood relationally. Bartmanski and Fuller use the example of how relocating a Manhattan skyscraper in a medieval city would alter the relational scale and its meanings. (ibid. 205-206) Soviet mass housing is scalarly interesting, as standardisation and prefabrication means that there are large housing stocks of buildings and apartments of similar size; similar interior size as well as similar height of either the 5-storey khrushchevka and the 8 to 16 storey brezhnevka4_{. How these buildings are perceived by residents as} a part of everyday urban aesthetics is affected by the relationality of their scale, as it depends on the surrounding elements of the built environment.

Secondly, there is substance; the physical material of exterior and interior. The durability and rarity have implications on the substance's cultural meaning (Hodder 2012, quoted in ibid. 206).

Materiality should not be reduced to mere substance, but rather understood as a physical dimension in human experience. Physical matter never functions in a vacuum, thus substance is also

understood relationally. Sensory qualitied of substances are perceived within the framework of given location and setting, and context of social production and consumption. The perceiving of substances is affected also by availability and popularity of materials. (ibid. 206) Materials used in different types of Soviet mass housing are relatively monotonous, as the buildings are mainly built of either conrete or brick. The popularity and distinctiveness of these materials contributes to meanings associated with the materials.

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Thirdly, Bartmanski and Fuller address style in classifying and differentiating objects of the built environment in context. In built environment, style is manifested in material and formal relations. Generally stabilized collective imageries allow speaking of style not in ”formally claiming what is and what is not Baroque, but rather that buildings can be and are experienced under this guise” (206). Certain styles can obtain iconic power and become representational. For example, Classical style has been used in architecture for parliaments as a style for democratic institutions of power. (Bartmanski & Fuller 2019: 205-206) In this study, I am assessing the khrushchevka and

brezhnevka as a style, due to their distinctive and collectively recognized, although unofficial, architectural style. There are certain architectural characteristics that make Soviet mass housing a distinct style. These include for example prefabricated parts combined with simplicity and monotony.

These three dimensions of analytical study on the built environment, help situate objects of the built environment in their, historical, social, political and aesthetic contexts. Semiotically stabilized assemblages emerge over time, creating shared imaginaries. Bartmanski and Fuller's research on the Berlin site demonstrates how the interrelatedness of materiality and meaning ”cuts across time and space in that matters of scale, substance and style were of concern for builders, politicians, rulers and citizens in different epochs”. (ibid. 206) Bartmanski and Fuller claim that this is expecially evident when looking at grand civic architecture, where there are collective meanings (ibid. 207). It is evident looking at the current contestation over Moscow and of nicknaming residential buildings after political leaders, collective meanings are clearly present not only in grand civic architecture, but also in architecture of housing. This brings the focus to everyday architecture as a part of the everyday urban aesthetics. Urban aesthetics of everyday life have a particular meaning for people living in cities. As these buildings are so common, it creates shared, collective and individual imageries of the city.

The Moscow administration has declared that the Moscow renovation program is underway due to the deteriorated and outdated material and living conditions of the Khrushchev-era housing stock. Comparing how scale, substance and style are used in arguments opposing and supporting the khrushchevka on one hand, and the replacing building stock on the other, will allow me to analyse the role that meanings of materiality play in the regeneration project. As the project of demolishing the khrushchevka and allocating residents to a better quality housing has prompted protests on the

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citizens' behalf, it appears that the material deterioration of the khrushchevka is not a strong enough reason for every resident to be content about leaving their apartments to move to a newly built one. By comparing discourses on materiality around the old and new housing stocks in Moscow

renovation project in alternative and regime media, I aim to approach meanings of materiality beyond its deterioration.

Following Bartmanski and Fuller, I will look into the interconnectedness or materiality and meanings in Soviet mass housing, comparing to new housing that is being built to replace them in the Moscow renovation program. I aim to show how the relational concepts of scale, substance and style are drawn from to consolidate social meanings and to legitimate certain ideological systems.

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3 Soviet leaders' legacies on housing: historical review

Housing in the Soviet Union before the waves of residential mass construction

The urban population increased from 18% in 1926, to 33% in 1939 to 48% in 1959 in Russia. In 1989, 73% of the population was living in urban areas, after which the percentage was remained fairly stable, only falling slightly. (Murawski 2018: 918) Rapid urbanization together with the waves of residential mass construction from the 1950s onwards transformed Soviet urban forms and housing standards. Before the mass housing campaigns associated with the rules of Nikita

Khrushchev and Leonid Brezhnev, the post-war era in the Soviet Union was characterised with hard living and economic conditions, and standards for housing and living were low. The two years between the Stalinist era (1927-1953) and Khrushchev's designation were characterised by rapidly changing leadership and insecure political conditions preceded by the death of Josif Stalin.

It was common for people to live in kommunalkas; shared accomodations with multiple families in apartments that had shared facilities, where private space could often be had only by curtains. Single-home occupancy was one of the forms of socialist living during Stalin's era, but most people lived in communal housing. (Harris 2013: 85-86)

During the Stalinist era, the urban population increased from 18% in 1926, to 33% in 1939. (Murawski 2018: 918) At the same time with rapid urbanisation of the population, there was

proportionally less living space for urban residents. By the 1950s, almost half of the people lived in cities, but a Soviet city dweller would have less space on average than urban dwellers in the 1920s (Urban 2012: 128). The national average of the number of square meters per capita was 8.2 in 1926 and 7.4 in 1955. As the number includes spaces such as kitchens and bathrooms, personal space was scarce. (Urban 2012: 128)

Standardisation and prefabrication of housing was not introduced until the Khrushchev-era, and construction was slower. Living conditions of regular citizens were bad, however, Stalin's legacy regarding the built environment is more associated with large-scale ornamented Stalinist

architecture and the stalinka, which refers mostly to an elite residence. These types of residential buildings were mostly built by traditional means, instead of from mass-produced pre-fabricated panels. Due to being built with larger resources and better materials for the elites instead of the masses, Stalinkas continue to be more wanted in the real estate sector. Compared to the housing for

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the masses, Stalinka types of buildings are rare. The categorisation of Stalinist architecture instead covers a wide range of buildings that are other than residential.

Murawski (2018) addresses Collier's ideas on the early years of Stalin era, which he sees as the formative Soviet period. According to Collier, during the early 1930s, there was a time when ”enterprise-centrism” started to emerge, and a time during which mundane economic questions won over the utopic fantasies of the homo sovieticus in the 1920s. Soviet city-building from the early 1930s brought the end of theoretical speculation on the proper form of the socialist city, and the renewed emphasis on the practical problems of planning new cities around industrial enterprise. Purely architectural or aesthetic aspects of city design were gradually pushed out from planning priorities, and functionality became priority. (Murawski 2018: 913)

Khrushchevki, brezhnevki and the mikroraion: Prefabricated forms into the most common urban forms

Post-Stalin era saw changes on multiple levels compared to the Stalinist rule. The mass housing campaigns under Khrushchev's rule were the most important critical juncture in history of mass housing in the Soviet Union. Similar development was continued by Brezhnev's administration. By their magnitude, Khrushchev's mass housing campaigns were the most influential constructions to transform the Soviet everyday life, urban aesthetics and urban forms.

The legacy of Khrushchev of his reign from 1955 to 1964, is mainly associated with the

”Khrushchev's Thaw”. Besides foreign policy legacies, changes during the Khrushchev-era had implications to the urban formations, urban planning standards, housing and living conditions, urban aesthetics, and the quality of urban life. Legacies associated with the Khrushchev-era are the largest housing reform during the history of Soviet Union, Soviet avant-garde architecture and next phase modernist architecture, and increasing usage of open and green spaces and landscape

architecture. During the Thaw that was characterised by more open-mindedness towards the West, architects were able to connect to and visit in the Western countries. (Staniukovich-Denisova & Liubimova 2017)

Zubovich (2015) and Harris (2013) emphasise the massive numbers of the mass housing campaign, as investment of economic, material and labour resources directed towards the projects. In less than 20 years between 1953 and 1970, there were almost 40 million newly built apartments in the city

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and countryside, for over 140 million residents. (Zubowich 2015 :1005) Migration to single-family homes from the kommunalki was considered the broadest attempt to improve the quality of urban life and aim towards less class inequality. (Harris 2013; quoted in Zubovich 2015: 1005-1006) Harris (2013; quoted in Zubovich 2015) emphasises the meaning of acquiring the personal space, comfort and the possession of a single-family home, in providing raised expectations for wider future improvements. Possession of an apartment was a right which residents widely felt entitled to. Acquiring a space of their own and a significant improvement on their living standards from a regime that seemed willing to improve the quality of their lives, induced residents to become more active in ”politics of complaint” and in engaging with state officials. (Harris 2013: 307; quoted in Zubovich 2015:1006)

Although some residents still continued to live in kommunalkas, the mass housing campaign suggested that there is a reason to believe in a brighter future for communism. A single-family apartment was a considerable improvement, which was perceived as a sign for progress for Soviet workers, and as a new kind of freedom that people felt entitled to. (Urban 2012: 134) In

Khrushchev's mass housing production, the prefabricated buildings were meant to only last for 25 years (Urban 2012: 129). There was a plan that after the buildings begin to decay after the given number of decades, the conditions under the communist regime would have improved for adequate resources for building new, good-quality housing for all residents.

The mass housing campaign initiated by Khrushchev shaped the understanding of home in Russia. Property rights and rights for proper housing became to be understood as a reward for socialist labour. (Zubovich 2015: 1009) By the mass housing campaign, the Soviet regime was able to solve the housing question at the time, whereas many welfare states all over the world continued to struggle with a housing crisis. (Murawski 2018: 921) The mass housing campaign under

Khrushchev's reign reinforced the legitimacy of the regime. (Harris 2015: 306, quoted in Murawski 2018: 921)

The form of a khrushchevka building was the result of architects who attempted a design that would be as economical as possible. Khrushchev had initiated the promotion of low-cost construction since the early 1950s, when he was a party leader of the Moscow region, before he became the head of state in 1953. (Urban 2012: 129) The design originated from a policy of distributing square metres of housing to residents, where the minimum amount of space would be allocated per person,

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in order to reduce costs. (Zubovich 2015: 1007) The size of the housing is a criticised legacy. Although criticized, it has been argued that Khrushchev's legacy on solving the housing crisis is among features of the socialist urbanims, that succeeded. (Murawski 2018) Having succeeded Stalin in 1953, Khrushchev made mass housing a priority in the political agenda. The massive scale of construction was a trade-off for good quality, and Khrushchev has famously asked: ”Do you build a thousand adequate apartments or seven hundred good ones? Would a citizen rather settle for an adequate apartment or wait ten or fifteen years for a very good one?” (Khrushchev remembers. The last testament. 1974: 102. Quoted in Urban 2012: 129)

Khrushchev's era is known for de-Stalinization, which can also be seen in relation to the built environment. Khrushchev criticised the building methods and aesthetics of the flamboyant Stalinist buildings, condemning them as expensive and overly decorative, promoting processes of

standardization in urban housing. (Urban 2012: 129) Although single-family occupancy existed in the Stalinist era, Khrushchev's differentiation was that he made the type of housing plausible for the masses (Harris 2013).

This is how the aesthetics of Soviet housing was reduced to purely economical, and the aesthetic side was neglected. Instead, there was a resolution calling for a ”Soviet architecture of natural simplicity, austere in its forms, and economical” (a resolution of the Central Committee in 1955; Urban 2012: 129). Construction began with the motto ”better, faster and cheaper” (Urban 2012: 129). In 1962 in Moscow, 98% of new apartments corresponded to the design standards specified in Architectural Planning Directorate prompted by Khrushchev in 1951. The standardized construction of these buildings was based on prefabricated concrete panels, which were assembled at the factory, and could be put together without mortar at the construction site in only 12 days at fastest, as was proudly stated. The most well known type of khrushchevka was called K-7 series, with five storeys, first brick and then big panel construction, and modest in its architectural contemplation. (Urban 2012: 129)

Besides producing an extensive amount of mass housing buildings, the Khrushchev-era had large implications to the urban forms of Russian cities. Not only were residential buildings standardized, but standardization applied to residential neighbourhoods or areas as well. One of the basic

planning blocks of the Soviet Union was the microraion, or the microdistrict, which became a standard for composition of residential areas more widely during the Khrushchev era (source).

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Compared to the Stalin-era city, which was generally marked by compactness and a significant historical centre, the Khrushchev-era urban developments concentrated largely in the fringes of the city. City centre was losing its significance as a concentration of services, as it became a standard that residential areas were constructed together with everyday facilities. As a standard,

microdistricts were equipped with services such as schools, grocery stores, kindergartens and sports facilities. (Urban 2012: 131) The establishment of kindergartens and schools in microdistricts improved the education of Soviet children. (Urban 2012: 134)

Khrushchev aimed for differentiation from Stalin, and Leonid Brezhnev, who came to power in 1964, continued similar housing and construction policies as Khrushchev. In contrast to Stalin-era construction which was mainly intended for the Soviet elite, the khrushchevka and brezhnevka buildings succeeded in filling Russian people's need for housing. Mass housing campaigns under the reigns of Khrushchev and Brezhnev are considered modernizers of popular life, also in terms of more comfortable conditions and improved living standards, as buildings were equipped with running water and central heating. (Urban 2012: 133-134) This was a clear dinstinction from the Stalinist era.

When Leonid Brezhnev came to power in 1964, he continued the standardization processes and repetitive construction in the urban areas of Russia. Prefabricated buildings and microrayons became the most common form of housing, and by 1980s, 70% of housing in Moscow was constructed from prefabricated parts. (Urban 2012: 133-134)

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4 Methodology

Depictions of Soviet mass housing in the contradiction of the Moscow

Renovation Project

Discourse analysis

I will follow the methodology of discourse analysis on analysing depictions of Soviet mass housing upon the controversy around Moscow renovation project on the one hand, and visual analysis on analysing depictions of Soviet mass housing in film on the other.

Discourse analysis has been conceptualised in numerous ways, and it is a popular method in social and political research. I am using discourse to study and describe the ”relational totality which constitutes and organizes social relations around a particular structure of meanings”, to quote Doty (Doty 1996: 239) By this, I aim to describe relations and meanings in the dialogue of political leaders as political actors, and citizens as social actors and as residents with rights.

I am approaching the controversy around Moscow's renovation project by making use of political discourse analysis (PDA) and critical discourse analysis (CDA). Political discourse analysis should be understood as a separate field from critical discourse analysis. However, they are interlinked, and in this thesis, I am making use of both approaches.

In this thesis, political discourse is understood following van Dijk's (1997) conceptualisation as the object of study of critical-political discourse analysis. The type of analysis examines mainly the reproduction of political power through political discourse. Besides analyzing the domination or abuse of political power, the analysis includes the study of resistance and ”counter-power” against ”discursive dominance” (van Dijk 1998: 11). This type of analysis ”deals with the discursive conditions and consequences of social and political inequality from such domination”. Political discourse analysis shares the general, wider aim of critical discourse analysis, mut aims to contribute also to political and social research. (van Dijk 1998: 11-12)

Van Dijk defines political discourse as a study of those who produce political discourse, thus representators of a political system, or politicians as central players of the political domain (13). (ibid. 12-13) In this study, political discouse is understood as any discourse which is made public

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under a political purpose; here it is understood as the discourse of Vladimir Putin and Sergei Sobyanin and their administration, as they are serving at the time of the announcement and implementation of the renovation program and closely involced with any decision-making associated with the renovation of the new and demolition of the old housing stock.

Political discourse includes Putin's and Sobyanin's transcripts on the official site of Kremlin, and news articles published under the official platform for Moscow Mayor and administration. These are conceptualised as political discourse, as the official platforms represent the president of Russia and the Mayor of Moscow and their administration, thus significant political actors with political aims. Following this conceptualisation, the object of my study are Vladimir Putin, the President of Russia, and Sergei Sobyanin, the Mayor of Moscow, serving at the time of the announcement and implementation of the renovation program and closely involvement with any decision-making associated with the renovation of new and demolition of the old mass housing stock.

Adding an approach of critical discourse analysis towards critical and regime media, I am studying discourses from both supporting and opposing the regime plans on the renovation program. This allows for a parallel examination of discourses towards a type of Soviet mass housing, through its demolition, and authorities, through approving of the project. By discourse analysis on a set of media and political documents, I will also illuminate meanings associated with Soviet mass housing and their aesthetics and materiality. Studying the demolition of Soviet buildings, preceding the construction of new mass housing, will allow for an interesting analysis of Soviet and post-Soviet housing questions. Studying discourses on current political leaders associated with the renovation project offers an interesting lense to look through in order to analyze how nostalgia and criticism towards authorities is manifested in materialisations of mass housing campaigns.

Following these conceptualisations, I aim to describe how meanings of Soviet mass housing are produced, reproduced and maintained by discourse. Some of this discourse is used in political aims, by political actors, and it reproduces political power. Other type of discourse in my analysis is media discourse, which on its behalf also maintains and (re)produces meanings of Soviet mass housing, contributing to public opinions but also having their own purposes for the discourse.

Data collection and corpus

Urban aesthetics, materiality and leadership : Depictions of Soviet mass housing in post-Soviet Moscow during urban regeneration