1 NB! Follow this link to download a free copy of the published version (available until the end of June 2017): http://explore.tandfonline.com/page/pgas/soviet-union-collapse-25-years-on-soviet-union You need to scroll down to the section “Soviet Union – Neighbourhood” THE GHOST OF ESSENTIALISM AND THE TRAP OF BINARISM: SIX THESES ON THE SOVIET EMPIRE Epp Annus In recent decades, scholars in the diverse field of Soviet and post-Soviet studies have passionately investigated the Soviet nationalities question. Different sets of approaches and opinions have emerged, conflicted with each other, created dialogues, and, in some cases, vanished from contemporary discourse. Sometimes these queries have been posed with an emphasis on the question of the Soviet Union as an empire. In 2000, for example, an editorial for Russian Review stressed how “scholarship on nationalities and nationality policy reveals fundamental characteristics of the Soviet system” and how a crucial part of the nationality policy question is the question of colonialism: “Was the Soviet Union a modern colonial empire? If indeed it was, then we need to ask how this colonialism influenced Soviet rule of national minorities and forged the Soviet system as a whole. If it was not, then we should delineate characteristics that distinguished the Soviet Union from European colonial empires.” (D.L.H, vi) These and similar questions, posed in the 1990s and 2000s, have inspired much discussion and have generated a stream of supplementary questions. How should we understand and interpret the situation of different nationalities and ethnic groups under Soviet rule? Was the Soviet Union indeed an empire? Historians tend to pose questions about the general build-up of the Soviet Union; cultural theorists prefer to consider the particularities of texts and are disinclined to pronounce forceful general conclusions. Discussion has also