Mikson-málið sem „fortíðarvandi“: stjórnmál minninga, þjóðarímyndir og viðmiðaskipti.

THE MIKSON AFFAIR AND TROUBLED PASTS: The Politics of Memory, National Identities, and Paradigm Changes This article explores how dominant ideologies during different time periods reconfigured political and legal attitudes towards individual resistance to Soviet rule and collaboration with the Germans during World War II. As a case study, the so-called Mikson Affair is analyzed. It centered on charges—first put forward by Estonian refugees in Sweden at the end of the war, then by the Soviets during the Cold War, and, finally, by the Simon Wiesenthal Center following the breakup of the Soviet Union—against an Estonian policeman, Evald Mikson, for killing communists and Jews in 1941 during the last phase of the Russian occupation of Estonia and the beginning of the German one. The article ties Mikson‘s personal and political trajectories with national and transnational processes, such as Estonia‘s independence struggle; Estonian collaboration with Nazi Germany; the persecution of the Jews and the Holocaust; the ideological conflict of the Cold War, and the end of Communism. Thus, the focus is on exploring the intersections between individual representations based on experiences, on the one hand, and ideological paradigm shifts, reconfigurations of power relations, and collective memories, on the other. The purpose is to show how interpretations of war crimes memories by various political elites—especially Estonian, Icelandic, and Jewish but also Russian ones—were used, in the Cold War and during the post-Cold War period, to influence, revise, and question national identities, notions of individual and collective guilt, foundational myths, and governmental behavior.