Always Under Siege: Olga Freidenberg’s Diary-Theory and the Everyday Terror of Stalinism

Foreign Affairs | 2026-08-18 | society

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English Summary

The article analyzes Olga Freidenberg’s diary from the Siege of Leningrad, proposing that her account serves as a profound metaphor for life under totalitarian regimes like Stalinism. The core argument is that constant state oppression constitutes an 'everyday terror,' which amounts to a systematic siege on human dignity and privacy—a condition of complete unfreedom. By treating Freidenberg's notes as an anthropological study, the analysis develops a political theory detailing how total denial of choice or escape defines modern tyranny. This framework suggests that understanding historical atrocities requires focusing not just on grand political events, but on the pervasive mechanisms of daily psychological and physical control.

中文摘要

本文分析了奧爾加·弗賴登伯格（Olga Freidenberg）在倫巴甫區圍城期間的日記，提出她的記錄可作為一種深刻的隱喻，用以描繪生活在斯大林主義等極權政權下的狀態。核心論點指出，持續不斷的國家壓迫構成了一種「日常恐怖」，這本質上是對人類尊嚴和私密性的系統性圍困——即徹底缺乏自由的生存條件。透過將弗賴登伯格的筆記視為一項人類學研究，本文發展出了一套政治理論，詳細闡述了選擇或逃脫權利的完全剝奪如何定義現代暴政。此框架建議，理解歷史上的暴行，不應僅著眼於宏大的政治事件，而必須聚焦於日常心理和身體控制的普遍機制。

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