In June 1949 the Soviet state arrested seven farmers from the village of Bila Tserkva. Not wealthy or powerful, the men were unknown outside their community, and few had ever heard of their small, isolated village on the southwestern border of Soviet Ukraine. Nevertheless, the state decided they were dangerous traitors who threatened to undermine public order, and a regional court sentenced them to twenty-five years of imprisonment for treason.
In To Make a Village Soviet Emily Baran explores why a powerful state singled out these individuals for removal from society. Bila Tserkva had to become a space in which Soviet laws and institutions reigned supreme, yet Sovietization was an aspiration as much it was a reality. The arrested men belonged to a small and misunderstood religious minority, the Jehovah’s Witnesses, and both Witnesses and their neighbours challenged the government’s attempts to fully integrate the village into socialist society. Drawing from the case file and interviews with the families of survivors, Baran argues that what happened in Bila Tserkva demonstrates the sheer ambition of the state’s plans for the Sovietization of borderland communities.
A compelling history, To Make a Village Soviet looks to Bila Tserkva to explore the power and the limits of state control – and the possibilities created by communities that resist assimilation.

Emily B. Baran is associate professor of history at Middle Tennessee State University.

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“Baran’s portrait of Sovietization in one village presents lessons that can be applied throughout the Soviet Union and enrich our understanding of the life and death of the Soviet experiment. This book also offers a fresh perspective on Ukraine’s Soviet past as questions about the enduring legacies of the USSR have taken on new meaning with Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine. War and territorial annexation are no longer a thing of the past in Ukraine—the story of Bila Tserkva offers a timely look at the lived reality of resistance.” The Russian Review

“In this well-written book, Emily Baran takes her readers to Soviet Ukraine in the first years after World War II, and the small town of Bila Tserkva on the border with Romania. This stimulating book will be a very valuable teaching aid in upper-level courses on the modern state, Soviet history, and contemporary religious history.” Nova Religio

“This is a well-written book on a fascinating topic. Baran’s impressive ability to conduct and contextualize interviews allows her to demonstrate just how haphazard Sovietization was in the borderlands during the initial postwar period and how communities of dissenters could survive for decades alongside supposedly homogenous Soviet society. Read this book and learn from one of the best.” Serhy Yekelchyk, University of Victoria and author of Ukraine: What Everyone Needs to Know

“Baran is a brilliant storyteller who manages a cast of historical actors in a way that does not feel overwhelming to the reader. Her ability to connect the “small story” with larger issues of power, human rights, and state-building is a model for students and scholars at any level. This gem of a book is valuable not only for its usefulness in the classroom, its insight into a fascinating case involving a minority faith community in the USSR, and its creative analysis, but also for its impressive contribution to the history of lived experiences in borderland areas.” *Canadian Slavonic Papers *