Formation of Karelia’s sister-cities relations (analysis of the republican newspapers)

The paper addresses the history of origin and formation of Karelian twinning relations in the 1960s-1970s using the materials of republican newspapers (Leninskaya Pravda and Komsomolets). The reference to the press allows us to define the way the contacts between the twin-cities were presented to the population, as well as to consider the way the newspapers covered the citizens' attitude to these connections. In the scientific literature connected with the study of the twinning movement in Karelia, as well as in other republics of the USSR, newspaper materials were often used as auxiliary sources. In our study we used the historical-systemic, historical-genetic, historical-comparative, typological methods, and content analysis. The analyzed articles, notes, interviews allow us to trace the formation of sister-cities relations between Petrozavodsk and Varkaus, Petrozavodsk and La Rochelle, as well as between the Karelian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (ASSR) and the Neubrandenburg district and to conclude that in the republican press during this period a certain hierarchy of sister-cities was built, in which the top position was occupied by Neubrandenburg. Soviet newspapers reflected the official discourse of the twinning policy.