What and how were local authorities criticised for in the Soviet press (on the example of a city newspaper of the second half of the 1940s)

The Soviet state during the years of Stalin's rule is characterized, in particular, by a rigid vertical of state power, a communist ideology monopolized in society, and the impossibility of criticizing Soviet power. However, such assessments began to be given only from the turn of 1990, when glasnost was proclaimed, and later, already in the Constitution of Russia of 1993, mandatory state ideology was prohibited. However, such an approach is often unjustifiably absolutized, since even in Stalin's USSR, critical publications about the shortcomings of government bodies took place in the Soviet media, and this despite the fact that all the media were, of course, only official, that is, controlled, censored. But here, of course, it is necessary to make a reservation: the criticism concerned not the Soviet government in general, but specific bodies on specific issues, while excluding criticism of the authorities of the union republics and, of course, the authorities of the union level. Basically, the authorities at the level of local Councils of Workers' Deputies (village councils, settlement, district, city councils) were criticized, and the level of criticism still did not go beyond some informal "red lines". The article reveals this topic using the example of the city newspaper "Novorossiysky Rabochiy" (several newspaper issues published in 1947 are analyzed). An interesting phenomenon is noted: criticism of local authorities in this newspaper then, more than seventy years ago, under Stalin, was often stricter than in post-Soviet Russia. An explanation of this paradox is given.