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« 2026. # 1 (187)

The Ethnology Notebooks. 2026. № 1 (187), 225—237

UDK [94:327.7]:725.945:726.8]:355.1](410)”19/20″

DOI https://doi.org/10.15407/

The date the article was first submitted to the publication 8.12.2025

The date the article was accepted for publication after review 8.01.2026

The date of publication (publication)

THE COMMONWEALTH WAR GRAVES COMMІSSION REPORT 2021 AS A TURNING POINT IN THE TRANSFORMATION OF BRITISH MEMORY POLICY

BARAN Zoya

  • ORCID ID: https:// orcid.org/0000-0001-9685-3953
  • Candidate of History, Associate Professor,
  • Ivan Franko National University of Lviv,
  • Department of World Modern History,
  • 1, Universytetska str., 79000, Lviv, Ukraine,
  • Contacts: e-­mail: zoja_baran@ukr.net

Abstract. Introduction. The politics of memory shapes dominant narratives about the past and determines their role in contemporary public discourse. In this process, material sites of memory associated with wars acquire particular significance, serving as distinctive points for reflecting on historical experience. For more than a hundred years, the Commonwealth War Graves Commission has carried out the honorable and complex mission of commemorating those who fell in the two World Wars. The system of military cemeteries and memorials that has been created has long been considered the embodiment of the principle of «equality in death».

Problem Statement. In 2021, the Commission’s Special Committee released a Report that identified violations of this principle related to colonial hierarchies and racial biases embedded in commemorative practices in the first half of the 20th century.

The purpose of the article is to analyse the Report and to identify its impact on Britain’s politics of memory.

Methods. The general scientific methods of analysis and synthesis, as well as special scientific comparative-historical and chronological methods are used in the work. The author adheres to the principle of historicism.

Results. It has been established that the Report, which revealed the unequal commemoration after the First World War of tens of thousands of fallen combatants and non-combatants from Africa, Asia, and the Middle East, became a turning point in Britain’s politics of memory. The state publicly acknowledged the colonial inequality in commemorating the fallen, which marked a significant step toward reassessing the imperial legacy in the sphere of commemoration.

Conclusion. Official London pledged to take active steps to eliminate inequalities in commemoration. Evidence of positive changes came in January 2025 with the opening of the Cape Town Labour Corps Memorial (South Africa) which seeks to correct historical inequalities in commemoration, as well as with the launch of a project in Freetown to create a new memorial dedicated to the members of the Sierra Leone Non-Combatant Corps. Thus, this Report not only corrected a historical injustice, but also symbolised the beginning of the decolonisation of British memory — that is, the transition from imperial silence to public recognition of the multiplicity of war experiences.

Keywords: United Kingdom, Commonwealth War Graves Commission, politics of memory, First World War, deco-lo-nisation.

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