Dictators, you'd think, would have no need ot all the messiness of the courts. What'sthe point of seizing total power if you can't wield it? Yet tyrants in history maintained elaboratejudicial procedures. In a new series Julian Putkowski analyses the grotesque distortions that occurwhen the law gets political. 1: Vyshinsky- A Ratin Human Form.
Alongwith Stalin , Vyshinsky perfected the trial as a theatrical spectacular in which the defendants became reluctant protagonists forced to read their own confessions, and where the curtain was final. How did he do it? How did that era distort intellectual discourse today? With Prof John Erikson. Producer Matt Thompson