Peer-reviewed articles have all been through a peer-review process. We practice double-blind peer-review. All material is reviewed by two independent specialists at least at post-doc level. A prerequisite for publishing scientific articles in Baltic Worlds is that the article has not already been published in English elsewhere. If an article is simultaneously being considered by another publication, this should be indicated when submitting.
This paper examines the politics of monument building and the “de-communization” of public space in Ukraine. It first introduces the conceptual categorization of societal-political interaction over memory in order to showcase permutations between between the two types of memory. It then proceeds to evaluate recent memory developments in the case study of the provincial town of Shyshaky in central Ukraine. I argue that official governmental memory politics is secondary to a broader social memory dynamics in re-structuring the local memory landscape in how it represents Ukraine’s WWII experience and its Soviet past. Approaching the local memory developments as a case of permutations between social and political memories yields greater and more accurate insight.
By
Andrii Nekoliak
February 25, 2020
For more than a decade the government of Georgia, following consultations with international and transnational actors involved in financial politics and development work, is attempting to stimulate economic development in the countryside by encouraging tourism. The mountainous regions play a specific role in this process. Mountains provide a seemingly good starting point for the development of tourism as they can be defined as being very rich in both cultural heritage and natural landscapes. The main question addressed here is whether the current spatial plans and heritagization strategies of the government for Tusheti are subtle steering mechanisms primarily concerned with encouraging a free market economy. Towards this end, the local population are expected to become entrepreneurs in tourism services. In order to theoretically embed and explain what is happening in Georgia, the concepts of governmentality and heritage regimes will be used. The focus of this paper is on governmentality as it is perceived from the perspective of critical heritage studies and the anthropology of development.
By
Edita Štulcaitė
February 25, 2020
This article will introduce the term “pribaltification”, designating the tendencies in the Soviet Union and Russia to imagine and represent the Soviet Baltic republics – and later the independent states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania – as a largely uniform political and cultural entity, and to significantly blur the cultural and linguistic distinctions between the natives of these republics/countries. Analyzing the narrative and semiotic systems that underpin design and production strategies in an audio-visual text of a Russian television serial Gastrolery [Guest Performers], I will demonstrate that representations/metageographies of Lithuania and Lithuanians articulated in the film closely align with the principle of “pribaltification”. Thus, an image of Lithuania and Lithuanians appears to be employed synecdochically, whereby one specific state embodies onscreen all three Baltic countries as a whole. I will also suggest that “pribaltification” in Gastrolery may not be driven exclusively by popular Russian metageographies of the Baltic States. Thus, analysis of the serial may make it possible to observe traces of the Russian state’s geopolitical discourse on the Baltic States.
By
Dzmitry Pravatorau
November 21, 2019
Spatial polarization has become one of the EU’s most pressing issues. While the EU Member States have shown convergence in economic development, interregional inequalities within states have increased considerably. Polarization means that urban agglomerations and capital city-regions demonstrate population growth and increasing prosperity, while a growing number of rural, remote, and old industrial regions suffer from economic and demographic stagnation or decline. The growing divides between rich and poor regions are caused not only by economic laws.
By
Nadir Kinossian
June 18, 2019
By conducting a comparative qualitative and systematic study of the local (island) pre-conditions for creating sustainable socio-economic development through entrepreneurship, here defined as a process of identifying, evaluating, and exploiting entrepreneurial opportunities, this study aims to shed light on entrepreneurial responses to challenges and opportunities on three islands in the Stockholm Archipelago and how context influences these responses.
By
Paulina Rytkönen et al
June 17, 2019
Although there have been great changes in the lives and livelihoods of people in the Baltic Sea archipelago during the last century, the lives of local inhabitants are still strongly linked to the local nature, culture, and history. Customary use of local ecosystems provides resources for the household, but it is also an important carrier of local identity, culture, and way of life. Fishing, hunting, and harvesting of berries, mushrooms, etc., function as cultural and intergenerational glue for the local community context even today. This paper reflects upon the cultural and social importance of the small scale and informal economy in the Swedish Baltic Sea archipelago for sustainability living local communities, some of the present challenges to its continuation, and the potentials for positive change. It is based on participatory research on customary use of biodiversity and local and traditional knowledge in the Kalix Archipelago in the northern Bothnian Bay and in the Sankt Anna Archipelago in the Baltic Sea proper.
By
Håkan Tunón, Marie Kvarnström, Joakim Boström and Anna-Karin Utbult Almkvist
June 17, 2019
This article focuses on the blackmailing of the Jews during the Nazi occupation of Lviv, Galicia. Despite a considerable amount of attention from historians to the Shoah in Lviv, this issue is still one of the few unstudied problems. Based on the carefully collected source materials, the author reconstructs the main features of this phenomenon, its evolution, its local specifics, and the main types of blackmailers and the methods of their activities.
By
Taras Martynenko
March 7, 2019
In less than 15 years, activist journalists have enjoyed a vertiginous career in Ukraine, from a persecuted and marginal minority to one of the most influential social groups and key actors in the political field. This was certainly facilitated by the technological shift that made media work more cost-efficient and less resource-demanding. But the transformation could also only happen because the culture had a long tradition of journalists taking a stand against authorities, and the idealized figures of an honest publicist, a passionately engaged writer, and a resistance fighter were familiar and readily accepted by the public.
By
Roman Horbyk
March 7, 2019
In Romani Studies, the second half of the 19th century witnessed a great migration of the Roms from the two Rumanian provinces of Wallachia and Moldavia as a result of the abolition of slavery (also called “Emancipation”, which ushered in the massive liberation of the Romani slaves in 1856 at the initiative of the Prime Minister Mihail Kogălniceanu). However, this period is still poorly explored, particularly from a linguistic and ethnologic point of view.
By
Julieta Rotaru
September 6, 2018
The Roma migrations, which are becoming more topical today, have prompted policies giving attention to issues of Roma inclusion first in the East, but then also in the West. Inclusion policies have, by and large, failed to improve the situation of Roma communities. In order to achieve a better understanding of these issues, we argue that attention should be paid to Roma as distinct ethnic communities, but that are still integral parts of their respective civic nations
By
Elena Marushiakova and Vesselin Popov
September 6, 2018
Issue 2025, 1: 
Baltic Worlds covers; the Baltic Sea Region, Eastern Europe, Russia, CentralAsia, Caucasus and the Balkan area.