Poland

68 articles tagged with poland were found.

Soft Power. Coopting post-Soviet youth: Russia, China, and transnational authoritarianism

This Special Issue include eight articles that endeavor to analyze more deeply different aspects of the influence of transnational “soft power” aimed at coopting youth in authoritarian and hybrid regimes through radical and nationalist youth organizations, patriotic education, and youth wings of ruling parties. By means of such activities, governments try to distract the youth from countercultural movements and opposition politics as well as to educate an obedient and loyal generation. The purpose is to “vaccinate” such generations with illiberal or authoritarian values in order to eliminate potential threats to regimes’ stability.

Essay by Oleg Antonov and Olena Podolian August 23, 2023

Conservative national narratives in Poland, Russia and Hungary. “We are the norm!”

New Conservatives in Russia and East Central Europe. Eds. Katharina Bluhm and Mihai Varga (London: Routledge, 2019), 309 pages.

By Anna Schwenck October 25, 2021

MEMORY BATTLEFIELD ON THE EAST FRONT: UKRAINE AND POLAND

Discussions about the assessment of historic events have always had their place in the public discourse in democratic societies, whereas totalitarian regimes such as the Communist one preferred an official version of history that is not up for debate. This is why a conflict-prone memory boom in the CEE was to be expected after the fall of the Iron Curtain. The only recently intensified trend is to fight memory wars with the means of memory laws, i.e. by using laws prescribing and proscribing certain representations of historic events as a weapon to protect one’s national collective memory from divergent interpretation by others. Such approach to governing memory wars are detrimental to the neighborly relations, i.e. turning them into un-neighborly ones.

By Anna Grinberg October 25, 2021

Jan Grabowski’s research is facing a lawsuit in Poland. New book on the Polish Police during WWII

On the Watchpost. The complicity of the Polish and Polish Criminal Police in the Holocaust. Review of Na posterunku. Udział polskiej policji granatowej i kryminalnej w zagładzie Żydów Jan Grabowski 432 pages. Wydawnictwo Czarne, Wolowiec 2020.

By Piotr Wawrzeniuk April 22, 2021

The end of “East Central Europe” and the return of “Europe in-between”

Political and scholarly debates on European (meso-)regions have returned time and again over the past 100 years. The conceptualizations of Central and Eastern Europe plays a major role in the debates, which affects the Baltic Sea region and Northern Europe as well. These issues have already been addressed many times, but recently, a new development deserves our attention: the launch of the “Three Seas Initiative” in the summer of 2015 by the presidents of Poland and Croatia, comprising 12 EU member states between the Baltic, Adriatic and Black Seas.

Essay by Jörg Hackmann April 21, 2021

The legacy of 1989 in Poland. Conflicts and commemoration 30 years after the end of Communism

The author has analyzed the coverage of the 30th anniversary of the Roundtable Agreement and June elections in Polish newspapers of all political hues. Additionally several official speeches held in connection with the commemorations have been scrutinized. The goal has been to examine the uses of memory of 1989 in Polish politics of 2019 and highlight the strategic choices and constraints faced by mnemonic actors in this context. Thus, the study presented may be seen as a follow-up to Bernhard’s and Kubik’s investigation conducted ten years ago. However, this analysis expands the focus of Bernhard’s and Kubik’s work by paying special attention to cultural constraints on politics of memory. Thus, the aim is both to give insight into contemporary politics of memory in Poland in relation to the recent past and contribute to the more general understanding of how culture works in politics of memory.

By Barbara Törnquist-Plewa April 21, 2021

A city of amnesia Marcin Kącki’s Białystok. White Power. Black Memory

In his book of reportage: Białystok. White Power, Black Memory Marcin Kącki documents oblivion and denial of the memory of the former Jewish inhabitants of the city; paradoxically, it is also a call for this memory to be restored. In other words, we are dealing here with the two basic attitudes and forms of remembering historical trauma, distinguished by LaCapra: The first results in the process of “working-through”; the other is based on denial and results in “acting-out”.

By Jan Miklas-Frankowski February 15, 2021

Nomadic Memory Artivism as the Practice of Recovering Memory

Memory can be retained and archived. You can, however, also manipulate it, obliterate its fragments and sometimes whole segments, using its stores as a tool in a political fight with minorities. Historical memory is only seemingly a domain of objective knowledge. The point of departure for my artivistic practice is always work with archival material. With time, my experiences led me to outline a specific understanding of historical memory as a process in which the most important role is played by the migration of ideas, a peculiar kind of nomadism.

Essay by Zuzanna Hertzberg February 12, 2021

“There are many shades of grey in the history of Polish-Jewish relations” An exhibition of memory maps of a lost culture

The Grodzka Gate-NN Theater in Lublin is displaying maps about the memory of Jewish Central and Eastern Europe in an online exhibition. Martin Englund from Baltic Worlds meets curator and educator Piotr Nazaruk in a conversation about the memory maps, educating people about the Jewish history of Poland, nostalgia, and anti-Semitism.

By Martin Englund October 7, 2020

Presidential election in Poland: the festival of polarization

The brutal presidential campaign only exemplified the degree of polarization in the Polish society. The campaign before the first round turned out to be relatively calm, where most of the candidates had to show their conciliatory side. However, due to the course, the intensity of the competition had revealed long-lasting divisions in Poland.

By Maciej Sychowiec July 21, 2020