This article, based on the analysis of media, video production and songs, as well as semi-structured interviews, pursues three objectives. First, it analyses Belarusian rock musicians’ modes of protest engagement in the context of the 2020 Belarusian post-electoral protests and the 2022 Russian war of aggression against Ukraine. Second, it situates their engagement within the Belarusian underground rock artistic tradition that took root in the 1980s, but which was updated in waves as new impulses were given to protest. Finally, it provides an overview of four types of social logics that have historically contributed to the protest politicization of Belarusian rock music.
By
Yauheni Kryzhanouski
October 23, 2025
The modern Russian state is built on random and unpredictable institutionalized violence, on fear and pain. Therefore, one of the most common reactions to the power abuse from the Russian government is to ignore the state and try to build your own little life.
Essay by
Elena Palenova
January 18, 2023
"I was terrified and scared but more than ever before I felt that I am a Belarusian and I could not stay home. I can’t say that I felt exactly like a soldier preparing to die while protecting the Homeland, but a similar feeling overwhelmed me then."
These are the words of one of the female protestors who took part in a street demonstration in Minsk on February 27, 2022. According to different estimates, between 1,000 and several thousand Belarusians came out to protest against the start of the war in Ukraine and against the referendum on constitutional change in Belarus.
Essay by
Alesia Rudnik
January 18, 2023
Lusine Djanian and Alexey Knedlyakovsky at the Bakhtin workshop shared their experiences from the art protest in 2013, in the Russian Republic of Mordovia, the historical place for those serving sentence or being exiled. And it was in this region where Bakhtin spent many years of his life when he was not allowed to live in Moscow. The protest was a direct action to support the demands of Pussy Riot-member Nadezda Toloknnikova, who was serving her sentence in prison for the action in the Moscow Cathedral of Christ the Savior.
By
Ninna Mörner
November 7, 2017
Issue 2025, 4: 
Baltic Worlds covers; the Baltic Sea Region, Eastern Europe, Russia, CentralAsia, Caucasus and the Balkan area.