Latest Articles


03.07.2009
Toomas Hendrik Ilves

Who are we? Where are we?

National identity and mental geography

Over the last thousand years, Finland, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania have had multiple identities and been members of several empires. Now, writes the President of Estonia, "we should be looking to create identities that go beyond those that history has foisted upon us". [ more ]

02.07.2009
Martin M. Simecka

Still not free

01.07.2009
Stefan Jonsson

The first man

29.06.2009
Tatiana Zhurzhenko

The geopolitics of memory

25.06.2009
Timothy Snyder

Holocaust: The ignored reality


New Issues


03.07.2009

Gegenworte | 21 (2009)

Die Wissenschaft geht ins Netz [Science goes internet]
03.07.2009

Mute | 12 (2009)

The creative city in ruins
03.07.2009

Varlik | 7/2009

Eurozine Review


24.06.2009
Eurozine Review

So what's our problem?

"Hungarian Quarterly" divines the future of the forint; "Index on Censorship" gives libel law a bad press; "Samtiden" doubts whether Norwegian police women are any freer with the hijab; "Le Monde diplomatique" (Berlin) applies the belt to Europe's cordon sanitaire; "Mittelweg 36" sees solidarity outgrow the nation; "Roots" says yes to Europe, but not at any cost; "Kulturos barai" does not dismiss the idea of a new Lithuanian Grand Duchy; "Le Monde diplomatique" (Oslo) calls the European elections a farce; "Rili" wants to keep the market out of universities; and "Fronesis" explains what 2°C means in an expertocracy.

09.06.2009
Eurozine Review

Happy birthday, Mr Habermas

26.05.2009
Eurozine Review

In monads' land

05.05.2009
Eurozine Review

Advanced profligate capitalism

21.04.2009
Eurozine Review

A kind of Tory communist



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Headlines
Toomas Hendrik Ilves

Who are we? Where are we?

National identity and mental geography

cultural politics Over the last thousand years, Finland, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania have had multiple identities and been members of several empires. Now, writes the President of Estonia, "we should be looking to create identities that go beyond those that history has foisted upon us". [ more ]

03.07.2009
Stefan Jonsson

The first man

On the North, literature and colonialism

literary criticism Nordic countries might not have a "classical" colonial past, writes Stefan Jonsson, yet a "northern colonialism" does exist. Any understanding of it must start with Nordic culture's view of nature and the myth of the "first man". [ more ]

01.07.2009
 

European histories

Eurozine conference Vilnius 2009 Under the heading "European histories", the 22nd European Meeting of Cultural Journals explored the role of history and memory in forming new identities in a Europe in change. Read the first of the texts here, including the welcoming address and closing speech, the panel "Dilemma '89", and Timothy Snyder's remarkable keynote speech. [more]

29.05.2009
Timothy Snyder

Holocaust: The ignored reality

European histories Auschwitz and the Gulag are generally taken to be adequate or even final symbols of the evil of mass slaughter. But they are only the beginning of knowledge, a hint of the the true reckoning with the past still to come, writes historian Timothy Snyder. [ more ]

25.06.2009
Martin M. Simecka

Still not free

Why post-'89 history must go beyond self-diagnosis

Dilemma '89 The dissident generation of the 1970s and 1980s produced a body of work unprecedented in Czech history. Yet its monumentality stands in the way of an uncompromised interpretation of the communist past, argues Martin Simecka. [Lithuanian version added] [ more ]

29.05.2009
Mircea Vasilescu

European histories, Romanian fairytales

The Securitate archives and the public debate that never was

Dilemma '89 In Romania, the National Council for the Study of the Securitate Archives has been rendered toothless, while former communist functionaries, in new democratic guise, still purport to be protecting "national interest". [ more ]

29.05.2009

 

A look into the latest issues

Eurozine Review

So what's our problem?

Journals digest "Hungarian Quarterly" divines the future of the forint; "Index on Censorship" gives libel law a bad press; "Samtiden" doubts whether Norwegian police women are any freer with the hijab; "Le Monde diplomatique" (Berlin) applies the belt to Europe's cordon sanitaire; "Mittelweg 36" sees solidarity outgrow the nation; "Roots" says yes to Europe, but not at any cost; "Kulturos barai" does not dismiss the idea of a new Lithuanian Grand Duchy; "Le Monde diplomatique" (Oslo) calls the European elections a farce; "Rili" wants to keep the market out of universities; and "Fronesis" explains what 2°C means in an expertocracy. [ more ]

24.06.2009

Miklós Haraszti

In God's name

free speech A new UN proposal condemning "defamation of religion" cements oppressive governments' control of free speech while still sounding compatible with the advanced multiculturalism of liberal democracies, writes Miklós Haraszti. [ more ]

19.06.2009
Zoltán Farkas

Hungarian bubbles

Financial crisis Despite the horror-stories, Hungary's budget deficit at 3 per cent of GDP and its public debt at just above 70 per cent do not fare too badly in a global comparison. "So what's our problem?", asks Zoltán Farkas. [ more ]

18.06.2009
Theresa Wobbe

From nation-building to market-building

European integration Georg Simmel's concept of "society as unity of the diversity of forms and degrees of sociality" opens up a non-national perspective on society. What is the structure of the sociality of the EU and what are the social forms that allow for a self-stabilization of this system? [ more ]

23.06.2009
Charlotte Wiedemann

Myths of migration

Fortress Europe Although the EU cannot keep people from sticking to their West African traditions of mobility, EU member-states apply every possible means to achieve their aim: to prevent Africans from entering the EU, writes Charlotte Wiedemann. [ more ]

23.06.2009
 

Ralf Dahrendorf 1 May 1929 - 17 June 2009

Lord Dahrendorf Ralf Dahrendorf, sociologist, philosopher and politician, was a pillar of liberalism throughout the second half of the twentieth century. On 17 June, Dahrendorf passed away in Cologne. Only in May, he published in Merkur an article calling for a return to a "responsible capitalism".

Ralf Dahrendorf

After the crisis, back to a Protestant ethic?

financial crisis "After the financial crisis, back to a Protestant ethic?" Rather not, says Ralf Dahrendorf, but still: the reduced circumstances in which developed countries are finding themselves call for a return to a responsible, parsimonious capitalism. [ more ]

05.05.2009
 

Habermas at eighty

Seyla Benhabib

Cosmopolitanism and democracy

From Kant to Habermas

social philosophy Justice within and justice beyond borders is increasingly interconnected, writes Seyla Benhabib. In the cosmopolitanism of Jürgen Habermas, who turns eighty on 18 June, "the will to include the Other, regardless of national origin, has been present from the start". [ more ]

09.06.2009
Jürgen Habermas

The dialectic of secularization

cultural diversity The opposition between "multiculturalism" and "Enlightenment fundamentalism" is misconceived, argues Jürgen Habermas. "The universalist claim of the political Enlightenment does not contradict the particularist sensibilities of a correctly understood multiculturalism." [ more ]

15.04.2008

Eurozine news item: Blätter für deutsche und internationale Politik celebrates Jürgen Habermas' eightieth birthday on 18 June with an issue dedicated to the influential social philosopher. With contributions from Seyla Benhabib, Axel Honneth, Oskar Negt, Claus Offe, Albrecht Wellmer and others. [ more ]

 

behind the headlines: Iran

Ramin Jahanbegloo, Danny Postel

Ideas whose time has come

A conversation with Iranian philosopher Ramin Jahanbegloo

from the archives "For me as an Iranian philosopher, thinking differently is a form of going beyond the challenges of my daily life in Iran. It's an opening up to the world which goes hand in hand with the act of being free." [ more ]

06.10.2006
 
Andrei Plesu

The Left treading on the Right

debate "The Left is impudent, cheeky," writes Romanian philosopher Andrei Plesu in "Dilema veche". "It hides the Gulag behind a veil of 'historical necessity'." A provocative statement that has prompted a response from the Hungarian political scientist G.M. Tamás. [ more ]

16.06.2009

Read also: "Undoubtedly, leftwingers exist who can find excuses for the Soviet penal universe. But I don't regularly discuss matters with them", responds G.M. Tamás. "Quite honestly, you are too equidistant for my liking", writes Plesu in his concluding comment.

Toril Moi

"I am not a woman writer"

About women, literature and feminist theory today

feminist theory In the 1970s and 1980s, many women found the female in literature inspiring; but then Nathalie Sarraute snarled in an interview: "When I write I am neither man nor woman nor dog nor cat." Toril Moi finds that since then the discussion has gone nowhere. [ more ]

12.06.2009
Will Brady

Homecoming 2009

national myths "Whether you're a Scot, of Scottish descent, or simply love Scotland", Homecoming 2009 is for you. Yet scotophiles should make no mistake: the reinvented Highland culture that emerged in the 19th century was but a "tame accessory to British unionism". [ more ]

05.06.2009
Marek Seckar, Avraham B. Yehoshua

I always try to be an optimist

Interview with A. B. Yehoshua

interview "Host" talks to Israeli novelist A.B. Yehoshua, a Zionist but also an uncompromising critic of Israeli policy who advocates the return of East Jerusalem to the Palestinians: "History has taught us that everything is possible." [ more ]

09.06.2009
Ewa Hess, Hennric Jokeit

Neurocapitalism

science Neuroscience is the leading science of the twenty-first century, write Hennric Jokeit and Ewa Hess: "The basis of this claim is the maxim that all human behaviour is determined by the principles of the activities of neurons and the way they are organized in the brain." [ more ]

09.06.2009
 

20 years Tiananmen

Martin Hala

China through Zhuangzi's third eye

Twenty years after Tiananmen, the country is both different and same

20 years Tiananmen In the twenty years since Tiananmen, China has risen from the ashes by engaging with the West economically and by manufacturing domestic, "patriotic" consent. But as the economic crisis deepens, will the "rising dragon" continue to be immune to history? [ more ]

03.06.2009
Wolfgang Kraushaar

"The personality cult must be ended now!"

Paint-bombs at Tiananmen Square

20 years Tiananmen The outcome of the Tiananmen Square demonstrations in June 1989 is well known. Less so is the fate of the three young men who threw paint bombs at the portrait of Mao Tse-tung adorning the gate to the Forbidden City. Wolfgang Kraushaar chronicles the events of twenty years ago. [ more ]

07.08.2008
 

Background: European elections

Marc Clément

Social Europe: A long march?

European elections If social redistribution at European level should stand a chance, politicians must see beyond the purely national interests of their voters. Yet it is pointless to try to impose a European system for social protection until European citizens feel that they form part of the same community. [ more ]

09.04.2009
Rainer Bauböck

Who are the citizens of Europe?

European elections Current citizenship laws in the European Union vary dramatically. The tension between freedom of movement and national legislation on citizenship has the potential to create serious conflicts, writes Rainer Bauböck. [ more ]

23.12.2006

Read also: Stig Saeterbakken, "My heart belongs to Europe, therefore it is broken" and Marco Pautasso, "Ich wäre gerne European"

 
Dave Boothroyd

The ends of censorship

Free speech As one type of censorship comes to an end, a new one is in the making, writes cultural theorist Dave Boothroyd. The power wielded by corporations such as Network Solutions or YouTube produces a new form of subjectivity characterized by self-censorship. [ more ]

26.05.2009
Jan Koneffke

Lucky that Silvio exists!

Italian society's soft spot for Berlusconi

Italy "If I've been interested in political life of late, it's in order to go on working as a businessman," said Silvio Berlusconi in 1993. Since then, his motivations haven't changed, writes Jan Koneffke. Why don't the majority of Italians take offence at a politician who disregards democratic rules? [ more ]

26.05.2009
 

New eurozine focal point

Media landscapes: Central and eastern Europe

In focus Those in central and eastern Europe who in 1989 saw the media as the handmaiden of democracy have today become targets for new and subtler forms of censorship. A Eurozine focal point guest-edited by Judith Vidal-Hall illustrates how media autonomy in Europe's "newer democracies" is being inhibited by market forces, continuing political intervention and, in some countries, the influence of organized crime. [ more ]

Miklós Haraszti, Judith Vidal-Hall

A shifting media landscape

An interview with Miklós Haraszti

interview On the twentieth anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, Miklós Haraszti, the OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media, speaks to Judith Vidal-Hall about the shifting media landscape in the post-communist countries of central and eastern Europe. [ more ]

20.03.2009

Read also: All articles in the focal point Media landscapes: Central and eastern Europe

 

Correspondence

Rudi Dutschke, Gábor Révai

Correspondence 1966-1971

Correspondence "The entire population will next year have to put up with much 'sacrifice', in other words greater exploitation. 'Unfortunately', it is unlikely that a 'revolution' in the 'vulgar materialist' sense will be the result, but rather a protracted process of crisis". Rudi Dutschke to Gábor Révai, 1966. [ more ]

23.04.2009
János Mátyás Kovács, Gábor Révai

Dutschke's Hungarian friend

Gábor Révai in interview

Interview "I don't think that Dutschke would have become a politician. I can't imagine him as diplomat with a suit and tie, like Joschka Fischer". Gábor Révai, in the 1960s a young socialist in Hungary, on his former friend and father figure Rudi Dutschke. [ more ]

23.04.2009
 

debate

Debating denial

Controversy The publication of Slavenka Drakulic's Eurozine essay "Why I have not returned to Belgrade" in the Serbian newspaper "Politika" has triggered a debate on Serbia's responsibility for the wars in the former Yugoslavia. Eurozine has translated several of the comments to Drakulic's article by Serbian intellectuals and artists, including Ljuba Popovic, Uros Djuric, Milena Bogavac, Danica Vucenic, Natasha Markovic and Mirjana Miocinovic. In a concluding summary of the debate, Drakulic notes that opening up the topic of accountability for the the war crimes committed in former Yugoslavia is important for Serbian society. "Many citizens of both Serbia and Croatia seem to believe that if they all just shut up for long enough, the problem will disappear. But it won't." [ more ]

03.04.2009
 

behind the headlines

Otto Luchterhandt

Legal nihilism in action

The Yukos-Khodorkovsky trial in Moscow

Khodorkovsky trial The new trial of Mikhail Khodorkovsky will be an indicator of the seriousness of Dmitri Medvedev's stated intentions to clamp down on legal nihilism in Russia. Otto Luchterhandt provides a step-by-step account of the farce that led up to Khodorkovsky's conviction. [ more ]

04.04.2006

Read also: Boris Dubin, Lev Gudkov, The oligarch as public enemy (de)

 

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Darwin at 200

Jerry Coyne, Steve Jones, James Randerson, John von Wyhe

Dinner with Darwin

Darwin at 200 On the 200th anniversary of Darwin's birth and the 150th anniversary of "The Origin of Species", "New Humanist" editor Caspar Melville asks a selection of scientific commentators what they'd like to say to Darwin around the supper table. [Romanian version added] [ more ]

30.01.2009

Peter C Kjćrgaard

Western front

creationism The Council of Europe recently issued a resolution warning against the rise of creationism, based on a report that documented not only the existence of a strong Christian creationist lobby in Europe, but also the rise of Muslim creationism. Peter C. Kjćrgaard reports. [ more ]

20.05.2008
Juli Peretó

Intelligent design and the assault on science

intelligent design Biochemist Juli Peretó delivers a rebuke to the fallacies and dishonesties of the theory of intelligent design and examines the ambiguous attitude of the Catholic Church towards creationism. [ more ]

13.07.2006

Read also: David Attenborough, the great popularizer of evolutionary biology, in conversation with Laurie Taylor.

 

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Eurozine News Item

Gallery for Cultural Journals at the Alte Schmiede, Vienna

news item Cultural journals have always been a central part of the programme at the Alte Schmiede (Old Smithy) in Vienna. Now, a broad selection of Austrian and European cultural journals, among them numerous Eurozine partner journals, can be read in their Gallery for Cultural Journals that opened on 11 February at Schönlaterngasse 7 in Vienna. [ more ]

18.03.2008
 

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In Focus

Shared space, divided society

Focal point: Cultural diversity Migration is part of modern society, meaning more and more people of different ethnic, religious, and cultural backgrounds live together in Europe. The multitude of perspectives and experiences represents an enormous resource, but as cultural conflicts inherent in today's urban societies become visible, doubts are also raised about the value of diversity. In cooperation with the European Cultural Foundation, Eurozine presents a broad take on the issue that goes beyond the common dichotomy between multicultural segregation and the forceful assimilation of the "melting pot". [ more ]

 

The Eurozine network at a glance

 

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Focal points

European histories

http://www.eurozine.com/comp/focalpoints/eurohistories.html
For solidarity to exist in the enlarged EU, an historical awareness must be developed that includes the experiences of new members. [more]

Media landscapes: Central and eastern Europe

http://www.eurozine.com/comp/focalpoints/medialandscapes.html
How Media autonomy in Europe's "newer democracies" is being inhibited by market forces and continuing political intervention. [more]

The malady of infinite aspiration?

http://www.eurozine.com/comp/focalpoints/financialcrisis.html
Sound in principle or sick at heart? Articles on the financial crisis, compiled under Durkheim's memorable phrase, "the malady of infinite aspiration". [more]

Editor's choice

Laurent Mauriac, Pascal Riché
Online journalism: Transposition or transformation?

http://www.eurozine.com/articles/2009-05-22-mauriacriche-en.html
The editors of the pioneering French politics website explain their concept for bridging the gap between print and the Internet. [more]

Literature

Andrea Zlatar
Literary perspectives: Croatia
Post-traumatic stress disorder

http://www.eurozine.com/articles/2009-03-31-zlatar-en.html
Common to new Croatian writing is the postwar experience, with marginal characters exploring tensions between individual and society. [more]

Katharina Raabe
The read expanse

http://www.eurozine.com/articles/2009-04-16-raabe-de.html
In the twenty years since the fall of communism, literature has been lifting the fog settling over the historical expanses of eastern central Europe. [more]

Conferences

Eurozine emerged from an informal network dating back to 1983. Since that time, a variety of European cultural magazines have met once a year in European cities to exchange ideas and experiences. In the meantime, approximately 100 periodicals from almost every European country have become involved in these meetings.
European histories
The 22nd European Meeting of Cultural Journals
Vilnius, 8-11 May 2009

http://www.eurozine.com/comp/focalpoints/vilnius_european_histories.html
The 22nd European Meeting of Cultural Journals took place in Vilnius, Lithuania, 8 to 11 May 2009. Under the heading "European Histories", the Eurozine conference explored the role of history and memory in forming new identities in a Europe in change. [more]

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