Eurozine Editorial

Ever since the French Revolution, all modern regimes that have claimed to be democracies have rested on some form of people power. Can we really be so sure of the principle that divides the democratic ‘us’ from populist ‘them’?

One year on from the escalation of Russia’s invasion and there’s no sign of conflict resolution in Ukraine. While controversy abounds over political negotiations, constructive discussions about bearing witness to war and what of Ukraine’s cultural heritage should be preserved are forward thinking.

Is it possible to value time for oneself when barely able to make ends meet? Can fears of energy crises be soothed by ideas of fairer distribution? And can knowledge of more-than-human intelligence ease Anthropocene insecurity and feelings of isolation?

Very little information is available to the outside world about the situation for Ukrainians who have remained in the regions occupied by Russia since 24 February 2022. A new article in Eurozine provides a rare insight on life behind the Russian lines.

What’s in a word, a term, a meme, a full-blown narrative? At a moment of Russian unilateral ceasefire for the Orthodox Christmas, considered by many Ukrainians as hypocritical, Eurozine authors take an investigative look at the rhetoric of war and Russia’s victim narrative.

Eurozine has had a very difficult year and is still a way from finding long-term stability. But we’re rebuilding the team and even starting an exciting new youth project. Thankfully, you, our readers, have stuck with us through the thick of it.

The arts are a source from which Ukrainian society draws its sovereign will. A compendious new issue of ‘Osteuropa’ explores that proposal in depth.

Taking on imperial knowledge, cultural denial and dogmatic absolutism requires authors who can find their way around tricky narrative strategies, using their wits to juggle cultural preconceptions.

Eurozine welcomes its newest partner, Gwara Media, to the network with an article written on residency by the Ukrainian organisation’s editor-in-chief. Is media fatigue an inevitable fallout of war? Or can new angles be found that still reach tired audiences? What can history and reflection teach us about war reporting?

We moved office last week. We’ve had to contend with literal tons of physical memory from Eurozine’s almost forty-year history, and are yet to unpack it. It can either be a new beginning or a hibernation plan.

Excruciating pain and paralytic numbness alternate in an inhuman rhythm. As Ukrainian artists struggle to overcome exhausted tropes of warfare and martyrdom, others consider what it will take to bring the perpetrators to justice. But moral reckoning is an even more complicated business.

Unity is precious – good neighbours know this – but not if it undermines personal distinctions. When faced with autocracy, those defending diversity have plenty to address: post-colonial Russia, the heroization of wartime trauma, the return of Empire. And those fleeing war zones, scattered throughout Europe, are forced into finding collectivity within a growing diaspora.

It would have taken a miracle for Viktor Orbán to lose the election. Hungary is a fortified kleptocracy where the ruling party has captured the state and controls 80% of the media. It certainly didn’t help that the opposition’s campaign failed to deliver a post-illiberal vision.

Europe is facing a vast humanitarian crisis. This time, there is a good chance that governments will rise to the challenge. If only because it is all too clear that uncontrolled mass migration is one prong in Russia’s hybrid war against ‘the West’.

Clinging to his nukes, Putin will only lose power if his own turn on him. It’s hard to predict when, if ever, the leaders he has humiliated and threatened into submission will do the basic calculus and find that obeying the tyrant will inevitably cost way more than defiance.

Amidst the geopolitics, Ukraine lacks a sense of agency, observe two leading journalists of the Euromaidan generation. But cultivating confidence is difficult when journalism itself seems to have lost its bearings.