Bogdan Iacob

is a researcher at the Institute of History (Bucharest) at the Romanian Academy. His work centres on the role of Eastern European experts (e.g., historians or doctors) in international organizations. He explores connections between state socialist countries and post-colonial spaces. In 2019, he co-authored 1989. A Global History of Eastern Europe with James Mark, Ljubica Spaskovska, and Tobias Rupprecht.

Articles

Cover for: The struggle over 1989

The struggle over 1989

The rise and contestation of eastern European populism

Eastern Europe is clearly part of a global populist wave, and is now part of the western right-wing populist imaginary as the bedrock for ‘pure’ European values. Only by looking at ‘1989’ from a new angle can we see how populist governments’ rejection of a ‘decadent’ and ‘imperialist’ West merely continues a communist stance, despite their strident anti-communist rhetoric.