Leslie Waters

University of Texas at El Paso (United States of America)

Dr. Leslie Waters is Associate Professor of History at the University of Texas at El Paso. She received her PhD from UCLA and specializes in twentieth century Central and Eastern European history with a research focus on moments of historical rupture. Her first book, Borders on the Move: Territorial Change and Ethnic Cleansing in the Hungarian Slovak Borderlands, 1938–1948 was published by Rochester University Press in 2020. Her current project is “Barcelona ’92: The New Europe at the Olympic Games,” which analyzes the role of the 1992 Summer Olympics in integrating post-communist Central and Eastern Europe into liberal international politics and the global capitalist economy.

Vladimir Šumanović

University of Zagreb (Croatia)

Vladimir Šumanović (Zagreb, 1986) is assistant professor at the Department of History on Faculty of Croatian Studies, University of Zagreb. He completed his classical gymnasium education in Zagreb. He has been working at the Faculty of Croatian Studies since 2017, teaching courses in national and world contemporary history. He obtained his doctorate in February 2019 with a thesis on Key Military-Political Events in Eastern Bosnia in 1942. His field of interest is Croatian contemporary history and the period of the World War II in the former Yugoslavia. He has published scientific papers on this topic in local and international historical journals and has participated in numerous academic conferences and several television programs. He is a co-author (with Vlatko Vukelić) of the book “Chetnik Units in the Service of the Independent State of Croatia,” published in 2021.

Vlatka Vukelić

University of Zagreb (Croatia)

Vlatka Vukelić (Sisak, 1979) is an Associate Professor at the Faculty of Croatian Studies, University of Zagreb. She works at the Department of History since 2004. where teaches at all levels of study: undergraduate, graduate, and doctoral. She was head of the Department of History and head of the doctoral program in history for many years. She has published three monographs and is also the editor of several collections. Her scientific papers are published in both local and international scientific journals. She participates in the organization and presentation of scientific and professional conferences, particularly focusing on elucidating historical controversies in 20th-century Croatian history. Her research addresses humanitarian disasters and social threats in the interwar period, as well as the broader social and political circumstances during World War II. She is involved in research and public awareness efforts regarding the consequences of the Homeland War and the number of child victims. She shows a strong scientific interest in communist crimes in Croatia, seeing it as crucial for the healthy development of young Croatian society and the shaping of future guidelines for Croatian historiography, and consequently, accurate and reliable educational curricula.

Luisa Tousova

Charles University (Czechia)

Luisa Tousova is an undergraduate student at Charles University Faculty of Humanities focused on post-communist democratisation processes, memory politics, and non-violence resistance movements. In the past year, she has presented her research at the University of Limerick AICUR conference on the othering of Roma citizens in the Czech Republic. Additionally, she has participated in curatorial work at a Czech Ministry of Culture-funded gallery, assisting in a project focused on amplifying Eastern European voices through an anti-colonial lens.

Claudiu-Lucian Topor

”Alexandru Ioan Cuza” University Iasi (Romania)

Claudiu-Lucian Topor (b. 1975) has been an associate professor at the Faculty of History at the ”Alexandru Ioan Cuza” University Iasi. His achievements in studying the human past reflect a long-lasting interest in the history of diplomacy, the history of wars and international relations. For several years he has documented the sociability of foreign diplomats present in Romania (ministers plenipotentiary, legation and consular staff, etc.) in the light of the experiences of social life. The reconstruction of German-Romanian relations was highlighted in the rest of his post-doctoral research. His research, reflecting the peaceful interstice of the cooperation with Germany, finally transgressed into the age of belligerence, 1916-1918. Author and editor of several volumes dedicated to German politics in Romania and in South-East Europe in the early 20th century.

Luboš Švec

Charles University (Czechia)

Luboš Švec is an associate professor of modern history at the Institute of International Studies, Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University. He studied history at Charles University and received his doctorate from the Institute of History of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic. He focuses on the history of relations between Czech society, the Baltic nations and other nations of Central and Eastern Europe, as well as on the processes of nation-building and statehood in this region. He is the author of the historical text of the book History of the Baltic Countries(Prague 1996); the monographs Czechoslovakia and the Baltic States 1918-1939; Perestroika, the Baltic Republics and Czechoslovakia 1988-1991(Prague 2013); and the Lithuanian expanded version Perestroika, Baltijos republikos ir Čehoslovakija 1988-1991 (Vilnius 2017).

Juhan Saharov

University of Tartu (Estonia)

Juhan Saharov is a Research Fellow (PhD) in Political Theory at the University of Tartu. He is specializing in the intellectual history of economic and political thought in the late Soviet Union and East-Central Europe, focusing on market socialism, the role of expertise in state socialism, and the transformation of ‘self-management’ and ‘sovereignty’ concepts in Soviet republics during perestroika. He has held visiting fellowships at Stanford University and the Imre Kertész Kolleg (University of Jena). Currently, he is the PI of the research project ‘From Experts to Revolutionaries’ (2025–2028) at the University of Tartu, which examines the transformation of the intelligentsia, its expertise and professional languages in the Baltics and East-Central Europe during the late Cold War. The project investigates how scholarly elites evolved from scientific experts into catalysts of political change, mapping Estonian experts’ networks in East-Central Europe during the late 1980s.

Rusnė Marija Poligaitė

Vilnius University (Lithuania)

Rusnė Marija Poligaitė is a graduate of the Bachelor’s program in Political Science at the Institute of International Relations and Political Science, Vilnius University (VU IIRPS), class of 2025, awarded a Magna Cum Laude diploma. Since autumn 2025, she has been enrolled in the Master’s program in Contemporary Politics. Her Bachelor’s thesis, which forms the basis for this conference proposal, was recognized as the best thesis in its cohort (field – Comparative Politics) and was awarded the Romualdas Ozolas Honorary Scholarship. During the 2023–2024 autumn semester, she studied at Sciences Po Lyon as part of the ERASMUS+ exchange program, where she earned a Certificate in Political Science. She is an active participant in academic conferences: in 2023 and 2024 she took part in the student session of the Annual Lithuanian Political Science Conference at VU IIRPS, and in 2025 she participated in the interdisciplinary student conference “Discoverers of Histories” organized by the Faculty of History, Vilnius University. During her undergraduate studies, she and her colleagues developed an oral history project titled “What Did It Mean to Be a Relative of an Anti-Soviet Resistance Participant During the Soviet Era?”, which was recognized as one of the best works in the course Anthropology of Soviet and Post-Soviet Societies and was published this year on the website of the Center for (Post)Soviet Memory Studies at VU IIRPS.

Tautvydas Petrauskas

Lithuanian Culture Research Institute (Lithuania)

Tautvydas Petrauskas, art historian, art critic. VDA BA in Art History and Curatorship (2021), MA in Art History and Theory (2023), PhD in Art History (from 2023). Currently working on a dissertation on the influence of the Lithuanian Sąjūdis movement and the changes at the beginning of Independence on the visual arts of the time. His research interests include post-war art and contemporary art of Lithuanian and Western culture, art theories, art criticism, cultural history and philosophy of the 20th century.

Vilija Navickaitė

Vilnius University (Lithuania)

Vilija Navickaitė is a PhD student at the Institute of International Relations and Political Science, Vilnius University. She is working on her dissertation “Our Hearts Demand Change!” Individual Mechanisms of Belarusian Self-Determination to (Not) Engage in Mass Protests in the Summer of 2020″ (supervisor Prof. Ainė Ramonaitė). Vilija works in development cooperation mainly in the Eastern Neighbourhood region on projects promoting democratisation and human rights based on art, culture and creative thinking methodologies.

Karel Müller

CEVRO University (Prague, Czechia)

Karel Müller focuses on civil society, democracy and the public sphere, post-communism and Europeanization. He is actively engaged in a number of NGOs, public policy groups and in municipal politics. He provides consultancy on civic involvement, public affairs and other related issues. Currently he works at the CEVRO University in Prague. He published articles in British Journal of Politics and IR, German Politics, International Political Science Review and others. His last book Active Borders in Europe was published in 2023 at Springer.

Gintautas Mažeikis

Vytautas Magnus University (Lithuania)

Gintautas Mažeikis is a prof., habil. dr. Philosopher.

Research on critical theory and the forms and functions of symbolic thinking.

Books:

• Kritinė teorija ir kultūros politika, VDU, 2023
• Critical Theory and Symbolic thinking, Palgrave, 2025

Anastasia Mamaeva

Sorbonne University (France) / French Research Center in Humanities and Social Sciences (CEFRES) (Czechia)

Anastasia Mamaeva is a PhD candidate at Sorbonne University and an associate researcher at the French Research Center in Humanities and Social Sciences (CEFRES) in Prague. Her dissertation explores references to “Western” pop cultures in Czechoslovak cinema during the long 1970s. As an artist-researcher and science communicator, her work engages with the aesthetics and broader material culture of production design in the genre cinemas of Czechoslovakia, Poland, Hungary, and the Soviet Union during late socialism. Selective publications: – “Making Films Fantastiques in 1970s Czechoslovakia: Juraj Herz’s Testimony,” Human Affairs: Postdisciplinary Humanities & Social Sciences Quarterly, De Gruyter, 2/2026 (upcoming) – “Le Secret d’un grand conteur (1971) et les transferts culturels franco-tchécoslovaques,” Romanistica Comeniana, 1/2024, Bratislava, Comenius University, 2024.

Dalia Kuizinienė

Vytautas Magnus University (Lithuania)

Dalia Kuizinienės academic degree: doctor of humanities, professor at the Department of Lithuanian Studies.

1. Lithuanian literary tradition and intertexts of western culture in Lithuanian e/migrant literature//(Inter)cultural dialogue and identity in Lithuanian literature (editors Irena Ragaišienė, Adelheid Rundholz)/2023. Göttingen : Brill, V&R unipress 2. Kuizinienė D. Lithuanian exilic and (e)migrant literature: ribos ir paribiai//Migration: conceptions and experiences. Compiled by Margarita Matulytė. Vilnius: Lithuanian National Art Museum, Lithuanian Culture Research Institute. 2022. 3. Kuizinienė D. (compiler and introductory article) Vytautas Osvaldas Virkau. Diary. 1944-1952. Vilnius: Versus. 2023. 263 p. ISBN -978-9955-829-49-2. All publications: https://www.vdu.lt/cris/entities/person/dalia-kuiziniene/publications

Viktorija Jonkutė

The Institute of Lithuanian Literature and Folklore (Lithuania)

Dr. Viktorija Jonkutė is a researcher at the Lithuanian Literature and Folklore Institute. She completed her joint doctoral studies in Literature at the Lithuanian Literature and Folklore Institute and Vilnius University, and in 2020 defended her PhD thesis on collective memory in the Lithuanian and Latvian press during the Revival period at the end of the 20th century. On the basis of this thesis she prepared and published a monograph (2024). She has held research fellowships at the University of Latvia and the University of Illinois at Chicago. She has contributed to several documentary films and joint Lithuanian-Latvian cultural and scientific projects. V. Jonkutė is a member of the Memory Studies Association  (The Netherlands) and the Association for the Advancement of Baltic Studies (USA). Read more: litbalt.weebly.com

Anete Jenča

Turaida Museum Reserve (Latvia)

Anete Jenča is a historian and theologian currently working as a Senior Specialist Historian at the Turaida Museum Reserve, a nationally protected cultural monument in Latvia, and her main research topic is spiritual heritage. In museum she created two exhibitions – “Black and White time: Lutheran churches during the Soviet occupation period” (2024) and “We Believed – We Are: Latvian Evangelical Lutheran Church during the Third Awakening (1987-1991)” (2025). Anete holds two master’s degrees from the University of Latvia: one in History (2012) and another in Theology (2021). At present, she is pursuing a doctoral degree in Theology and Religious Studies at the University of Latvia. Her research interests lie at the intersection of religious thought, historical memory, historical trauma in society, church history in totalitarian regimes and cultural heritage, particularly within the context of Latvian and European intellectual history. Anete has contributed to various academic projects and publications, including collaborative monographs and scholarly introductions to theological texts.

Wanda Jarząbek

Polish Academy of Sciences (Poland)

Wanda Jarząbek  is a professor Dr hab. In the years 2019-2022 vice-president of the Scientific Council of IPS PAS, 2017-19 chair of the Eastern Studies Department. She was among others a visiting professor at the Maison des sciences de l’homme in Paris, visiting scholar at Cold War International History Project, Washington; at the School of European, Russian and Eurasian Studies at G. Washington University in Washington, the German Historical Institute, Warsaw. She is researching Polish and international history in the 20th. century, the Cold War period, CSCE, human rights issue, Polish German relations, Soviet Bloc (Warsaw Pact). Now she is working on Polish foreign policy after 1989. Author of plenty articles on Cold War, CSCE, among other books (i.e.): Kłopotliwy sojusznik? PRL w politycznych strukturach Układu Warszawskiego 1980-1991 (A troublesome ally? PRL in the political structures of the Warsaw Pact 1980-1991), Warsaw 2022; – Polska Rzeczpospolita Ludowa wobec polityki wschodniej Republiki Federalnej Niemiec w latach 1966 – 1976. Wymiar dwustronny i międzynarodowy. (The People’s Republic of Poland vis-à-vis the eastern policy of the Federal Republic of Germany in 1966 – 1976. Bilateral and international dimensions),Warsaw 2011 – Polska wobec Konferencji Bezpieczeństwa i Współpracy w Europie. Plany i rzeczywistość 1966 – 1975r., (Poland vis-à-vis the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe. Plans and Reality , 1966 – 1975), Warsaw 2008.

Marta Haiduchok

Central European University (Vienna, Austria)

Marta Haiduchok is a PhD Candidate in Historical Studies at Central European University, Vienna. After finishing her BA (Ukrainian Catholic University) and MA (CEU) in History, she is now working on her doctoral project. Her primary research focuses on the contestatory political violence in East-Central Europe in the 1960s-1980s. She is interested in the topics of radicalism, extremism, and terrorism, and studies the theoretical and practical discourses on those in the context of the Eastern Bloc. She is also interested in history of political thought and intellectual history, as well as in the interdisciplinary overlap between the fields of history, sociology, and political science. Additionally, Marta is one of the authors of a collective volume, “Invisible University for Ukraine: Essays on Democracy at War” (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2024).

Laura Gheorghiu

Karl Franzens University Graz (Austria)

Laura Gheorghiu is a journalist for foreign policy, specialized in Central and Eastern Europe, Laura Gheorghiu holds a MA from Central European University with focus on Comparative Politics. Also enrolled in a PhD in Public Law at the Karl Franzens University Graz, which is frozen for now, on medical reasons. Her topic covers regional identity and types of pluralism in Transylvania. In time, she has published over 450 media articles as well as 30 scientific articles in several journals or books at home or abroad. Apart from politics in Central and Eastern Europe, her interest goes to topics as democratization, transitional justice, legal theory and interpretation.

Recent publications:

• “The Euro Currency – Symbol and Counter-symbol”, in Euro- the Nexus of Stability, ed. by E. Dijmarescu, Romanian Academy, 2024, pp. 321-366;
• “Ideological Hatred and the New Social Cleavages”, in “Warsaw East European Review: Ukraine at War. Why Did It Happen, When Will It End?”, no. 13/2024, pp. 67-89.

Jindřich Čeladín

Vytautas the Great War Museum (Lithuania)

Jindřich Čeladín, born 1978-07-28, Karviná, Czech Republic

Education:
1998-2004 Masaryk University in Brno, Faculty of Arts, History, Baltic Studies, General Linguistics, Czech Republic (Bc. and Mgr.)
2014-2022 Charles University in Prague, Faculty of Social Sciences, Modern History, Czech Republic (Ph.D.)

Work experience:
2006 – 2013 Blansko City Museum, Czech Republic
2014 – 2019 Prague City Museum, Czech Republic
2019 – 2022 Maironis Lithuanian Literature Museum, Kaunas, Lithuania
2022 – Vytautas the Great War Museum, Kaunas, Lithuania

Research Interests:
Lithuanian Historiography of the 19th Century, Lithuanian-Czech Relations, History of Statues and Monuments, Nationalism

Maxime Chervaux

French Institute of Geopolitics (Université Paris 8) (France)

Maxime Chervaux is a faculty lecturer at the French Institute of Geopolitics (Université Paris 8). The ongoing research project behind this proposed communication explores how electronic music scenes contribute to spatial, civic, and symbolic forms of resistance in contexts of conflict. He has been conducting fieldwork in Ukraine since 2022.

Dalia Bukelevičiūtė

Vilnius University (Lithuania)

Dalia Bukelevičiūtė is an Associate Professor at the Faculty of History of Vilnius University since 2013, lecturer at the faculty since 2004. Research interests: political situation of Central and Eastern European countries and their relations with Lithuania in 1918-1940, formation of security systems in Europe in the 1940s, Lithuania’s relations with Czechoslovakia/Czech Republic from 1989 to the present, Lithuania’s relations with China 1905-1945 and the Lithuanian communities in China, Lithuanian-Finnish cooperation in the period from 1990 to 2000, the development of the Lithuanian financial and tax system in 1918-1940. • Dalia Bukelevičiūtė, Mokesčių administravimo istorija 1918–1940, Vilnius: Tyto Alba, 2020. • Dalia Bukelevičiūtė, et al., Visada šalia: Valstybės vadovų apsauga XIII–XXI a., Vilnius: Mažoji leidykla, 2019. • Dalia Bukelevičiūtė, et al., Socialiniai pokyčiai Lietuvos valstybėje 1918–1940 metais, Vilnius: Vilniaus universitetas, 2016. • Dalia Bukelevičiūtė, et al., Lietuvos valstybės kontrolės istorija, Vilnius: Vilniaus universitetas, 2015. • Dalia Bukelevičiūtė, Lietuvos ir Čekoslovakijos dvišalių santykių dinamika 1918–1939 metais, Vilnius: Vilniaus universitetas, 2010.

Una Bergmane

University of Helsinki (Finland)

Una Bergmane is a Latvian historian and Academy Research Fellow at the University of Helsinki’s Aleksanteri Institute, specializing in the Soviet collapse, Baltic independence movements, and Cold War international relations. She earned her Ph.D. in History from Sciences Po Paris and has held fellowships at institutions including Yale University, Cornell University, and the London School of Economics.

David Ilmar Beecher

University of Tartu (Estonia)

David Ilmar Beecher is lecturer of Political Thought and Cultural History at Tartu’s Skytte Institute of Political Study. He earned his PhD in European and Russian History at the University of California Berkeley in 2014 with a dissertation on the University of Tartu as an observatory upon European and Russian relations across four centuries.  As a Fulbright Scholar, Visiting Professor of the Estonian Diaspora and lecturer he has a wide variety of courses in English and Estonian at Berkeley and Tartu on world history, human rights, nations and empires, Europe and Russia, political economy, and universities and dissidents. His most recent research interest has been the official Stalinist doctrine of the “Friendship of the Peoples”, and its role in various late Soviet movements for national independence and international solidarity, including the Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization.

Wojciech Bednarski

University of Wrocław (Poland)

Wojciech Bednarski, Ph.D., is a historian, lecturer at the University of Wrocław, and Program Manager at the Platform of European Memory and Conscience. His scholarly work focuses on modern history, the mechanisms of propaganda and media, and the history of totalitarian regimes, with particular attention to the role of historical narratives in shaping political and social structures. He is deeply engaged in public history and how collective memory influences contemporary societies. At the University of Wrocław, Dr. Bednarski teaches courses on the history and political system of the United States, as well as modern cultural and political history. He also manages educational initiatives that connect academic research with broader audiences.
In his role at the Platform of European Memory and Conscience, he oversees international projects and grants, coordinates cross-border research, and curates travelling exhibitions on 20th-century history, including European Gulag and Century of Martyrs. His work often bridges scholarship, education, and public engagement, with projects reaching audiences in over 20 countries. As both a researcher and practitioner, Dr. Bednarski is committed to fostering dialogue on historical justice, remembrance, and the defence of democratic values through research, education, and international cooperation.

Juozas Banionis

Genocide and Resistance Research Center of Lithuania (Lithuania)

Juozas Banionis is a historian, Doctor of Humanities, researcher of the activities of the Lithuanian diaspora in the West, from 1987 to 1993 he worked at the Institute of History of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences (since 1990 – the Institute of History of Lithuania), and since 1994 he has been working at the Centre for the Study of the Genocide and Resistance of the Lithuanian People. Since 1995 he has also taught at Vilnius Pedagogical University (2011-2018, Lithuanian University of Educational Sciences), professor (2015). Books (published by GRRCL): Lietuvos laisvės byla Vakaruose 1975-1990, (2002); Lietuva 1940-1990: okupuotos Lietuvos istorija, (et.al., 2005; anglų k. 2007); Lietuvos laisvinimas Vakaruose 1940-1975, (2010); Lietuvos laisvinimas Vakaruose po Helsinkio akto 1975-1994, (2017).