Agency versus/with Structure: On the Question of how Transformation is Enacted

International Joint Research Project Legacies of Communism?
Post‐Communist Europe from Stagnation to Reform, between Autocracy and Revolution
“Agency versus/with Structure: On the Question of how Transformation is Enacted”

Online-workshop organised by the Leibniz Centre for Contemporary History Potsdam (ZZF)

This workshop intends to focus on one of the central theoretical questions posed by our research: in a time of rapid political and ideological change yet substantial continuities in practice and structure what should be privileged in our interpretations: the agency of our historical actors or the customs and norms built up over decades, which guide and frame these actions. 
At the workshop ‘Agency versus/with Structure’ to be held digitally from 21 to 24 September 2020 we will discuss this research dilemma both from a theoretical as well as empirical perspective drawing on our own research. We are particularly interested in determining the spaces in which agency could take place and trump/change existing norms and structures and/or the conditions in which actors decide to maintain/conform to existing conditions, hence actively perpetuating entrenched structures. We are aware that in between the two poles there are a number of actions that could be classified as manipulation, subversion or partial acceptance.
A special focus should be placed on the agency of elites – as collectives or as individuals– and their ability to shape the very process of transformation. Additionally, we may reflect upon the mechanisms of interaction between agency and structure and the question what, if anything, was peculiar to them in the times of transformation to post-communism. 
 

Programme:

Monday, 21 September – Panel 1

Welcome and introduction: 9.30 – 10.00
Juliane Fürst and Jan C. Behrends (Potsdam)

Moderator: Balázs Apor (Dublin) 

Paper 1: 10.00 – 10.40    
Kateryna Chernii (Potsdam):
Establishment of Ukrainian Football Championship: Football Federation of Ukraine – between Soviet Legacies and Post-Soviet Challenges (1990-1996)  

Coffee Break    

Paper 2: 10.50 – 11.30    
Maren Francke (Potsdam): 
Coping with the Regime Change: Institutionalization Efforts in the Hungarian University Colleges Movement

Coffee Break    

Paper 3 11.40 – 12.20  
Astrid Hedin (Malmö): 
Social Networks as Structures and Agents in Post-Communist Transitions – the Reformation of the SED into the PDS
    

Tuesday 22 September – Panel 2

Moderator: Jan C. Behrends (Potsdam)

Paper 1: 10.00 – 10.40    
Corinna Kuhr-Korolev (Potsdam):
Soviet Museums in Times of Change (1986-2000)

Coffee Break    

Paper 2: 10.50 – 11.30    
Arzuu Sheranova (Budapest): 
‘Strongmen’ versus ‘Weak States’ in Central Asia: Evidence from the 2015 Parliamentary Election’s voting Preference in Rural Kyrgyzstan

Coffee Break    

Paper 3: 11.40 – 12.20    
Adam Hudek (Bratislava): 
The Afterlife of the Slovak National Communism in the 1990s 

Wednesday 23 September – Panel 3

Moderator: Juliane Fürst (Potsdam)

Paper 1: 16.00 – 16.40    
Natalia Otrishchenko (Lviv):
Connections and Continuance: Urban Planning Education in (Post-) Socialist Lviv

Coffee Break    

Paper 2: 16.50 – 17.30    
Sanja Ivanov (Toronto): 
Agency and Alltag. The Legacies of (Post-) Socialism in Contemporary Europe

Coffee Break    

Paper 3: 17.40 – 18.20    
Jovana Janinovic (UPJS Kosice, University of Valladolid):
Negotiating Urban Memories in Post-Yugoslav Space: Actors, Voices and Manipulations of Communist Legacies

Thursday 24 September – Panel 4

Moderator: tba

Paper 1: 10.00 – 10.40    
Ia Eradze (Berlin): 
The Georgian Central Bank on the Verge of Transition: New Clothes, Old Habits?

Coffee Break    

Paper 2: 10.50 – 11.30    
Michael Zok (Warsaw): 
Male Actors Deciding Female Reproduction. Reproductive Rights during Post-Communist Transition in Poland

Coffee Break    

11.40 – 12.20    
Final Discussion