The main theme of European history in the 20th Century is the transition from empire to integration. Ukraine is the country whose experiences bring together European and global themes that allow us to see this process. 1917 is the year to begin – the anti-colonial revolution that was also a colonial revolution.
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Mining exclusive documents and interviews, celebrated journalist Paul Lendvai sketches the extraordinary rise of Orbán, an erstwhile anti-communist rebel turned populist autocrat.
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Europe has seen difficult and dark times before. The European construct remains in spite of all challenges a historical success which needs serious overhauling. Europe will come out of this crisis changed and hopefully stronger. But how and when–depends on statesmenship and civic initiatives – on the engagement to uphold the democratic values and institutions that have underpinned our freedom.
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Monthly Lecture by Isván Rév. István Rév is Professor of History and Political Science at the Central European University (CEU), Budapest and director of the Open Society Archives, one of the largest Cold War and human rights archives in the world.
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"Europa im Diskurs" mit dem Bischof der Evangelischen Kirche in Österreich Michael Bünker, der Politikwissenschaftlerin und Publizistin, Ulrike Guérot, der Friedensaktivistin und Theologin, Viola Raheb, Shalini Randeria, Rektorin IWM; Soziologin und Sozialanthropologin und Heide Schmidt, Österreichische Politikerin. Es modieriert: Renata Schmidtkunz, Leiterin der Ö1-Sendereihe „Im Gespräch“
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What we witness today is the unraveling of the post-Cold War international order, and both Russia and Turkey play a major role in this process. But what do Moscow and Ankara want? What new order do they dream of? Is the same dream shared by both? What defines their foreign policy – the nature of their political regimes, their imperial legacies, or their national interests?
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Österreichischer Bundespräsident a.D. Heinz Fischer und tschechischer Außenminister Lubomír Zaorálek unterzeichnen eine Finanzierungsvereinbarung für das Institut für die Wissenschaften vom Menschen (IWM).
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Timothy Snyder presents his latest publication "On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century" in conversation with Martin Pollack.
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It has become a commonplace that we live in a “post-truth” era. Is “post-truth” just another chapter in the long history of propaganda, or does it represent a new phenomenon?
A conversation with Ivan Krastev and Peter Pomerantsev, moderated by Angelina Kariakina.
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The bad news, on everybody’s lips, is that Europe – and more specifically the European Union – is in crisis, a crisis that could well prove to be the first step leading to its dissolution. With this in mind, we will try to come up with some good news, even though not unequivocally so: „crisis” is a constitutive concept of Europe!
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Europe is changing. Looking outwards, it has to operate increasingly as a global player; looking inwards, it needs to counter the centrifugal tendencies of some of its member states by strengthening regional cooperations. For a small country like Austria, the latter are crucial, but many neighbouring countries’ internal developments are putting a strain on their relations with Austria.
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Building on her longstanding and groundbreaking research on the “New Wars”, this lecture by Mary Kaldor explained that the difference between old and new wars is not empirical but conceptual. New wars have a different logic from old wars. Old wars (both inter-state wars and classic civil wars) can be analysed in Clausewitzean terms as a contest of wills. New wars are more like a social condition.
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From Heine’s aesthetic perspective we can best understand Friedrich Nietzsche’s “gay science” or joyful wisdom of philosophy and his pronouncement of “the death of God.”
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In this year’s Patočka Memorial Lecture, political theorist Chantal Mouffe examines the crucial role played in politics by what she calls ‘passions’ to refer to the common affects that are at stake in the construction of collective identities.
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The Chip on the Shoulder

Populist revolt within countries has its complement in a populist revolt against the liberal, rules-based international order, which is driven by three revisionist powers – China, Russia, Iran – that have rich histories as civilizations, empires that once extended well beyond their current size, a powerful sense of historic entitlement and of historic grievance. Today their quest for enlarged spheres of influence in East Asia, Eurasia, and West Asia (or the Middle East), respectively, has reinforced, and in turn been reinforced by, a politics of resentment inside many countries of Europe and the U.S. The chip on the shoulder politics of the moment are perhaps best exemplified by Russia, because of the steepness of its decline. Is this a passing phase or a new normal, in Russia and beyond?
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What, if anything, is the Difference between Fascism and Communism?

Do we really know the answer? Two opposing political projects have framed that question. One equates fascism and communism as totalitarianism; the other proffers a heroic portrayal of communism as anti-fascism.
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Lecture I: The Gift of Geopolitics: How Worlds are Made, and Unmade

Americans and Europeans long tended to think of geopolitics as a kind of primitivism to be transcended. The “escape from geopolitics” has both a right wing and a left wing incarnation: the former rooted in a fantasy of universal democracy and benign US-led hegemony, the latter, in a world order governed by supranational institutions and pooled sovereignty. What both share is a conviction that the rivalry of states, with conflicting interests and worldviews, produces conflict, insecurity and impoverishment. How can the inevitable interstate frictions be harnessed to push the major powers security and prosperity?
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This Monthly Lecture explores the history of the dream to “adjust the climate” in architecture, urban planning, and art. In order to understand the deeper reasons for anthropogenic climate change, we need to rethink the ways in which we have cut ourselves off the vagaries of the weather.
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“Europa im Diskurs” mit dem Soziologen Heinz Bude, Bundeskanzler Christian Kern, Roger Köppel, Nationalrat, Schweizerische Volkspartei (SVP), Jan-Werner Müller, Professor für Politikwissenschaft, Princeton University; IWM Visiting Fellow und Karin Priester, Politikwissenschafterin, Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster. Es moderiert: Alexandra Föderl-Schmid, Chefredakteurin DerStandard
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Michael Igantieff discusses in the Political Saon with Christian Ultsch und Ivan Vejvoda the question: How do we reconcile refugee’s rights of asylum with sovereign rights of border control and citizens’ rights to security?
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In this panel discussion James Kirchick (Fellow, Foreign Policy Initiative, Washington; correspondent, Daily Beast) discusses his latest publication "The End of Europe: Dictators, Demagogues, and the Coming Dark Age" with Ivan Vejvoda (Permanent Fellow, IWM).
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In this book presentation Luuk van Middelaar discusses the recent German edition of his book "A Passage to Europe", as well as current challenges facing the European Union.
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Hochrangig besetzte Debatte im Burgtheater mit der Journalistin Alison Smale, dem Politologen Ivan Krastev, Regisseur Robert Dornhelm, STANDARD -Chefredakteurin Alexandra Föderl-Schmid, dem republikanischen Trump-Kritiker Jim Kolbe und der Carnegie-Analystin Judy.
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Who has a claim to be included in a democratic political community? Answers to this question distinguish populists from democrats. In this talk Rainer Bauböck propose that the question needs to be broken up into three: Whose interests should be represented in democratic decisions? Whose rights ought to be protected by democratic governments? Who has a claim to citizenship and voting rights?
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