The Long Perestroika from Afar: Making Peripheries Central

The international workshop »The Long Perestroika from Afar: Making Peripheries Central« explores the ›long perestroika‹ from the 1980s to the 2000s by shifting attention away from the familiar centers of power and toward the peripheries. It is held from June 1 to 3, 2026 at Kloster Seeon, Bavaria and brings together research on local actors, marginalized groups, minorities, and regional initiatives across the socialist and postsocialist world. By focusing on perspectives from outside the main political and cultural centers, the workshop aims to reconsider perestroika as a broader and more uneven historical process whose dynamics continued well beyond the late Soviet period. This is the third and final meeting in the Long Perestroika conference series, following two previous workshops in Prague and Washington, DC.

The project »Perestroika from Below: Participation, Subjectivities, and Emotional Communities across ›the End of History‹, 1980–2000« is supported by the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon Europe research and innovation programme (grant agreement No 101054550, project acronym PerefromBelow21). Views and opinions expressed are those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Research Council Executive Agency. Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.

The conference is organised by Juliane Fürst (ZZF Potsdam/Central European University Vienna), Bradley Gorski (Georgetown University), Corinna Kuhr-Korolev (ZZF Potsdam), Veronika Pehe (Institute of Contemporary History, Czech Academy of Sciences) and Kelly Smith (Georgetown University).

You can find more information here and in the programme below.

Programme

MONDAY, JUNE 1

15:00 — Welcome

15:30–17:00
OUT OF CENTRE: MEDIA-MAKING IN AND ABOUT PERIPHERIES
Moderation: Kelly Smith (Georgetown University)

Andrii Pykalo (University of Toronto) — Kharkiv Amateur Television and Perestroika (1985–1991): Media Practices and Everyday Experiences of Change

Jānis Oga, Eva Eglāja-Kristsone (University of Latvia) — From “Cīņa” to “Neatkarīgā Cīņa”: Media Transformation, Marketization, and the Long Perestroika in Latvia

Sandra Plaskonova (Slovak Academy of Sciences) — Revolution from Below: The Birth of Slovakia’s Independent Culture

17:00–17:30 — Coffee Break

17:30–19:00
DISCUSSION PANEL: WAS THERE A PERESTROIKA FOR WOMEN?
Moderation: Dina Fainberg (University of London)

Timothy Nunan (University of Regensburg) — Contested Modernities: Azerbaijani Women’s Magazines and the Geopolitics of Gender and Sexuality, 1985–1997

Ella Rossman (GWZO, Leipzig) — Between Waves: Women’s Organising and Feminist Politics in the Long Perestroika

Liāna Ivete Žilde (Art Academy of Latvia) — Domestic Peripheries: Intimate Family Spaces during Perestroika in the Work of Latvian Photographers Ina Stūre and Inta Ruka

19:30 — Dinner

TUESDAY, JUNE 2

09:30–11:00
RELIGIOUS PRACTICES ON THE EDGE
Moderation: Veronika Pehe (Czech Academy of Sciences)

Zilola Khalilova (Centre of Islamic Civilization in Uzbekistan) — Islamic Learning under Late Socialism: Reformist Visions in Soviet Uzbekistan

Kateryna Budz (University of Edinburgh) — On the Path to Legalisation: The Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church during Perestroika

Abigail Scripka (ZZF Potsdam) — “Men Kommunistka Boldym”: How Long Perestroika Shaped the Lives of Baqsylar in Kazakhstan

11:00–11:30 — Coffee Break

11:30–13:00
EMPOWERMENT OF THE MARGINALS?
Moderation: Bradley Gorski (Georgetown University)

Maria Cristina Galmarini (William & Mary) — Dissenting Invalids: A Disability History of the Long Perestroika

Jennifer Ramme (University of Graz) — From Image to Action: Women, Queers, and Black & People of Colour Performing Alternatives in Unofficial Music Scenes during Late State Socialism in Poland

Jekatyerina Dunajeva (Corvinus University of Budapest) — Narrating Transformation: Roma Experiences of the Last Socialist Decade and Regime Change

13:00–14:45 — Lunch Break

14:45–16:45
PROFESSIONAL PERESTROIKAS: CONTINUITY AND RUPTURE AT THE WORKPLACE
Moderation: Irina Gordeeva (ZZF Potsdam)

Polina Gundarina (University of Leipzig) — Working with Socialist Fun: Organising Leisure in Soviet Doma kul’tury Before and After 1991

Elene Nabakhteveli (Ilia State University) — Lived Perestroika: Georgian Physicists at the Margin of the Soviet Scientific System

Iuliia Skubytska (ZZF Potsdam) — “Pioneer Organization is Outdated!”: Children Demanding Change Within Perestroika’s Framework

16:45–17:15 — Coffee Break

17:15–18:45
DISCUSSION PANEL: PERESTROIKA OF (FOR) THE SOUL?
Moderation: Juliane Fürst (ZZF Potsdam/CEU Wien)

Choi Chatterjee (California State University) — Vedanta in Late Perestroika and Post-Soviet Russia

Nadezhda Beliakova (University of Bielefeld) — Faith on the Margins: Reassembling Religious Minority Communities during Perestroika in Kazakhstan and the Volga Region

Anca Mândru (Lucian Blaga University of Sibiu) — Etatization of Time vs. Churchification of Space: Secular and Religious Ritual during the Long Perestroika

Alexandra Kolesnik (University of Bielefeld) — Singing Perestroika from the Margins: Vernacular Memorials to Viktor Tsoi and Emotional Communities Beyond the Centres in the 1990s

19:00 — Dinner

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 3

09:00–10:30
NEW COMMUNITIES – OLD VALUES
Moderation: Corinna Kuhr-Korolev (ZZF)

Alexandra Koroleva (Sciences Po Paris) — Akademgorodok in Novosibirsk and the Transformations of Local “Pamyat”: “Hidden” Actors, Commonalities and Conflicts in the 1980s

Marina Aptekman (Tufts University Boston) — “Comrades, Let’s Remember Afghan”: Veteran Unions of the Soviet–Afghan War in Peripheral Industrial Cities in the 1990s

Ivan Lavrentjev (University of Tartu) — Workers’ Struggle Against Restoration of Estonia’s Independence in the Late 1980s

10:30–11:00 — Coffee Break

11:00–12:30
DISCUSSION PANEL: COMMERCIALISATION AND TRANSNATIONALISM
Moderation: Alisa Lozhkina (ZZF Potsdam)

Siobhán Hearne (University of Manchester) — Perestroika and the Reconfiguration of Soviet Humanitarianism: The Soviet Red Cross between Reform and Disaster

Jules Siran (University of Geneva) — Foreign Students in Hungary during the Long Perestroika: Marketization of Student Mobility and Experiences of Exclusion (1980s–1990s)

Alexa von Winning (University of Tübingen) — Seeds of the Market: The Soros Foundation’s Support for Regional Economic Change in Belarus

Steven Harris (University of Mary Washington) — Air Perestroika: Aeroflot’s Breakup and the Rise of Russia’s Regional Airlines

12:30–14:00 — Lunch Break

14:00–15:30
PERESTROIKA IN THE VILLAGE
Moderation: Francis Kirk (ZZF Potsdam)

Kateryna Malaia (University of Utah / Kharkiv School of Architecture) — Perebudova (Ukr. for Perestroika) in Rural Homes

Violeta Davoliūtė (Vilnius University) — From the Long Thaw to the Long Perestroika: Justinas Marcinkevičius, Algirdas Brazauskas, and the Defense of the Post-Soviet Village

Nathalie Moine (Centre Marc Bloch) — State Farm in Ruins, Disrupted Lives: Perestroika in the Double Periphery of a Moldovan Village

15:30–16:00 — Coffee Break

16:00–17:30
DISCUSSION PANEL: PERESTROIKA AS DECOLONISATION?
Moderation: Franziska Davies (ZZF Potsdam)

Faruh Kuziev (Centre for Information Resilience) — Sharora Earthquake: A Soviet Pompeii. Natural Disasters, Decolonisation, and Nationalism in Tajikistan during the Long Perestroika

Asel Doolotkeldieva (University of Potsdam), Elmira Nogoibaeva (Research Center Esimde) — “Sudden” Activism During Perestroika in Kyrgyzstan: Logical Yet Surprising?

Stefanie Eisenhuth (ZZF Potsdam) — Rewriting the City: Competing Memories and the Cultural Politics of Transition in Lviv

Ksenia Robbe (University of Groningen / Goethe University Frankfurt) — The “Peripheral 1990s” and Their Slow Violence in Contemporary Russian Autofiction

Jeff Sahadeo (Carleton University) — Rivers as Terrains of Contest in Georgia’s Perestroika

19:00 — Dinner

Werkstattbericht, Bilderbingo und Podiumsgespräch zu Industrieregionen im Wandel 
7.Mai 2026, 16:30 Uhr, Kraftwerk Zschornewitz

Die Industriekultur lebt vom Ehrenamt und vom Austausch vor Ort. Das Leibniz-Lab für Umbrüche und Transformationen organisiert deshalb eine Diskussion von Ehrenämtler*innen, Auszubildenen und Studierenden zu industriekulturellem Erbe und Arbeitswelten in Anhalt-Bitterfeld-Wittenberg und im Ruhrgebiet. Im Anschluss daran sollen die Ergebnisse der Diskussion einer breiteren regionalen Öffentlichkeit vorgestellt werden. Dazu lädt das Leibnz-Lab ab 16:30 Uhr ins Kraftwerk Zschornewitz ein. 

Die Veranstaltung beginnt mit einem Bericht über die Diskussionen am Vormittag. Danach gibt es Zwipro, Oberkipper, Sabotagebalken und vieles mehr zu sehen. Zeigt das Titelbild eine Aufnahme aus Sachsen-Anhalt oder dem Ruhrgebiet? Raten Sie mit bei „Auf Schicht“ - einem Bilderbingo. Zum Abschluss gibt es ein Podiumsgespräch dazu, wie Industriekultur bewahrt und Zukunft gestaltet werden kann – mittendrin im einst leistungsstärksten Braunkohlekraftwerk der Welt. Mit dabei sind Ehrenämtler*innen, Wissenschaftlern der Leibniz- Gemeinschaft, Vertretern des Just Transition Center, Festival Osten & Forum Rathenau, u.v.a.

Die Veranstaltung ist eine Kooperation des Netzwerk Industriekultur Sachsen-Anhalt (NIK) und der Ferropolis Stiftung Industriekultur gGmH mit dem Leibniz-Lab „Umbrüche und Transformationen“ unter Beteiligung folgender Leibniz-Institute: Institut für Zeitgeschichte München-Berlin, Deutsches Bergbaumuseum Bochum/Leibniz Forschungsmuseum für Georessourcen, Leibniz-Zentrum für Zeithistorische Forschung Potsdam im Rahmen der Reihe „Moving Labs“ des Leibniz-Lab.

Mehr Infos zur Veranstaltung erhalten Sie auf der Website des Leibniz-Lab.