Utopia and democracy workshop

27-28 Apr, 2023

Our workshop at CEU Democracy Institute will begin soon, on 27 April, 2023. You can also join online in Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@ceudemocracyinstitute730

This workshop aims to investigate the relationship of utopia and democracy, primarily in the 19th and 20th centuries, up to contemporary problems. We intend to enrich the intellectual history of the concept of democracy in drawing attention to its relationship with various forms of utopianism, either literary, political, philosophical or practical. We will investigate what elements of democratic societies have been endorsed and / or criticized by utopias, which we understand as social and political structures presented as alternatives to historical reality.

PROGRAM

Abstracts are available here

Day 1 (Apr 27)

10:00-11:15

Panel 1/ Introduction (Prof. László Kontler) and First Plenary

 Luisa Passerini (EUI): “Utopian versus utopian” (online)

11.15-11.45 Coffee break

11:45-13:15

Panel 2/ Origins of Democracy and Utopia

Myrthe Bartels (IAS CEU) What would an ancient democratic utopia have looked like?
Ferenc Huoranszki (CEU) Dreams of a Final Normative Theory: Why do they not search for Utopia?
Zoltán Balázs (Corvinus) The Time of Democracy

13:15-14:30 Lunch Break

14:30-16:00
Panel 3/ Democracy and Utopia between East and West

Zsolt Czigányik (CEU DI) Democracy and leadership in 19th century Hungarian utopias
Iva Dimovska (CEU DI) Barbarians and Geniuses, or the democratic potentials of a Balkan utopia
Ana Maria Spariosu (EUI) ‘‘The only real democracy is direct democracy’’: an exploration of the concept of democracy in two Italian contemporary utopian communities

Day 2 (Apr 28)

9:30-11:30
Panel 4/ Utopia, Democracy and Politics

Eglantina Remport (ELTE) Patrick Pearse, Democracy and the Irish Proclamation of Independence
András Bozóki (CEU) Ideas between Innovation and Imitation
Ondrej Slacalek (Prague) The end or a new beginning of anti-utopian democracy?
Zoltán Gábor Szűcs (ELTE): A utopia of fear? Three forms of utopian thinking in contemporary realist political theory

11:30-12:00 Coffee Break

12:00-13:30

Panel 5/ Modern and Contemporary Utopias

Daryna Koryagina (CEU) Towards the Brave New Communist World: utopian notions in socio-cultural life in Soviet Union in 1920s
Natalya Bekhta (IAS Tampere) On Democratic Futures and the Literary Imagination of Central Eastern Europe (online)
Emrah Atasoy (Warwick) Utopia, Dystopia, and Democratic Discourse in Contemporary Turkish Literature

13:30-14:30 Lunch Break

14:30 – Panel 6/ Second Plenary