Aneta Mihaylova (Institute of Balkan Studies - Bulgarian Academy of Sciences – Bulgaria)

Political Culture and Cultural Politics in Central and South-East Europe (mid-19 th - 20 th century )

I’m a researcher at the Institute of Balkan Studies – Sofia, Department “The Balkans after World War II”. At present I’m involved in a joint research project between the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences and the British Academy, which started in October 2004 and its duration is planned for three years, but with the idea to be prolonged having in mind the importance of the issues it deals with.

The aim of the project “Political Culture and Cultural Politics in Central and South-East Europe (mid-19 th - 20 th century )” is to examine the development of political cultures in a range of different kinds of urban environment from two distinct regions: central Europe (which is defined in pragmatic terms as the territory of the German Confederation and Empire, the Habsburg Empire and their successor states) and south-eastern Europe, broadly speaking that part of the continent which experienced Ottoman rule at one time or another. The experience of urbanization varied considerably both within and between the two regions, and they have embraced a diversity of national and ethnic identity, confessional and political allegiances. The project will bring together scholars working on different subjects and different cities to compare research findings. Participants will look both at the national capitals and regional centers (such as Belgrade, Budapest, Prague, Sofia and Vienna) where political leaders met and literature and propaganda were produced, and it will also look at the development of political culture in smaller provincial towns over the century between the European revolutions of 1848 until the end of the Cold War. The time-period of the project is rather broad, encompassing a century and a half, but it gives the possibility to trace the development of a process from a comparative perspective in different political settings.

The focus of the project is the two principal points of contact between culture and politics: on the one hand what might be called political culture, and on the other hand what might be called cultural politics. The first category would include the cultural forms and media in which politics finds expression, or through which political ideas are transmitted (for example the press and news media; pamphlets and political literature; scholarship and academic research; propaganda, cartoons and other forms of comment or satire; slogans, symbols and uniforms; music and songs). The second category would cove ways in which culture in the broadest sense is political or has political purposes (for example, cultural and educational policies of national and local governments, the establishment and policies of cultural institutions, relations between government or political movements and the cultural industries; the political uses of popular culture (both commercial and ‘grass roots’, monuments and the staging of history of commemoration, the political activities or affiliations of intellectual or art movements; the political uses of sports and sporting events, and of leisure activities, including tourism. Participants in the project will examine the ways in which culture has been used to reinforce or undermine political authority, or has assisted the growth and development of political movements, and they will look at the ways in which culture and cultural events have been used explicitly by those with political authority to further political ends.

The comparative approach addresses a number of key research questions. For example, what patterns are discernible in the development of political culture and the politicization of culture during this period? What categories of the political uses of culture can be identified? What regional variations were there in the cultural and political impact of urbanization? How did the relationship between local, national and international politics impinge on cultural activity in a region whose history during this period was characterized by revolutionary upheaval, warfare and occupation, and where national identities and political cultures were re-invented several times over?

My particular academic interest and participation in this project is connected with the development of cultural policies in South-East Europe in the Cold War period.