IGSD News

Happy to report a preprint of my article 'Belarus: Five Years On' in the US Journal of Democratizatsiya - The Journal of Post-Soviet Democratisation, Special Forum with a focus on #Belarus then and now. I discuss whether the uprising of 2020 was just another short-lived revolt or if it marked the moment of irreversible #change in the history of #Belarus, which I call elsewhere a moment of people-forming (peoplehood). Belarus' active #civil #society demonstrates incredible #creativity in designing its own alternative futures, and this process is unstoppable.

On 11 February, Professor David Chandler kicked off the Sustainability Spotlight's first thematic event with his book talk on HOPE: Alternative Futures and Broken Worlds. The thematic event was part of the 'Radical Imaginaries - Radical Transformations' series of activities coordinated by Dr Marit Hammond (PAIS), Professors Graeme Macdonald (English) and Elena Korosteleva (IGSD). The discussion problematised the meaning of hope as an instrument of neoliberal thinking, to seek alternative understandings and develop radical imaginaries of alternative futures, The discussion will be continued by a workshop on 30 April, with external speakers and research network-building.

Carnegie Europe organised a higher-level discussion on the need for Europe to re-engage with Belarus. 10 experts, ranging from former Ambassadors, heads of think-tanks, and scholars, were invited to respond in 200 words to the question of engagement, and while there were nuances in responses, the general gist was a 'no' to engaging with dictators. This is reassuring, especially on the eve of the 4th anniversary of Russia's war against Ukraine: putting more pressure on dictators and being strategic in supporting opposition is the only way forward, as was argued by Professor Korosteleva.

I was delighted to give a keynote on my OUP book 'Complexity and Community in IR: Nurturing Resilience in Central Eurasia' to the KIU Competence Network of Interdisciplinary Ukrainian Studies, at Frankfurt (Order) in Berlin. While introducing some key concepts from the book - the VUCA-world, the Anthropocene, complexity-thinking and resilience - I drew a lot on my empirical work in the region, especially on Ukraine and Belarus, which was of interest and relevance to the PhD students (mostly from Ukraine) of this EU-funded network.

Thank you to Susann Worschecn, a Principle Coordinator of the network, for the invitation, and to the students- for so many questions you all had about resilience, Ukraine and the wider region.

The Horizon Europe SHAPEDEM project concludes with its final review conference on 20 January 2026, with the European Commission. The consortium, comprising 12 partners from Germany, Denmark, Belgium, Italy, Lebanon, Poland, Spain, Ukraine, and the UK, represented by the University of Warwick, presented its work to the panel of evaluators. The project focused on assessing the understanding and practices of democracy in the eastern and southern neighbourhoods, as well as the EU support for democracy as a composite stakeholder. Warwick was responsible for undertaking work - fieldwork and analysis - in the six countries in the eastern neighbourhood (WP2), drawing on the results of online surveys, focus groups, interviews, and roundtables. WP2 specific outputs included 8 published, submited and projected publications.

It has been three challenging years of research, including overcoming the obstacles of BREXIT, Russia's ongoing war against Ukraine, Belarus civil war, Gaza war, and increasing geopolitical complexity around the globe. Yet, the project went beyond all expectations and has achieved a lot, including critiquing and offering specific recommendations to the EU on how best to support democracy efforts in around the globe. Team Warwick – including Anastasiia Kudlenko and Aijan Sharshenova – is grateful to the EU, UKRI and especially to the consortium and its leadership – for the support, and inspiration. Thank you!