Description

We call for papers for a workshop on ‘Popular geopolitics in Russia and post-Soviet Eastern Europe’, to be held at University College London on 19-20 February 2015.

This workshop is intended to advance research into the societal or ‘popular’ dimension of geopolitics in Russia and post-Soviet Eastern Europe.

Eligible topics

Participants are invited to tackle the following interrelated questions:

• How do citizens (‘the public’) in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and other post-Soviet states perceive ‘the West’ and its constituent parts (the European Union, the USA and other individual countries), their regional neighbourhood and their place on the geopolitical map?

• How are geopolitical narratives sustained and/or challenged by domestic and transnational media, popular culture, government policies (including education and public diplomacy) and processes outside state control (such as travel and increasing internet use)?

• How do public attitudes reflect, contradict and/or shape official geopolitical rhetoric and policy choices?

• How might theoretical approaches and evidence from different disciplines and geographical areas be combined to further our understanding of such issues?

Contributions are invited from all relevant disciplines, particularly Political Science and International Relations, Geography, Anthropology, Sociology, Education and Media/Communication/Cultural Studies.

Guidelines for submission