Photo: Peter Župník / Central European Forum

CENTRAL EUROPEAN FORUM 2019:

PUBLIC AGAINST FEAR 

FOUR EVENINGS WITH CENTRAL EUROPEAN FORUM  2019

BRATISLAVA

FRIDAY 15 NOVEMBER

Umelka Gallery, Dostojevského rad 2, Bratislava

18:30 Opening address 

Bridget A. Brink (Her Excellency the Ambassador of the United States of America to Slovakia)

18:45 It was all supposed to be different 

It Was All Supposed To Be Different. Slovakia after 1945.  A guide for teachers and students to Slovak history, from the end of the war through the 1968 invasion to Mečiar’s fall.  Book launch and discussion with the book’s authors

Zuzana Gallayová (Slovakia) – Michal Bohuš (Slovakia) – Martin Posch (Slovakia) – Martin M. Šimečka (Slovakia)

The book will be launched by Jiřina Šiklová (Czech Republic)

19:00 Instead of self-glorification 

Jiřina Šiklová (Czech Republic)

19:10 New Forms of Fear 

Fear hasn’t disappeared, it has just changed. Various forms of fear of the future loom large all over Europe.  Fear has changed but so has courage.  What forms does it take in Great Britain, Hungary and Germany? What role does the tradition of defiance, of which 1989 is a potent symbol, play across Europe today?

Irene van der Linde (The Netherlands) – Timothy Garton Ash (Great Britain) – Marko Martin (Germany)

Moderator: Natalie Nougayrède (France)

SATURDAY 16 NOVEMBER

The Old Market Place, Velvet Revolution Square (SNP Square 25), Bratislava

18:30 30 years after

Do we need a new set of values? What was the aim of the 1989 street protests?  Thirty years ago the Czechs and Slovaks overcame fear.  What kinds of fear are we grappling with today? A dialogue about courage, fear, as well as hope and human dignity.

Zuzana Čaputová, President of the Slovak Republic – Ivan Havel (Czech Republic) 

Moderator: Michal Hvorecký (Slovakia)

19:20 The courage to be Europe 

The fear of populists and the kinds of fear populists feed on is the Achilles’ heel of European politics, the greatest weapon dictators can wield against Europe. How can we distinguish the real causes of fear from imaginary ones? And how can we counter them? 

Barbara Coudenhove-Kalergi (Austria) – László F. Földényi (Hungary) – Raphaël Glucksmann (France) – Zafer Şenocak (Germany)

Moderator: Michal Havran (Slovakia)

SUNDAY 17 NOVEMBER

The Old Market Place, Velvet Revolution Square (SNP Square 25), Bratislava

18:30 Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie: Honorary Central European 2019

A reading from her novel Americanah

Zuzana Fialová (Slovakia)

Laudatio

Mária Modrovich (Slovakia)

18:50 The power of the story 

Questions and Answers with the audience 

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (Nigeria)

Moderator: Chris Keulemans (The Netherlands)

20:30 Imagination against fear 

The reasons why the politics of fear has triumphed is something we keep discussing – it is the weightiest question there is.  We have seen many excellent analyses but the time has come to talk about what chances the public has of standing up against it in an effective way. The time has come to talk about political imagination, taking into account our nations’ experience of totalitarianism.

Masha Gessen (Russia/USA) – David Graeber (USA/Great Britain) – Ivan Krastev (Bulgaria)

Moderator: Martin M. Šimečka (Slovakia)

MONDAY 18 NOVEMBER

The Klarisky Church, Klariská Street

18:30 Fear and hope 

What does religion have to say about a future full of new threats and of rapidly accelerating change? What answers does it offer the anxiety that these threats arouse in us? At what point – if at all – can fear be transformed into hope? 

Tomáš Halík (Czech Republic)

Moderator: Michal Havran (Slovakia)