Guest lecture on student strikes in Serbia by Filip Balunović

We kindly invite you to a guest lecture by Filip Balunović (University of Belgrade) concerning the ongoing student strikes in Serbia, including a presentation of his book on the roots of the movement in the post-socialist transition.

The lecture takes place on the 14th of May at 17:30 in room P209 at the main building of the Faculty of Arts.
Filip Balunović‘ recent book Revival of the Left in the Balkans explores how critical discursive breakthroughs by social movements in Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Croatia disrupted the post-socialist transitional status quo. Rather than focusing on structural openings or fleeting „windows of opportunity,“ the book frames the emergence of new left actors as a maturation of political consciousness—sparked by the growing exposure of parts of the population to critical, transformative ideas. While this study offers a valuable introduction to the post-socialist condition in the former Yugoslavia and the activist struggles that have shaped the region over the past 15 years, it is clear that the student movement that has been active in Serbia for the past six months represents something entirely new.

Over the past decade, Serbia has increasingly resembled a “movement society”—a concept referring to two intertwined trends: first, the widespread adoption of protest and non-institutional political action, and second, the normalization of these once-unconventional tactics as institutional avenues close off. This lecture focuses on Serbia’s present-day uprising, where students—ideologically diverse yet impressively united—are challenging an entrenched autocratic regime with a force that few could have predicted. Without violence, but with immense energy and defiant optimism, they are not only shaking the foundations of Vučić’s authoritarianism but also offering new lessons to political actors in the Balkans and beyond.