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After two Winter Schools, the first Spring School of the Cologne/Bonn Academy in Exile took place from 24 to 26 March 2025 at the Universities of Cologne and Bonn. Under the highly topical theme ‘Peace and Post-War Societies‘, nine of the CBA-Fellows discussed with other members and invited guests in thematic panels and discussion rounds.
In four interdisciplinary panels, the CBA-Fellows presented their current research on questions of international law in the 20th and 21st centuries, on Ukraine‘s role in a fast-changing Europe, on Ukraine‘s special position in the world structure, and on the role of the Russo-Ukrainian War as part of a new world order. Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Dr. h.c. Angelika Nußberger, Director of the Academy for European Human Rights Protection at the University of Cologne, opened the Spring School. Prof. Dr. Andreas Heinemann-Grüder, Senior Fellow at the Center for Advanced Security, Strategic and Integration Studies (CASSIS) at the University of Bonn, followed with a keynote speech on imperialism and war in the 21st century. In the first panel, CBA-Fellow Dr. Gleb Bogush addressed questions of pacifism and militarization in the context of international law against the backdrop of war. Dr. Sergei Akopov spoke on the phenomenology of rescue, addressing, among other things, the question of resistance, which Gleb Bogush had already raised in the previous lecture. The second panel was highly interdisciplinary and included an art-historical lecture by Dr. Kateryna Mikheienko, who shed light on the architecture of Kievan Rus. The cultural scientist Dr. Iryna Petrova spoke about the activities of Ukrainian cultural and scientific institutions during the war. Sociologist Dr. Daria Vystavkina expanded the discussion to include perspectives on the culture of remembrance and cultural memory. In Panel 3, which featured literary scholars and historians, Dr. Tatiana Khripachenko discussed the feminist, autofictional war diary of activist Victoria Amelina who died in 2023. Dr. Alena Pantiukhina took a comparative perspective and shed light on the post-war Soviet Union in the work of Friedrich Gorenstein. In panel 4, economist Dr. Halyna Matviienko ventured a look at the possibilities of green energy in a Ukrainian post-war economy and presented concepts of agroforestry and agrivoltaics in particular. The social scientist Dr. Galina Selivanova expanded the discussion to include aspects of transnational Russian repression in the rapidly changing world order.
Two keynote lectures completed the programme. On 24 March, the head of the Center for East European and International Studies (ZOiS) and Einstein Professor for Comparative Democracy and Authoritarianism Research at Humboldt University of Berlin, Prof. Dr. Gwendolyn Sasse, gave a lecture on ‘Society during and after War: Between Unity and Diversity‘ at the University of Cologne. This was followed on 25 March by the lecture ‘Writing War, (Re)Inventing Identity: Ukrainian Literature and Culture after 2014‘ by literary and cultural scholar Dr. Alexander Chertenko of Justus Liebig University Gießen at the University of Bonn. While Prof. Sasse presented the latest research results from the field of empirical social research on questions of diversity and unity within Ukrainian society in her lecture, Dr. Chertenko took a look at identity constructions in Ukrainian literature and culture since the beginning of the war in Eastern Ukraine (Donbas) in 2014 from the perspective of cultural studies.
In addition to personal statements by the participants, the final discussion on the possibilities of post-war societies also included thoughts on a peaceful future in Europe and the contribution that German politics as well as German academic culture can make to this.
The academic programme was complemented by a cultural programme on 26 March, during which the academy members visited Augustusburg Castle and the Max Ernst Museum in Brühl.
