How postcommunism ends. Central European Culture Wars in the 2010s

Abstract

Whereas the year 1989 symbolizes the victory of globalization anduniversalistic values in Central Europe, 2015 may stand for the reaf-firmation of national sovereignty and cultural particularism. Dur-ing the refugee crisis of that year, humanitarianism was rejectedin the name of national identity, abstract moral principles werereplaced with concrete obligations to one's ascribed group andthe memory of a particular past superseded an open future for hu-mankind.

Christian heritage was invoked not in order to strengthenpan-human solidarity but rather for the opposite purpose: asa badge of one's identity - national or European - that had to bedefended against the threatening Muslim Othe

Keywords

• Postcommunism
• Central Europe
• Culture Wars
• 2010s
• liberalism