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Jana Starek is an Austrian historian, writer and translator. She lives in Vienna and works at the Wiesenthal Institute for Holocaust Studies. She gained her PhD at the University of Vienna where she studied history, Slavic and Chinese studies. She has lived in several countries, including China and the Czech Republic. She is a co-founder of the International Helsinki Federation…

Adrian Zandberg is a Polish computer scientist, politician and historian, who is best known as one of the leading figures behind the Polish leftist party, Razem. Adrian grew up in Germany, before returning to Poland to study. While studying, he worked on campaigns with the Polska Partia Socjalistyczna (Polish Socialist Party) and he also subsequently spent time as a chair…

Anna Sosnowska is a sociologist at the University of Warsaw’s Centre of American Studies. Her main research interests include migrations from Eastern Europe and other peripheral world regions to the United States, the social and ethnic history of New York City and Polish economic history and historiography. Anna is the author of Ciągłość i dwoistość. Migracje z Europy Wschodniej do…

Adam Leszczyński is a journalist and author, a member of the Krytyka Polityczna team and a co-founder of the news website, OKO.press. Adam works for the Polish daily, Gazeta Wyborcza, and has published several books, with his work twice being nominated for the national Beata Pawlak prize for writing on religious, cultural or other themes affecting society. His most recent…

Paweł Kowal is a Polish politician, academic and civil servant. Formerly, an elected representative of Prawo i Sprawiedliwość (Law and Justice), has also been an MEP for Polska jest Najważniejsza and Polska Razem and currently represents the economically liberal and socially conservative Poruzuminie in the European Parliament. His most prominent positions have been as the director of the Mazowiecki Instytut…

Please note that Pavel speaks in English, but that the audience & the moderator speak in Bulgarian and there is consecutive interpreting to and from Bulgarian and English. Pavel Barša speaks at The Red House on the post-communist transition in Central Europe and why the end of totalitarian regimes in the region has coincided with a rise in support for…

Gaspar Miklós Tamás – is a Hungarian Marxist philosopher and public intellectual. Trained as a philosopher and the author of numerous scholarly books and articles, his is a life that has been intimately bound up with the political history of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Born in Cluj, Romania, he presently lives in Budapest. From 1986 to 1988, he studied…

Martin C. Putna is a Czech literary historian. A graduate of Russian language and literature from Prague’s Charles University, he is now a professor at his alma mater. He lives in Prague and has published numerous books, including the acclaimed biography, Václav Havel. Duchovní portrét v rámu české kultury 20. století [Václav Havel. A Pyschological Portrait within the Framework of…

Olumine Popoola is a London-based Nigerian-German author, poet, performer and speaker, who presents internationally, often collaborating with musicians and other artists. She currently lectures creative writing at Goldsmiths College, University of London and her publications include short stories, critical essays and poetry. Her novella This Is Not About Sadness came out in 2010 and her play Also by Mail was…

Gilles Kepel is a French orientalist, sociologist and political scientist. Considered to be one of Europe’s eminent experts on Islam and the Arab world, he graduated from Paris’ Institute of Political Studies [IEP] with two PhDs in sociology and political science. Based in Paris, he is a senior member of the Institut Universitaire de France and works as a professor at the IEP.…

Sławomir Sierakowski is a Polish sociologist and political commentator. He is a founder and leader of Krytyka Polityczna [Political Critique], an Eastern European movement of liberal intellectuals, artists and activists, with branches in Germany, Ukraine and Russia. Sławomir is also the director of the Institute for Advanced Study in Warsaw and the president of the Stanislaw Brzozowski Association, overseeing its…

Jurko Prochasko is a Ukrainian essayist and translator. Born in Ivano-Frankivsk he is now based in Lviv and works at the Literary Institute of the Ukrainian Academy of Science. He has translated works by, among others, Franz Kafka, Heinrich von Kleist, Sigmund Freud, Robert Musil, Joseph Roth and Ingo Schulze. The international nature of his work has brought him to…