Lecture: European wars after the Second World War - Русский мир and Srpski svet

Vladimir Putin's speech of February 24, 2022, in which he justified the attack on Ukraine, is surprising with its numerous parallels with Serbian war propaganda from the 1990s. Also, the images coming from Ukraine were reminiscent of those familiar to us from those wars from 30 years ago: women, children, fleeing civilians. Overcrowded buses and trains, farewells, defenders, attackers, destroyed apartments and hospitals. Similar backdrops, similar faces. The war in Ukraine looked like the wars of the 1990s in the disintegrated Yugoslavia.
History is neither predictable nor repeating itself. But as a science, it helps us to recognize similar structures and phenomena from the past, not to give meaning to the present, but to understand it. Recognizing structures makes it easier for us to see what historical actors are able to achieve with and in them.

Armina Galijaš has been a Senior Scientist at the Centre for Southeast European Studies at the University of Graz since 2011. Her research interests and teaching activities focus on the contemporary history of Southeast Europe. She studied East and Southeast European History at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, where she also worked at the Institute for East and Southeast European History from 2003 to 2005 after graduating. From 2005 to 2011, she was a research assistant and lecturer at the Institute for East European History at the University of Vienna. She was a visiting fellow or visiting professor at the University of Zurich and the University of Zagreb.