VOLUNTAS: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations - VOLUNTAS Special Issue: Civic Activism and Social Movements in Central and Eastern Europe

VOLUNTAS is now accepting submissions for Special Issue: Civic Activism and Social Movements in Central and Eastern Europe: Theory-Building
and Theory-Bridging Perspectives in Civil Society Studies.

• Civic Activism and Social Movements in Central and Eastern Europe: Theory-Building and Theory-Bridging Perspectives in Civil Society Studies
  Closes 1 November 2024

Guest Editors:
Bojan Baća, University of Montenegro, Montenegro
Ágnes Gagyi, University of Gothenburg, Sweden
Kerstin Jacobsson, University of Gothenburg, Sweden

Over the past decade, there has been a surge in research examining “civic activism”, “activist citizenship”, “social engagement”, “social movements”, “protest politics”, and other forms of civic participation and engagement in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE). This body of work has effectively showcased the existence of citizen-led initiatives and grassroots movements beyond the realm of formal NGOs and their transactional relationships with the state. The previously dominant notion of a “weak postcommunist civil society” has been challenged by both qualitative and quantitative studies, which have demonstrated the vibrant civic life and the diverse arenas of civic engagement. One of the key collections that signaled this shift was Kerstin Jacobsson and Steven Saxonberg’s Beyond NGO-ization: The Development of Social Movements in Central and Eastern Europe, published more than a decade ago (Ashgate/Routledge, 2013). This edited volume highlighted the usefulness of cross-fertilizing third-sector research with studies of social movements and grassroots activism, providing a nuanced understanding of civil societies in CEE. Research done from this perspective throughout the last decade has demonstrated that this broader diversity of civic engagement is part and parcel of civil society. This existing research background supports della Porta’s (2020) recent call in Voluntas for greater interaction between civil society research and social movement studies.

Nevertheless, despite the growing body of literature that both empirically challenges and theoretically critiques the “weak postcommunist civil society” thesis, these contributions have yet to result in coherent theoretical claims that directly address and advance previous frameworks across the entire field of civil society studies. Such updates are increasingly necessary as current global reconfigurations – such as US–China geoeconomic rivalry, the post- pandemic crisis, new wars and geopolitical tensions, and increased state intervention through green transitions and industrial policies – are reshaping the context in which new forms of civic activism and social contention emerge. CEE is one of the regions at the crossroads of these developments. A renewed effort to reconsider theoretical frameworks, supported by updated empirical research on the region, is essential to advancing concepts originally rooted in the geopolitical era of postsocialist regime changes. This is crucial for understanding new developments in civil societies in CEE and for engaging them in global conversations. Consequently, this special issue aims not only to contribute to and extend empirical findings about CEE but also to advance theoretical perspectives based on experiences of historical transformations of civil societies in the region. Understood in this way, we argue, “postsocialist civil society” is a space of knowledge production with global relevance.

This special issue seeks to engage with the rapidly changing conditions and interpretative frameworks of civil society action in the region, which are being reshaped by new geopolitical tensions and political transformations, and corresponding shifts in the state–civil society relationship. In this context, large-scale street protests (such as Euromaidan or the recent protests in Georgia), environmental struggles (like opposition to new Asian battery factories in Hungary or Australian Rio Tinto’s lithium mine project in Serbia), feminist movements (such as the anti-abortion protests in Poland), and even conspiracist coalition-building across entrenched ethnonational divides (like in the former Yugoslav region) are taking on new political and geopolitical dimensions, influencing how the role of civil society is understood on the ground. The special issue seeks to address the growing visibility of CEE civil societies in a way that avoids blindly succumbing to the effects of new geopolitical narratives – whether by simply applying them or empirically disproving them. Instead, it conducts an analysis that seriously considers both detailed local empirical data and the transforming global political context that shapes their interpretation. It redefines their meaning not by uncovering the relational histories in which they are formed and applied. New concepts that emerge from this process aim to capture the dynamics of these relations.

Accordingly, the proposed special issue transcends the simplistic portrayal of CEE as merely a repository of empirical material or case studies for applying theories and concepts developed from the historical experiences of affluent Western democracies. It also avoids reducing CEE to an illustrative board for phenomena considered alien to Western political life. Instead, it presents scholarly work that draws on the unique and rich historical experiences of CEE as a source for knowledge-production and theory-building on civil society in its own right. We thus seek submissions that aim to contribute to theorization and conceptualization not only applicable within the region but also relevant to socio-political contexts beyond it. On the one hand, this involves providing empirical updates and theoretical insights necessary for reformulating our conceptual apparatus and analytical vocabulary to address new dynamics of civic engagement and social activism in the area between the state, market, and household sectors, as well as for revisiting previous theoretical frameworks’ blind spots and inadequacies in researching civil society in CEE. On the other hand, we are looking for scholarly work that harness the distinctive historical experiences of CEE to contribute to global civil society studies – not simply by “adding” specificities of civil society in CEE as an empirical expansion of the field, but by using them as a basis for engaging with global concepts.

We invite scholars from various disciplines (e.g., sociology, political science, geography, anthropology, history, political economy, social psychology) and interdisciplinary fields (e.g., social movement studies, civil society studies, citizenship studies, resistance studies, science and technology studies) to submit papers that use the empirical reality of civic activism and social movements in CEE to advance civil society studies as a field. Thus, we are looking for existing empirical work that focuses on and seeks to theorize the processes, practices, and relations that constitute civil society in the region while engaging in dialogue with global concepts.

Abstract submissions due: 1 November 2024 (300–500 words)
Full paper submissions due:1 March 2025 (8.000 words)
Please submit your abstracts to Bojan Baća at bojan.baca@gu.se. Any questions regarding the
special issue can be sent to the same email address.