{"id":37224,"date":"2025-09-19T14:52:20","date_gmt":"2025-09-19T12:52:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/institutfrancais.sk\/?post_type=podujatie&p=37224"},"modified":"2025-10-27T16:50:53","modified_gmt":"2025-10-27T15:50:53","slug":"medzinarodna-konferencia-after-industry","status":"publish","type":"podujatie","link":"https:\/\/institutfrancais.sk\/fr\/podujatie\/medzinarodna-konferencia-after-industry\/","title":{"rendered":"International Conference \/ After Industry"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Work Hard, Pay Hard. Is There Political Democracy Without Economic Democracy?<\/strong><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

29. – 30. October 2025<\/strong> Nov\u00e1 Dubnica
30. October 2025<\/strong> Tren\u010dianske Teplice<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Curator: Ivana Rumanov\u00e1<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Film curator: Barbora Nem\u010dekov\u00e1<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Production: Michaela Kacsiov\u00e1<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Organisator: Cluster EUNIC Bratislava*, FFA BUT – Faculty of Fine Arts Brno University of Technology
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Conference \u201cWork Hard, Pay Hard\u201d discusses the current social, economic, and political crises as they are embedded in concrete places. It considers the historical evolutions and transformations these places have undergone, specifically in relation to the post-socialist transition of the 1990s. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The event takes place in two cities in the Tren\u010d\u00edn region of Slovakia: Nov\u00e1 Dubnica and Tren\u010dianske Teplice. Being an example of an ideal SORELA city, Nov\u00e1 Dubnica was built on a green field in the 1950s to accommodate workers of a nearby arms factory. This it inspires a reflection on what happens with the ideal socialist city and its urbanism once the socialism is over. Tren\u010dianske Teplice, is a neighboring spa city that provided infrastructure for regeneration and care for hard-working bodies. However, after 1989, it was wildly privatized, leading to the gems of its Functionalist architecture and infrastructures of care becoming victims of real estate speculation. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u00ab\u00a0When asked \u201cWho owns the state enterprises?\u201d by Milton Friedman in the early 1990s during his road-trip around Central Europe, one of the present Hungarian elite economists answered: \u201cOkay, the Society as a whole.\u201d \u2013 \u201cNot the society, the people!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Friedman\u2019s remark is rooted in the primacy of individual ownership, individual freedom and of the free market. This perspective, however, needs to be grounded in the European context, where traditions of public ownership, social welfare, and collective responsibility have long shaped economic and political life. Friedman\u2019s answer can nevertheless be seen as emblematic of the broader political, economic, and cultural transformations. Alongside the important processes of political democratisation, these economic changes contributed to weakening pre-existing mechanisms of solidarity in the name of freedom to compete.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the same time, it is important to recognize that the corruption, political populism, and the weakening of democratic institutions are phenomena present both in Eastern and Western contexts. The separation of political and economic democracy is therefore not a regional problem but a global one.  Thus it creates an oportunity for new forms of mutual international  and intrasectional learning, exchange of experiences and experimenting with the solidarity networks. What new possibilities arise when we insist on \u00ab\u00a0there is such a thing as society\u00a0\u00bb and \u00ab\u00a0there are alternatives,\u00a0\u00bb and explore their potential reactualizations together? \u00a0\u00bb – Ivana Rumanova, curator<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n

Curatorial text<\/a><\/div>\n\n\n

The conference will facilitate an exchange on these topics across interconnected panels:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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  1. Economic and social consequences of post-1989 transformations<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n
  2. Industrial production and the legacy of modernism revisited<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n
  3. Economic democracy<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n
  4. Revitalisation of utopia<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    The event will not be restricted to strictly academic formats. It will bring together various formats: lectures, commented urbanistic walks, artist talks and interventions, bathing-experiences in thermal spa, cinema screenings. The aim is to combine the bodily and collective experiences with the academing knowledge-sharing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    * French Institute of Slovakia, Embassy of France in Slovakia, Goethe-Institut Bratislava, Czech Centre Bratislava, Embassy of Spain in Bratislava, Instituto Cervantes Bratislava, Austrian Cultural Forum Bratislava, Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in Bratislava, Polish Institute Bratislava, Contact Point \u2013 Wallonie-Bruxelles International, Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany in Bratislava, Embassy of the Hellenic Republic in Slovakia, Embassy of the Republic of Cyprus in Slovakia, Embassy of the Republic of Slovenia in Bratislava, Bulgarian Cultural Institute Bratislava, Hungarian Cultural Institute Bratislava, Italian Cultural Institute Bratislava, \u00d6sterreich Institut Bratislava, Representation of the European Commission in Slovakia.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    With the support of the EUNIC Cluster Fund and the Franco-German Cultural Fund.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Participants<\/strong> (alphabetical order): Deutsche Wohnen & Co. Enteignen (DE), Adam Galko (SK) & Denis Kozerawski (SK), Kristen Ghodsee (US), Petra Hlav\u00e1\u010dkov\u00e1 (CZ), Zuzana Jakalov\u00e1 (SK), Andrea Kalinov\u00e1 (SK), Lucas Kalmus (DE), Bahar Noorizadeh (Iran \/ Can), Katja Praznik (SI), Hannah Proctor (UK), Eva Rie\u010dansk\u00e1 & Peter Vittek (SK), Nicole Sabella (AT), Barbara Spechtl (AT), Peter Szalay (SK), Kuba Szreder (PL), S\u00e9bastien Thi\u00e9ry (FR), VARIA (NL), Ji\u0159\u00ed \u017d\u00e1k (CZ)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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    PROGRAM<\/a><\/div>\n\n
    REGISTRATION  FORM<\/a><\/div>\n\n
    About the speakers and their speech<\/a> | About the curators <\/a> | About the moderators <\/a> | About the movies <\/a><\/div>

    About the speakers and their speech<\/h3>