Neoliberalism Compared: Transformations in Latin America and Eastern Europe
International Conference, UNC Charlotte, September 8-9, 2023
This conference will bring together specialists from various disciplines to think comparatively about neoliberalism in Latin America and Eastern Europe. We aim to illuminate similarities and differences in the conception, implementation, and effect of neoliberalism in both regions, as well as consider cross fertilizations between them. Papers selected for inclusion either provide a comparative perspective or a case study from one of the two regions that is of interest to a broader audience.
The conference will include two keynote addresses:
Friday, September 8: Dr. Joanna Wawrzyniak, an associate professor of sociology and the founding director of the Center for Research on Social Memory at the University of Warsaw. Dr. Wawrzyniak has a long standing experience in oral history and museum research. Her current projects relate to the memories of socialism, neoliberal transformation, and deindustrialization in Poland as well as to cultural heritage, decolonization, and memory processes in Eastern Europe, Western Europe, Caucasus and South Asia. Recently she published Remembering the Neoliberal Turn: Economic Change and Collective Memory in Eastern Europe after 1989 (co-edited with Veronika Pehe, Routledge 2023), and Cuts: Oral History of Transformation (with Aleksandra Leyk, in Polish, Krytyka Polityczna 2020). Joanna is president elect of the international Memory Studies Association, and the vice-chair of the European COST Action Slow Memory: Transformative Practices for Times of Uneven and Accelerating Change.
Saturday, September 9: Dr. Amy C. Offner, an associate professor of history at the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Offner is the author of Sorting Out the Mixed Economy: The Rise and Fall of Welfare and Developmental States, which received prizes in the fields of Latin American history, international history, economic history, and political economy. Her research has been supported by institutions including the ACLS, SSRC, NEH, and the Library of Congress. She is currently writing a history of the unraveling of the employment relationship after 1945.
Drafts will be pre-circulated among the attendees to maximize audience participation and feedback. Selected papers will be featured in a special issue of The Latin Americanist, a peer-reviewed journal and the oldest English-language journal of Latin American Studies, published by UNC Press.
The conference will take place in hybrid format on September 8-9, 2023, in commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the advent of a neoliberal regime by means of the violent coup d’état in Chile. The face-to-face version will be at the Dubois Center in uptown Charlotte (32 E. 9th St., Charlotte 28202), room 501. The virtual version will be available at Zoom links provided to registered attendees one day prior to the meeting.
Registration is free of charge but requested of all attendees here. Please register by September 1, 2023.
Please see the program summary and the program brochure (PDF)
Organizing Committee:
Jill Massino, Associate Professor of History, UNC Charlotte, jmassino@charlotte.edu
Carmen Soliz, Associate Professor of History and Latin American Studies, UNC Charlotte, carmen.soliz@charlotte.edu
Jürgen Buchenau, Director of Capitalism Studies, UNC Charlotte, jbuchenau@charlotte.edu