On December 5-6 iASK was represented by three colleagues at a major international conference in Moscow on Central Europe: 30 Years on the Path of Reforms. Problems, Challenges, Prospects organized by the Centre of Visegrad Studies of the Institute of Europe of the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS) in cooperation with the Embassy of the Czech Republic in Moscow and supported by the Russian Foundation for Basic Research.

The conference celebrated the 25th anniversary of the research project “Russia and Central Europe in New Geopolitical Realities” under the leadership of Ljubov Shishelina, a senior researcher at the Institute of Europe RAS.  This Institute was founded in 1987 and has become the major Russian center for Europe related academic research and a workshop for preparing policy proposals.

Presentations by Czech, Hungarian, Polish and Slovak scholars dealt with the economic, political, social factors of the collapse of the Soviet Bloc and the main issues in the life of the Visegrád Cooperation countries during the last three decades.

Ferenc Miszlivetz talked under the title ’ Re-Enchanting Europe – A New Beginning after Failure’, Jody Jensen examined the changing social models in East and Central Europe during the last thirty years, Attila Pók compared various international and Hungarian interpretations of the transition process in 1989-90. Our institute established successful, fruitful cooperation with this most important Russian research center dealing with the Visegrád countries, the participation of our colleagues in the work of this conference was part of this project.