Report by Michal Ďurčo, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Institute of History
From 19 to 21 September, European University Viadrina in Frankfurt (Oder) hosted the 11th Tensions of Europe (ToE) conference. The main organisers were The Viadrina Center of Polish and Ukrainian Studies and the European New School of Digital Studies, both of which are part of the university. The organising team in Frankfurt was headed by Falk Flade (European University Viadrina), who has been active in the Tensions of Europe network for several years and is also a member of the ToE Management Committee. The key topic of the conference was the word "Transformation". We speak of transformation as a change of fundamental character. The conference aimed to shed light on the technological, political, societal and environmental sides of these transformations in Europe and other regions in the past and present. Special attention was paid to the themes: (1) technologies as a driver of political, societal or environmental changes or as an obstacle, (2) technological "revolutions", transitions and "transformations" and their impact on politics, societies and the environment, (3) discourses on (technological) changes, especially concerning sustainability. Tensions of Europe have been connected to the history of technology from its very beginning. Technology can be a significant factor in enhancing, slowing down, or easing such transformations. There was a great interest in the conference's theme, which the many active participants confirmed. 132 researchers from Europe and beyond attended the conference on-site. The organisers also allowed combined sessions with online participants, 22 presentations were held online.
Traditionally, a summer school was held before the start of the conference. It was organised by ToE Early Career Scholars Network (ECS) members Ginevra Sanvitale (Trinity College Dublin), Michal Ďurčo (Slovak Academy of Sciences), Siegfried Evens (KU Leuven) and Tijana Rupcic (Central European University). 15 PhD students and young researchers attended the summer school. On Tuesday, 17 September, the summer school was opened by Aristotle Tympas (National and Kapodistrian University of Athens) with his lecture "East/West encounters in the history of technology: Tensions and transformations". Prof. Tympas stressed how important the history of technology is for understanding today's technology-based world. History of technology "is not just an addition to political history, it is crucial for understanding the political history." He elaborated on several issues, e.g., whether the East-West, North-South divide is useful for history and the limits and drawbacks of such an approach. Next on the agenda was the workshop "Your PhD in 3 minutes", where the summer school participants briefly presented their projects and research. Afterwards, they received comments on their projects from Prof. Tympas, Silvan Pollozek (European University Viadrina) and ECS members. In the last workshop on the first day, the participants were divided into three groups, and their task was to create a joint project to which they could all contribute with their expertise. The result were projects called "Historicising energy and environmental data", "Resources", and "Takes on (techno) justice". On the second day of the summer school, the participants visited the Futurium in Berlin, where they attended a workshop with Karena Kalmbach (Futurium) and Nora Thorade (Deutsches Technikmuseum). The workshop title was "Career Paths for early career STS/history of technology scholars". The possibilities for graduates to find employment in institutions such as museums or government agencies, NGOs, Think tanks etc. were discussed. The personal experience of both Kalmbach and Thorade is certainly a good inspiration. After the workshop, everyone had lunch together and went on a guided tour through the Futurium exhibition. It is impressive how innovatively the knowledge of historians and other disciplines can be processed and presented to the public. On the third day of the summer school, there were three lectures that were connected with the workshops. The first two activities, "Investigating Change in the History of Technology", were led by Anna Åberg (Chalmers University of Technology) and Hugo Pereira (NOVA University Lisbon). The summer school ended with a lecture by Valérie Schafer (C2DH, University of Luxembourg), "Envisioning the Future of the Past Together: Future Directions in the History of Technology", followed by a discussion. The lecture of prof. Schafer made a very motivating impression. The whole summer school was held in a traditionally positive atmosphere; the workshops and informal discussions with senior researchers were very beneficial. The participants received important feedback on their projects from more experienced colleagues; they also discussed their research among themselves and gained new contacts.
On the last day of the summer school, registration for the main conference was already underway. We must mention that the flood situation in Central Europe and the Oder River threatened the conference. The organisers closely followed the statements of the city representatives, who, fortunately, did not have to take any serious action in the end. The restrictions in Frankfurt did not affect the conference in any way. Only flood barriers had been erected. The only thing that did not occur was a boat trip on the Oder, which had been planned as one of the excursions because of the raised river level. The conference participants thus took part in a city tour or an excursion to the former model town of the German Democratic Republic, Eisenhüttenstadt.
Fortunately, the floods did not restrict traffic over the bridge to the Polish town of Słubice. On the first evening at the Auditorium Maximum of the Collegium Polonicum, a round table entitled "Co-Transformations in Central and Eastern Europe in Past and Present" was held here. The discussants were Miglė Bareikytė (European University Viadrina Frankfurt/Oder), Dagmara Jajeśniak-Quast (European University Viadrina Frankfurt/Oder), Valeria Korablyova (Charles University Prague) and Susann Worschech (European University Viadrina Frankfurt/Oder). The discussion was moderated by Jan-Hendrik Passoth (European University Viadrina Frankfurt/Oder). Each guest addressed transformation from a slightly different perspective but agreed on several issues. One of the crucial ideas from Dagmara Jajeśniak-Quast, for example, was that successful transformation is conditioned by a clear goal, which we often do not have today.
The conference programme was rich. On Friday and Saturday, six sessions were running simultaneously. The conference consisted of 39 sessions. Researchers looked at transformation from different perspectives and with different methods and methodology. Frequently repeated keywords were "sustainability", "resources", "environment", "energy", "artificial intelligence", "maintenance and repair", "industrialisation", "infrastructures", and "transport". We can only confirm that the topics reflected current research trends. Three sessions were devoted, for example, to the topic "Transitions and Transformations in Energy History. Turning Points in Energy History". The ToE energy history group organised the panel. Papers provided fresh interpretations or uncovered underexplored histories of energy. They questioned common assumptions and applied innovative approaches to studying energy technologies, socio-technical continuity, and change. Another three sessions focused on "Towards sustainability of global resources, fair trade and global justice? Experiences, challenges and narratives of transformation". Climate change, rising resource competition and global inequality pose tremendous challenges to contemporary societies around the globe and urgently require fundamental transformation processes to sustainable practices and international justice. These transformations require significant technological, institutional and cultural innovations. The panel aimed to enable a comparative discussion of local and global narratives about this transformation and the versatile roles of technology in it. One of the last sessions „Current and future transformations in the History of Technology. An unconventional panel of lightning talks“ had only short presentations. It was more of a brainstorming session, and the goal was to stimulate reactions and create a dynamic dialogue between the speakers and the audience.
The conference ended on Saturday with a keynote lecture by Helmuth Trischler (Deutsches Museum & Rachel Carson Center for Environment and Society) entitled "Writing Transformative Envirotech History in the Anthropocene: Provocations and Opportunities" (you may watch the recorded lecture, here). Prof. Trischler spoke about the origins of the Anthropocene debate around 2000, then presented it as a cultural concept. The main challenges (provocations) in the research of the "age of humans" are interdisciplinarity, i.e. the cooperation of the humanities and natural sciences; the discussion about the different perceptions of time, i.e. in the research of the Anthropocene, we need to analyse more extended periods than we do today (this discussion was opened by the book The History Manifesto). Another provocation is, for instance, the theory of technosphere reintroduced by the geoscientist Peter K. Haff. He argued that technologies can be, for some time, autonomous – for Trischler, as for the environmental historian, it is on us to prove it or not. What are the main opportunities for future research? We must leave the comfort zone of disciplinary containers - bring our expertise as historians into another discipline and be visible; we are responsible for getting our knowledge to the public. We should explore new temporalities and venture out to tell new narratives. Envirotech historians mostly talk about destruction, pollution, and how we hurt ourselves and nature. The key note lecturer suggested to tell positive stories, mobilise the principle of hope (Christoph Mauch's "Slow Hope"), and mobilise the positive forces of change we need to transform society. Historians should join the social-ecological transformation initiative and contribute to the science of healing the wounds inflicted by the Anthropocene. A discussion followed the keynote, and I guess that many scholars will be thinking about these “provocations and opportunities” after the end of the conference.
