Doctoral Project
Sichel ohne Hammer: Revolution und Nationenbildung auf dem Balkan, 1900er–1930er Jahre — abgeschlossen
Sickle without a Hammer: Revolution and Nation-Building in the Balkans, 1900s–1930s — completed
My dissertation aims to re-examine the relationship of the Balkan communists to the national question through a focus on the institution of the Balkan Communist Federation, a section of the Communist International. I claim that the Balkan communists understood the national question as primarily a peasant question, and therefore a class issue. This was simultaneously a consequence of an attempt to learn from the Bolshevik experience and from the conditions at home, as the Balkan Marxists struggled to gain mass support in their predominantly peasant countries before the First World War. They believed that the peasants’ class grievances were often expressed through the language of national oppression, as the central governments showed little regard for both in their drive to construct nationhood and develop a domestic capitalist class. In the immediate postwar period, when the Balkan countries were still seemingly unstable and weak, the spread of the revolutionary wave southward seemed likely. To the communists, it seemed possible only through an alliance of workers, peasants, and the oppressed nations, based on the Bolshevik model. The internal disagreements on how to correctly adapt this model (and indeed, if the model is adaptable at all), created conflicting visions of what communism in the Balkans should look like. The transnational perspective gained from this broader level of analysis goes beyond the ethnocentric stories of individual national parties and helps understand that these proletarian internationalist parties developed through an intermixing of local and global factors.
Curriculum Vitae
Stefan Gužvica graduated from the Anglo-American University in Prague before receiving his MA degree at the Central European University in Budapest, where he wrote a thesis on the Communist Party of Yugoslavia during the Great Purge (1936–1939). As a PhD Candidate in South East European History, he was researching the transnational links within the Communist International during the Purge, under the supervision of Professor Ulf Brunnbauer.
Positions, Assignments and Memberships
Member of the Study Group "Language, Knowledge, Practices"
Awards
- Winner of the 2018 International Research Competition of the Estonian Institute of Historical Memory, November 2018 (awarded for the best master’s and doctoral dissertation)
- The Hanák Prize of the History Department at the Central European University, June 2018 (awarded for the best master’s thesis)
- Outstanding Academic Achievement award at the Central European University, June 2018 (awarded to students with the highest GPA in their respective program)
- Best Paper Award at the Empire and Nation: Undergraduate Conference of the Central European University, August 2015
- Merit-based scholarship at the Anglo-American University, 2013–2016
- Second Prize at the Internest 2012 project, June 2012
- "Club 27" award with a one-time Scholarship, awarded by Erste Bank Serbia, May 2012
Publications
Monographs
Komunistička partija Jugoslavije za vrijeme Velike čistke (1936–1940) [The Communist Party of Yugoslavia during the Great Purge (1936–1940)]. Zagreb: Srednja Europa, 2020 (to be published).
Before Tito: The Communist Party of Yugoslavia during the Great Purge, 1936–1940. Tallinn: University of Tallinn Press, 2020.
Frakcijski boji v komunistični partiji Jugoslavije med Veliko čistko 1936–1940 [Factional Struggles in the The Communist Party of Yugoslavia during the Great Purge 1936–1940]. Ljubljana: Založba Sophia, 2019.
Edited Books and Journal Issues
Zus. mit Vladimir Balj: Zbornik radova o nastanku, prošlosti i istorijskom razvoju grada Bačke Palanke [The Collection of works about the emergence, the past and the historical development of the city of Bačka Palanka]. Bačka Palanka: 2017 (in print).
Journal Articles and Book Chapters
"Kamilo Horvatin: Zaboravljeni kandidat za generalnog sekretara Komunističke partije Jugoslavije" ["Kamilo Horvatin: The Forgotten Candidate for General Secretary of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia"]. Historijski zbornik LXXII (1/2019): 139–164.
Retrospective Lessons and Generational Gaps: The Impact of Yugoslav Communist Émigrés in Interwar Czechoslovakia on the Postwar Yugoslav State. In: Acta Historiae, 2019 (in preparation).
The Spanish Inquisition: Factional Struggles among the Yugoslav Interbrigadistas. In: Istorija 20. veka, 1/2019 (in preparation).
Lenjin na Titovom stolu: Uticaj Oktobarske Revolucije na Jugoslaviju [= Lenin on Tito’s Desk: The Impact of the October Revolution on Yugoslavia]. In: Stvar 9 (Winter), 2017, pp. 90–97.
Books and Rifles: Political Activity of Yugoslav Communist Students in Prague 1927-1937 (Part II). In: Slovanský přehled/Slavonic Review (2), 2017, pp. 343–371.
Books and Rifles: Political Activity of Yugoslav Communist Students in Prague 1927-1937 (Part I). In: Slovanský přehled/Slavonic Review (1), 2017, pp. 65–103.
Palanka u Vojnoj Krajini [Palanka during the Military Frontier]. In: Vladimir Balj (ed.): Zbornik radova o nastanku, prošlosti i istorijskom razvoju grada Bačke Palanke [= The Collection of works about the emergence, the past and the historical development of the city of Bačka Palanka], Bačka Palanka 2017, pp. 17–24.
Bačka Palanka u Revoluciji 1848. godine [= Bačka Palanka in the Revolution of 1848]. In: Vladimir Balj (ed.): Zbornik radova o nastanku, prošlosti i istorijskom razvoju grada Bačke Palanke [= The Collection of works about the emergence, the past and the historical development of the city of Bačka Palanka], Bačka Palanka 2017, pp. 43–55.
Sokolsko društvo u Bačkoj Palanci [= The Sokol Society in Bačka Palanka]. In: Vladimir Balj (ed.): Zbornik radova o nastanku, prošlosti i istorijskom razvoju grada Bačke Palanke [= The Collection of works about the emergence, the past and the historical development of the city of Bačka Palanka], Bačka Palanka 2017, pp. 91–108.
Jevreji u Bačkoj Palanci [= The Jews in Bačka Palanka] In: Vladimir Balj (ed.): Zbornik radova o nastanku, prošlosti i istorijskom razvoju grada Bačke Palanke [= The Collection of works about the emergence, the past and the historical development of the city of Bačka Palanka], Bačka Palanka 2017, pp. 109–125.
The Fight for Yugoslavia: Left-wing Nationalism of Yugoslav Student Émigrés in Prague. In: Annual of Medieval Studies at CEU 22, 2016, pp. 228–237.
Sokolsko društvo u Bačkoj Palanci [= The Sokol Society in Bačka Palanka]. In: Sunčanik, časopis za kulturu, književnost i umetnost 35 (Spring-Winter), 2011, pp. 7–15.
Jevreji u Bačkoj Palanci [= The Jews in Bačka Palanka]. In: Izvornik 7, 2011, pp. 233–251.
Presentations (selected)
2018
"Communist Yugoslavism before Socialist Yugoslavia: Yugoslav Communists and the National Question, 1919-1941." Paper on the Student Panel "Yugoslavism 1918 – 2018: Experiences, Memories, Perspectives" at Central European University, Budapest (Hungary), 30 November 2018.
"A Legacy Erased: Germans in the Yugoslav Communist Movement." Paper at the Conference "Cosmopolitanism and (Post-) Imperial Space. German-speaking Networks in Eastern Europe (ca. 1850-1950)" at Technical University Dresden, Dresden (Germany), 18-20 July 2018.
"Model (Self-)Managers: A Comparative Analysis of Worker and Manager Biographies in a Yugoslav Factory Newspaper." Paper at the Conference "Workers beyond Socialist Glorification and Post-Socialist Disavowal: New Perspectives on Eastern European Labour History" at the Institute for Economic and Social History, University of Vienna, Vienna (Austria), 24-27 May 2018.
"Retrospective Lessons: The Impact of Yugoslav Communist Emigres in Interwar Czechoslovakia on the Postwar Yugoslav State" at the Conference "The Yugoslav Laboratory of Political Innovation" at the Science and Research Centre Koper, Institute of Historical Studies, Koper (Slovenia), 10-11 May 2018.
"Surviving the Soviet Thermidor: Statistical Analysis of the Yugoslav Victims of the Great Purge, 1936-1939." Paper at the BASEES Annual Conference 2018 of the British Association for Slavonic and East European Studies at Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge (United Kingdom), 13-15 April 2018.
2017
"Surviving the Soviet Thermidor: Statistical Analysis of the Yugoslav Victims of the Great Purge, 1936-1939." Paper at the Conference "Socijalizam na klupi" [= Socialism on the Bench] at the Centre for Cultural and Historical Research of Socialism at the Juraj Dobrila University, Pula (Croatia). 28-30 September 2017.
"Wretched of the Earth: The Impact of Socialist Yugoslavia on the Early Algerian State." Paper at the Conference "From Below and In Between – Narrating and Practicing the Cold War in South East Europe" at the Humboldt University, Berlin (Germany), 1-2 June 2017.
2015
"The Fight for Yugoslavia: Left-Wing and Right-Wing Nationalism of Yugoslav Student Émigrés in Prague." Paper at the Undergraduate Conference in History "Empire and Nation" at the Central European University, Budapest (Hungary), 6-9 August 2015.
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