An international conference

COSMOS – The Centre on Social Movement Studies

Faculty of Political and Social Sciences, Scuola Normale Superiore, Florence, Italy

November 13-14,  2025

(all practical information, deadlines, etc. at the end of this post)

Keynote speakers

Andrew Hoskins, Personal Chair of AI, Memory and War, University of Edinburgh

Jenny  Wüstenberg, Professor of History & Memory Studies, Nottingham Trent University

In recent years, the political landscape across the globe has witnessed a dramatic resurgence of authoritarian practices—even within long-standing democratic regimes. One of the most striking aspects of this transformation is the strategic deployment of collective memory: selective readings of the past, the glorification of particular historical narratives, and the silencing of others have become central tools in the reconfiguration of political legitimacy, national identity, knowledge regimes in policy-making, and other critical indigenous and cultural knowledge. These developments point to an urgent need to reconsider the political uses of memory—not as peripheral, but as central to the dynamics of contemporary governance and political contestations, which are overwhelmingly haunted by repressed memories and silenced voices of the past.

At the same time, grassroots mobilisations and social movements have emerged or re-emerged to challenge these authoritarian tendencies. In social movements, this dynamic relationship between memory and social movements has highlighted its symbolic power, specifically as a valuable resource for mobilisation and as the site of doing politics, where claims of the past and future(s) are contested in the present. Indeed,  many of these movements draw on past struggles, rework collective memories, and engage in “memory work” as a form of resistance, identity formation, and political claim-making. From anti-colonial memory politics to the recovery of silenced historical traumas, memory has become a battleground in current democratic crises.

This interdisciplinary conference seeks to explore the multifaceted relationship between memory and activism in the context of democratic backsliding, authoritarian resurgence, and shifting political imaginaries.   By bringing together scholars from memory studies, political science, sociology, history, cultural studies, legal studies, human rights studies, and adjacent fields, we aim to foster dialogue across disciplines and methodologies. We particularly welcome contributions that bridge theoretical frameworks with empirical research and that engage with diverse geographical contexts.

We invite paper proposals addressing (but not limited to) the following questions:

• How do we conceptualise the relationship between memory and democracy?
• In what ways do emotions shape the interplay between memory and politics?
• How is memory mobilised in both democratic and autocratic regimes? What are the comparative dynamics at play?
• What role does cultural production—films, literature, art, digital media—play in shaping collective memory?
• How does memory inform contemporary forms of political participation, protest, and resistance?
• What is the significance of generational memory transmission in shaping political identities and movements?
• How do narratives of the past contribute to the legitimisation of nationalism and exclusionary ideologies?
• In contexts where freedom of expression is restricted, how do movements struggle over the past as a site of resistance?
• What might future practices of remembering—especially in relation to war, trauma, and violence—look like in a digitally mediated world?
• How do we approach and interpret “difficult pasts,” including silenced, taboo, or traumatic histories?
• What are the possibilities and limits of democratising memory politics?
• What are the key methodological and theoretical challenges in studying memory in digital and contentious political environments?

We are especially interested in papers that explore these themes through innovative methodological approaches, including ethnographic work, archival research, digital methods, discourse analysis, visual, and narrative methods.

Submission and timeline 

If you wish to participate, please send an abstract of up to 300 words and a separate document about your research bio-note of up to 150 words (both in Word format).  Please include your full name and institutional affiliation/s.  All documents must be sent to (jamievee.bautista@sns.it) and (stefano.filippini@sns.it) by July 14, 2025.

There will be no conference registration fee, and participants are responsible for their own food, accommodation, and travel expenses. More information on the schedule of activities and the book of abstracts will be communicated in due course.

Submission deadline: July 14, 2025

Notification of outcome:  no later than August 15,  2025

Registration for speakers: no later than  August 31, 2025

Registration for non-speakers: no later than September 5, 2025

Venue

Faculty of Political and Social Sciences

Scuola Normale Superiore

5F Palazzo Strozzi, Piazza degli Strozzi, 50122  Florence, Italy

Organising committee

Jamievee Bautista, Scuola Normale Superiore

Donatella della Porta, Scuola Normale Superiore

Stefano Filippini, Scuola Normale Superiore

Lorenzo Zamponi, Scuola Normale Superiore

Further information

Jamievee Bautista (jamievee.bautista@sns.it)

Stefano Filippini (stefano.filippini@sns.it)