CfP Cluj / Kolozsvár April 16-18, 2026

*Interregnum here & now: post-communist collapse, planetary crisis, and emancipatory resolve*

Since the first Historical Materialism Cluj / Kolozsvár conference in 2024, the polycrisis which was its main theme has not subsided. Instead, it has stabilized and deepened into a thick interregnum. We still face multiple, overlapping crises—economic, social, ecological, and geopolitical—yet these crises neither move toward resolution nor de-escalate. They persist, consolidate, and sediment themselves as the new normal. Hence interregnum now, as an instant of historical dialectique à l’arrêt. In stark contrast to the optimistic, fluidly progressive narratives of liberal transition studies—that triumphant Weltanschauung of the post-communist 1990s, now dead and buried by waves of austerity, dispossession, and historical humiliation through neoimperial wars—, our present interregnum reveals history as suspended progression, in which the multiplicity and perdurance of crises testify that the old is undoubtedly dying, yet without engendering, nor even prefigurating, a new historical stage worthy of that name. But also interregnum here. In this, Eastern Europe’s own specificity comes to light, as the geographical embodiment of interregnum: as contested, and currently exploding, inter-world, caught between the twin monsters—simultaneously decaying yet vigorous—of western authoritarian neoliberalism and non-western neoliberal authoritarianism. Eastern Europe has been self-positioning, for decades now, as a land willing to accept economic exploitation for the sake of elusive economic growth, geopolitical servitude for the sake of fragile peace at home and complicity in brutal wars everywhere else, and as culturally and socially conservative and politically right-wing whenever convenient, fast to align itself with the changing winds of anti-progressivism, to draw on a rich and shameful history of local illiberalism and extremism, and ready to innovate. In short, interregnum as both permanentized and localized polycrisis. But as Gramsci famously said about such conjunctures: “the old is dying and the new cannot be born”—this is the time to party. This then is the time to organize, strategize, and mobilize with emancipatory resolve, the time for international convening and merciless problematizing. This then is the time for socialism and optimism. At this dramatic historical and geographical juncture, the organizing committee of the Historical Materialism Cluj 2026 conference invites proposals for the following streams:

Eastern Europe: Socialist Traditions and Contemporary Politics, Society & Economy

Political Economy, Labour, and Class

Socialist Feminism, the Work of Social Reproduction, Intersectional Struggles

Organizing on the Left: Strategy, Activism, Mobilization

State and Territory

Ecosocialism, Ecological Crisis, and Planetary Communism

Marxist Thought and Critical Theory Today

Literature, Film & Media: New Perspectives from the Left

From the Techno-Scientific Revolution to Big Tech

*Deadline for abstracts: February 8, 2026*

We invite submissions from all producers of knowledge, working within or outside institutions (researchers, students, educators, activists, organizers, cultural workers, artists, writers, translators, editors, journalists, etc.), in a variety of formats. Apart from papers and panels, which can be submitted via the online form, we warmly welcome proposals for roundtables, book launches, debates, workshops, etc. Please send a brief description (300 words) of your planned event, including bios of all participants to: historicalmaterialismcluj@gmail.com

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s.a. »Die alte Welt liegt im Sterben, die neue ist noch nicht geboren: Es ist die Zeit der Monster.« Treffender als mit Antonio Gramscis Worten kann man die heutige Zeit kaum beschreiben.