16th International Conference on Unity and Plurality in Europe

We are pleased to inform you that International Forum Bosnia will be hosting the 16th International Conference on Unity and Plurality in Europe on the 2nd and 3rd of August, 2021. As with last year, because of the restrictions imposed by the ongoing Coronavirus situation, the conference will be online via the Zoom platform and will take place in somewhat reduced form. There will however still be an inaugural lecture, this year by leading historian of Bosnia and author of a forthcoming definitive two-volume history of Serbia, Prof. Marko Attila Hoare. This will be followed by a specially filmed interview with Latinka Perovic, the Doyenne of Serbian historians, which will be later carried in full by N1 Television. The conference will take the form of three panels, as usual, the first being on Religion and Public Life, the second on History, Ethnic Nationalism, and Fundamentalism, and the third on Genocide, Nation, and State.

As most of you are aware, International Forum Bosnia in a non-governmental organization that specialises in promoting critical thought and debate and the democratic social and political reconstruction of Bosnia and Herzegovina based upon an inclusive approach to the cultural and religious diversity of all its people. Founded in 1996 by a group of committed public intellectuals, academics, former politicians, writers, and patriots, from within Bosnia and Herzegovina, and friends from all around the region and the world, committed to our vision of an inclusive plural society, International Forum Bosnia is now in its 25th year of existence. Our two longest running programmes are the International Youth and Heritage Summer School held every year in Stolac and the International Conference on Unity and Plurality in Europe, both in their 16th year.

The Summer School started as a joint programme with the Luxembourg Scouts in 2004, when more than one hundred young volunteers converged on the town, which was one of the worst affected by the war of the 1990s, having suffered not just the near total physical destruction of the town''s historic core, but also the near total expulsion of its majority Muslim population. For a two week period, the Luxembourg Scouts and the young people of the town and from all around Bosnia worked to clear debris from the sites of damaged monuments and historic buildings, learn about religious tolerance and each others'' traditions, and kick-start the slow process of rebuilding the social fabric that the war and the immediate post-war years had done so much to damage, but had not been able to destroy fully. Over the years that followed, that initial camp has developed into a Summer School for undergraduate and graduate students, where they learn about the traditional arts and crafts involved in the vernacular and monumental architecture of Bosnia''s rich past, contribute through their own labour to ongoing reconstruction and conservation projects in the town and surrounding region, and have lectures and seminars on a range of associated topics, always with a focus on the contribution that culture can make to reconciliation and the fostering of plural communities.

The International Conference on Unity and Plurality in Europe has, until last year, always been run in parallel with the Summer School, in the nearby town of Mostar. It normally runs for 3-4 days, with a number of public lectures and discussion panels, artistic events, and book presentations, but its core is always the three panels at which Bosnian scholars from a range of disciplines, including history, sociology, philosophy, economics, theology, comparative religion, and literature, come together with peers from around the wider region and the world to present papers and discuss topics of importance for Bosnia and the region and how they fit into today''s world. The panels are closed to participants only and the normal complement is between 35 and 50, with about half coming from Bosnia and the remainder from other countries. Under more normal circumstances, some of the participants also hold seminars at the Summer School, while the attendees of the Summer School also attend the public lectures and panels, but not the closed sessions of the conference. The proceedings of the conferences are published in special volumes of our journal, Forum Bosnae.

Among the valuable results of the school and conference has been the development of a strong and resilient network of former participants and lecturers, both in Bosnia and around the world, who form a thriving community committed to the goals of International Forum Bosnia and the core values of Bosnian social, religious, and cultural pluralism. It is on this basis that International Forum Bosnia has developed its many other regular activities, including its annual international conferences on the Bosnian Oral Tradition and its place in World Culture, each autumn, and on Sarajevo and the World, each spring, its regular activities to mark UN World Interfaith Harmony Week in February of each year, and the many round tables, seminars, book presentations, and public lectures every year.

We look forward to seeing you at this year''s conference on Zoom and, God willing, at a reinstated conference in real-life in Mostar next year.

The holding of this year''s conference and summer school have been made possible thanks to the generous bequest of Johan Wolfs, a longstanding friend of International Forum Bosnia and former Dutch Ambassador to Sudan, Senegal, and the FYR of Macedonia, who sadly passed away in 2019. We would like to record our gratitude to Johan and to his wife, Ms Valerie Sluijter, the former Dutch Ambassador to Bosnia and Herzegovina, as well as to their family.

Please feel free to post notification of the conference on your social media and to send invitations to anyone you think might be interested. All speakers and invited participants are welcome to participate at all panels. We are therefore attaching links for each of the panels:

Topic: 16th International Conference on Unity and Plurality in Europe: First panel Religion and Public Life
Time: Aug 2, 2021 01:30 PM Sarajevo, Skopje, Zagreb
Join Zoom Meeting
https://us06web.zoom.us/j/89661539288?pwd=M055ZC9aKzY1MUthbFkxQ1NYbFFGUT09
Meeting ID: 896 6153 9288
Passcode: 514823

Topic: 16th International Conference on Unity and Plurality in Europe: Second and Third Panel
Time: Aug 3, 2021 01:30 PM Sarajevo, Skopje, Zagreb
Join Zoom Meeting
https://us06web.zoom.us/j/86577926363?pwd=S3B6NjgrWFR0V00rS3o1c01vOHhDdz09
Meeting ID: 865 7792 6363
Passcode: 550383