Moderators

Dr Bartosz Dziewanowski-Stefańczyk (European Network Remembrance and Solidarity, Institute of History of the Polish Academy of Sciences)

PhD, historian. He has worked for the Centre for Historical Research of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Berlin (2012–2016). Since 2016, a researcher and Deputy Head of the Academic Department at the Institute of European Network Remembrance and Solidarity and a researcher at the History Institute of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw. Fields of research: Polish–German relations, textbooks, Polish foreign politics of memory and cultural diplomacy. Recently published: ’To ”acquire the right place among the nations”. Cultural diplomacy and the New Order in East-Central Europe’, in Bartosz Dziewanowski-Stefańczyk, Jay Winter, Routledge (eds.), A New Europe, 1918–23: Instability, Innovation, Recovery, Routledge, forthcoming 2021; ‘Overcoming Conflicting Memories. History in the Polish–German Relations after 1989‘, in Jan Rydel, Stefan Troebst (eds.), History as an Instrument of Contemporary International Conflicts, Routledge, forthcoming 2021.

Gentiana Sula (Albanian Authority on Access to Information on the former State Security Service)

Chairwoman of the Albanian Authority on Access to Information on the former State Security Service. Representative of Albania on the ENRS Advisory Board and an observer member. She led the work which ensured access to files of the secret police during the dictatorship period, a law which was passed by Albanian parliament in spring 2015, and which enabled the establishment of the Authority she heads. Additionally, Ms Sula is a social activist and was an active participant of the Student Movement for Democracy in the 1990s. Her work also focused on advancing the country’s agenda of reckoning with its communist past, including improvement of the redressing mechanism for ex-political prisoners and their families, and recovering people who disappeared during the dictatorship. Fields of research: education, human rights, human resource development and transitional justice. She contributed to AIDSSH publications on the Sigurimi, the communist past and missing persons in the communist era.

Panelists

Dr Michael Žantovský (Vaclav Havel Library)

Amb. (ret), Czech diplomat, politician, author, journalist, lyricist and psychologist. He is a former Ambassador of the Czech Republic to the United Kingdom, Israel and the United States. Since September 2015, Director of the Vaclav Havel Library. Fields of interest: liberal democracy, human rights, freedom of information and geopolitics. Publications: Havel: A Life, London-New York, Atlantic Books, 2014; (with O. Kuzilek), Svoboda informací : svobodný přístup k informacím v právním řádu České republiky [Freedom of information in the Czech legal system], Prague, Linde, 2002.

Dr Łukasz Kamiński (University of Wrocław)

PhD, historian specializing in history of communism and anti-communist resistance. Assistant Professor at the University of Wrocław. From 2000 until 2016 at the Institute of National Remembrance, and 2011–2016 its president. Since 2017, he has been president of the Platform of European Memory and Conscience. Co-editor (with Grzegorz Waligóra) of a history of the Solidarity movement (in six volumes, 2010).

Prof. Florin Abraham (National University of Political Studies and Public Administration in Bucharest)

Associate Professor in Political Science at the Faculty of Communication of the National University of Political Science and Public Administration in Bucharest and a senior researcher at the National Institute for the Study of Totalitarianism. Florin Abraham has been Romania’s representative in the Steering Committee of the European Network Remembrance and Solidarity since 2014. Fields of research: European modern history, international relations and comparative politics. Recently published: 1989, Annus Mirabilis. Three Decades After: Desires, Achievements, Future, (ed.), Bucharest, Editura Comunicare.Ro, 2020; Romania since the Second World War: A Political, Social and Economic History, London-New York, Bloomsbury, 2017.

Paolo Cesarini (Former Senior Official at the European Commission)

Former senior European Commission official and expert in the field of EU Competition Law and Digital Single Market policies. Paolo Cesarini was previously Deputy Head of Unit for antitrust enforcement in the media sector (2002–2004) and for legislative projects and relations with Member States antitrust authorities (1997–2002). From 2004 until 2010, he was Head of antitrust policy in DG Competition and member of the Commission Taskforce on the Food Supply Chain in 2008 and 2009. From 2011 until 2016, he worked as Head of State Aid Policy for R&D, Innovation and Environment for DG Competition. His last position within the EU institutions was in DG Connect, where he worked from 2017 until 2020 as Head of media convergence and social media. He is also a lecturer at various universities. Fields of research: media innovation and regulation. He is the author of various contributions in the field of European and international law. Recently published: ’Regulating Big Tech to Counter Online Disinformation: Avoiding Pitfalls while Moving Forward’, MediaLaws, 1/2021, April 2021, p. 288–301; C. Leclercq, M. Sundermann and P. Cesarini, ‘Time to act against fake news‘, Euractive, 24 November 2020.