At the EUROPAST International Conference The Past and Future of Public History (Vilnius, 9–11 October), representatives of the European Network Remembrance and Solidarity joined leading scholars and practitioners to reflect on how public history can address the moral, political, and cultural challenges of the 21st century.
Representing the European Network Remembrance and Solidarity (ENRS), Małgorzata Pakier and Monika Haber, PhD, joined scholars and practitioners from across Europe — including Jan Kubik, Barbara Törnquist-Plewa, Violeta Davoliūtė, and Dovilė Budrytė — to reflect on how public history can address the moral, political, and cultural challenges of the 21st century.
In their joint presentation, “Negotiating the Meanings of the 20th-Century European Past: The Role of the European Network Remembrance and Solidarity”, Pakier and Haber explored whether memory cultures shaped by Europe’s postwar experience still offer adequate frameworks for understanding today’s realities. They asked whether the “lessons” of the 20th century continue to provide guidance — or whether new languages, concepts, and interpretative tools are needed to make sense of the present.
The discussion highlighted a growing tension in contemporary public history: while references to the past remain central to political and social debates, historical analogies are increasingly instrumentalised, simplified, or emptied of meaning. In this context, public history faces the challenge of remaining both relevant and responsible — resisting easy narratives while fostering critical reflection and dialogue.
Drawing on ENRS experience, the speakers presented how the Network creates spaces for such dialogue through initiatives such as Genealogies of Memory, In Between?, and Sound in the Silence, as well as through educational platforms like Hi-Story Lessons. These projects bring together diverse voices and perspectives, encouraging participants to question inherited narratives, reinterpret the past, and connect historical experience with contemporary concerns.
As Małgorzata Pakier noted during the discussion, memory has always functioned both as a moral compass and as a battlefield. Today, when references to history are frequently mobilised in political conflicts, public history must reclaim its role as a space for critical engagement rather than ready-made answers.
ENRS would like to sincerely thank the organisers — the Institute of International Relations and Political Science at Vilnius University and the EUROPAST team — for the invitation and for creating a forum for such an inspiring and timely debate on the future of public history.