COURAGE! PART 4

Tessa Szyszkowitz in conversation with Leonid Volkov

HOW TO FIGHT AGAINST PUTIN AND HIS WAR FROM EXILE

After Alexej Navalny’s death in a Russian prison camp in 2024 his Anti Corruption Foundation continues its work against dictatorship from outside the country.                

Their political lives are closely intertwined: Leonid Volkov was the chief of staff to the leader of the Russian opposition Alexej Navalny. When Navalny died in February 2024 his wife Yulia took over his role to speak up against Putin’s dictatorship. Her right hand man, again, is Leonid Volkov, who already managed Navalny’s political campaigns at the beginning of the 2010s.
Almost four years after the war against Ukraine started Volkov will explain how the Anti-Corruption Foundation continues to influence the Russian public from abroad. How do you conduct opinion polls about Putin’s popularity or the support for his war without endangering the Russian respondents? And: How many Russians really support Putin? Spoiler: 10 Percent. 30 Percent are actively against him and the vast majority watches silently until this regime falls. Leonid Volkov will explain the Russian mindset, the scenario for a possible end of Putin’s war and his regime.

Leonid Volkov is the political director of the Anti-Corruption Foundation, the leading organisation of Russian anti-Putin and anti-war resistance movement, founded by the late Alexei Navalny. Volkov also serves as chief of staff for Yulia Navalnaya, who took over the leadership after her husband was murdered by Vladimir Putin. He was campaign manager and chief of staff for Navalny’s Moscow mayoral campaign of 2013 and presidential campaign of 2018. Since 2019 he has to reside outside of Russia. There are 11 politically motivated criminal cases against him initiated by Putin’s regime; he’s sentenced to 18 years behind bar in absentia.

Tessa Szyszkowitz, is an award winning Austrian journalist and author living in London. She writes regularly for Falter, Tagesspiegel and NZZ am Sonntag. Her last book so far was “Echte Engländer – Britain and Brexit” (2018). She is a curator at Kreiskyforum and Distinguished Fellow of Rusi, the Royal United Services Institute. She received a FPA Media Award for Best Story of the Year 2025.

We are not our regimes.

De-escalation, Peace and Freedom in the Middle East: Iranian and Israeli Voices.

Archenemies. This is the term commonly used to describe the relationship between Israel and Iran. An enmity that will ultimately lead to war, as it did in June 2025.

Was war between these two states something that had to happen?

No, said a group of Iranian and Israeli scholars and artists, that were worrying together since November 2024 about the hostile relationship of their respective countries.

Three days after the breakout of the 12-day-war they published a statement in Hebrew, Farsi and English, urging for a ceasefire and diplomacy. And they stated: “We refuse to accept the inevitability of violent conflict as the only way forward between our nations, Israel and Iran, or their positioning as eternal arch-enemies.” Within a few days over 2400 people signed the open letter, from within Iran and Israel, along with many intellectuals from the Iranian diaspora.

This represents a significant milestone in Israeli–Iranian relations, as it is the first time that intellectuals, artists, academics, filmmakers, and human rights activists have attempted to establish dialogue between two nations whose populations have been pitted against each other for decades.

What are the chances and the challenges of this ambitious project? Human rights lawyer Mehrangiz Kar, editor of the Palestine – Israel Journal Susie Becher, publisher Hillel Schenker, political scientist Mehrzad Boroujerdi and the two historians Lior Sternfeld and Touraj Atabaki will join journalist Solmaz Khorsand February 12 on a conversation about crossing a supposedly insurmountable ditch.

Touraj Atabaki, Emeritus Professor by special appointment of Social History of the Middle East and Central Asia

Susie Becher, Communications Director of the Policy Working Group and Managing Editor of the Palestine – Israel Journal

Mehrzad Boroujerdi, Vice Provost and Dean of College of Arts, Sciences, and Education at Missouri University of Science and Technology

Mehrangiz Kar, Iranian human rights lawyer and an internationally recognized writer

Hillel Schenker, Israeli journalist and co-editor of the Palestine-Israel Journal

Lior Sternfeld, Professor of history and Jewish Studies and Social Historian of the modern Middle East

Moderator:
Solmaz Khorsand, independent journalist, podcaster, and award-winning author focusing on socio-political issues

VICTOR ADLER
Was sagt uns dieser Baumeister der Republik Österreich heute?

Screening und Diskussion

Victor Adler war einer der bedeutendsten „Baumeister der Republik“, porträtiert in einer neuen ORF-III-Dokumentation der gleichnamigen Reihe. Vor der ORF-III Erstausstrahlung veranstaltet das Bruno Kreisky Forum am Montag, den 16. Februar ein pre-screening, sowie eine hochkarätige Diskussionsrunde zu Victor Adler, den Begründer der Sozialdemokratischen Arbeiterpartei Österreichs.

Michael Ludwig, Bürgermeister der Stadt Wien und Historiker, diskutiert mit ExpertInnen die Rolle und Perspektiven des Ausnahmepolitikers Adler. Er gilt als Symbol für soziale Gerechtigkeit, Solidarität und den Einigungsprozess der Sozialdemokratie in dramatischen Zeiten des Umbruchs in Österreich, Europa und global. Die Sozialdemokratie als demokratische Emanzipationsbewegung im Vielvölkerstaat, als Vorkämpferin zur Lösung der sozialen Frage und zur Bekämpfung der Armut, als politische Kraft der Frauenemanzipation und Gleichbehandlung, ihre Friedenspolitik und Perspektiven für einen europäischen Einigungsprozess – diese und weitere Themen, die uns und die Sozialdemokratie bis heute beschäftigen, werden von der hochkarätigen Runde aufgeworfen.

Adler starb einen Tag vor Ausrufung der Ersten Republik, doch er blieb Vorbild für viele, auch für Bruno Kreisky. Was hat er uns heute zu sagen?

Michael Ludwig, Historiker, Bürgermeister und Landeshauptmann von Wien

Gabriela Hauch, Historikerin, Professorin für Geschichte der Neuzeit mit dem Schwerpunkt Frauen- und Geschlechtergeschichte.

Wolfgang Maderthaner, Historiker, Präsident des Vereins Geschichte der Arbeiterbewegung

Robert Misik, Autor und Journalist, Adler Biograf

Moderation:
Renata Schmidtkunz, Journalistin

Cathrin Kahlweit im Gespräch mit Franziska Davies und Gerhard Mangott

DAS FÜNFTE JAHR: DIE UKRAINE IM KRIEG

Russlands Krieg gegen die Ukraine geht im Februar 2026 ins fünfte Jahr – und ungeachtet aller internationaler Bemühungen um einen Waffenstillstand besteht derzeit wenig Hoffnung auf ein Einlenken des Kreml. Nach wie vor beharrt Wladimir Putin ebenso darauf, dass ein Sieg mit militärischen Mitteln möglich sei, wie auf seine Maximalforderungen. Dazu gehören unter anderem eine Abtretung des gesamten Donbass, eine Verkleinerung der ukrainischen Armee sowie die Installierung einer Russland-freundlichen Regierung in Kiew.

Trotz aller vorläufigen Erfolgsmeldungen der „Koalition der Willigen“ und einer vagen Einbindung der USA ist daher unklar, wie ein Schweigen der Waffen oder gar ein Wiederaufbau des in Teilen zerstörten Landes möglich sein soll. Die Osteuropa-Historikerin und Gründerin der Deutsch-Ukrainischen Gesellschaft, Franziska Davies, forscht zur modernen Geschichte der Ukraine und Russland und kennt sich daher in beiden Regionen hervorragend aus. Gleiches gilt für Gerhard Mangott, Professor für Politikwissenschaft und Experte für Sicherheitsforschung im post-sowjetischen Raum an der Universität Innsbruck. Davies und Mangott debattieren mit Osteuropa-Expertin Cathrin Kahlweit darüber, wie Russland zum Einlenken gedrängt und die Existenz der Ukraine gerettet werden kann.

Franziska Davies, deutsche Osteuropa-Historikerin, Schwerpunkte: die moderne Geschichte der Ukraine, Polens und Russlands, wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiterin am Leibniz-Zentrum für Zeithistorische Forschung (ZZF) Potsdam, Mitbegründerin und Co-Präsidentin der Deutsch-Ukrainischen Gesellschaft

Gerhard Mangott, österreichischer Politikwissenschaftler und Professor für Politikwissenschaft mit der Spezialisierung auf Internationale Beziehungen und Sicherheitsforschung im post-sowjetischen Raum an der Universität Innsbruck. Forschungsschwerpunkte: Innen- und Außenpolitik Russlands, Außenpolitik der USA, Großmächtebeziehungen, strategische Rüstungskontrolle und nukleare Proliferation

Cathrin Kahlweit, langjährige SZ-Korrespondentin, Publizistin und Moderatorin

Ulrike Lunacek in conversation with Thant Myint-U

HOW PEACE WAS MADE IN THE 1960’S – LESSONS LEARNED?

There are good and bad news when it comes to peace making. Bad news first: In today’s world, we see more conflicts and wars than ever. The environment and conditions for trust, reality based media, respect for international law and the quality of political leaders seem to be worse than ever. The good news, however, are: Peacemaking has always been difficult, already in the 1960s, nevertheless several UN peacemaking, mandate enforcement and peacekeeping missions were successful. Later on Track Two diplomacy emerged as an effective concept, protest and civil rights movements had an impact on peace negotiations. Today’s conflicts are pressing and have, due to disinformation, technology and weapons of mass destruction but most importantly unqualified and populist political leadership the potential to lead us to the brink of self-extermination.

What can we learn from the 1960s when the United Nations became an organization vetted with hope, competence and good leadership, with capacity and vision for a better and more peaceful world?

Historian Thant Myint-U, the grandson of the third UN Secretary General U Thant, will present and discuss his latest book Peacemaker: U Thant, the United Nations, and the Untold History of the 1960s and what this never-before-told story reveals about global politics and the prospects for future peace.

Based in part on recently declassified papers, the book tells the story of a schoolteacher in a remote Burmese town who, within a little more than a decade, finds himself at the very center of global politics, as the UN’s Secretary-General, mediating the Cuban Missile Crisis between Kennedy, Khrushchev and Castro, and then going on to confront one war after another through the turbulent 1960s, from Vietnam to the Congo and the Middle East. The story is the missing piece in the puzzle of how our world came to be and shines a fresh light on our real options today.

Moderator Ulrike Lunacek together with Thant Myint-U will discuss what real options we have or might have today. How to imagine a world where trust in functioning international organizations and multilateral rules-based United Nations can again become vibrant, including in the implementation of the necessary changes that have been postponed for too long.

Thant Myint-U is an award-winning writer, historian, conservationist, and a former international public servant. He has served on three United Nations peacekeeping operations as well many years with the UN in New York as chief of policy planning. For over a decade, he helped lead reform efforts in Burma (Myanmar), including as a peace mediator. He is the founding chair of Yangon Heritage Trust. The author of five books, he is an Honorary Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, UK.

Ulrike Lunacek, currently Special Envoy for Austria’s candidature for a non-permanent seat in the UN Security Council, has had a long career in Austrian and European politics: between 1995 and 2020 she was Member of the AT parliament, Member as well as Vicepresident of the European Parliament, and in 2020 she briefly formed part of the ÖVP/Green government as Secretary of State for Arts and Culture. An active member of development/North-South as well as feminist and LGBTIQ activities/NGOs before and after her time in party politics, she has written and edited four books and lives in Vienna as moderator, speaker and author.

Thant Myint-U:
Peacemaker: U Thant, the United Nations and the Untold Story of the 1960s
Atlantic Books, Limited, 2025, 19,50 €

Solmaz Khorsand in coversation with Friederike Frieß, Amb. Alexander Kmentt and Nikolai Sokov

ARE WE READY FOR THE NEW NUCLEAR AGE?

The world has entered a dangerous new phase in dealing with nuclear risks, “the third nuclear age” driven by an often referenced and poorly defined “great power competition” as Alexandra Bell, President and CEO of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists put it. There are persistent nuclear threats from Putin’s regime and by North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un’s alarming missile tests. Furthermore, US President Donald Trump is calling for renewed testing of America’s nuclear infrastructure.

What will the world look like when, as IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi predicts, there are 20 to 25 nuclear-armed states instead of the current nine, and they flex their muscles more and more?

What cards do the proponents of a rule-based world order still have to convince nuclear-hungry leaders of the threat posed by these weapons, which they brandish like toys? What is the future of non-proliferation treaties and diplomacy?

Friederike Frieß, physicist and senior researcher at BOKU’s Institute for Safety and Risk Sciences and member of the UN Scientific Panel on the Effects of Nuclear War
Amb. Alexander Kmentt, Permanent Representative of Austria to the United Nations Office and International Organisations in Geneva
Nikolai Sokov, Senior Fellow at the Vienna Center for Disarmament and Non – Proliferation and former Soviet and Russian arms control negotiator

Moderator:

Solmaz Khorsand, independent journalist, podcaster, and award-winning author focusing on socio-political issues

Robert Misik im Gespräch Markus Brunner und Hans-Jürgen Wirth

SOZIALPSYCHOLOGIE DES AUTORITÄREN

Was macht rechte Narrative für viele Menschen attraktiv?

In atemberaubender Rasanz kippen die USA über den Abgrund, und auch in Europa werden autoritäre und neu-faschistische Bewegungen tonangebend. Sehr viele Analysen beschäftigen sich mit politikwissenschaftlichen und insbesondere auch mit ökonomischen Ursachen für den Aufstieg dieser Neuen Rechten. Dabei gibt es eine Vielzahl wichtiger sozialpsychologischen Faktoren, die selbst seit Jahrzehnten schon erforscht sind: Warum Menschen für autoritäre Botschaften empfänglich sind; welche Dynamiken die Selbstradikalisierung entfacht, wenn rechte Agitation auf Gesellschaften einwirkt; wie sich Menschen selbst verändern, wenn autoritäre Anlagen wachgerufen werden.

Markus Brunner, Sozialpsychologe und Soziologe, untersucht in seinem Buch „Sozialpsychologie des Autoritären“ insbesondere die Autoritarismusforschung des Frankfurter Instituts für Sozialforschung und neuere Studien darüber, wie ein „rebellisch-autoritärer Charaktertyp“ entsteht und in „autoritäre Aggression“ umschlägt, und was es mit Menschen macht, wenn ein „paranoides Denken immer mehr zunimmt“.

Eine massenpsychologische Perspektive ist unumgänglich, wenn man die Pathologien unserer Zeit verstehen will. Der Psychoanalytiker Hans-Jürgen Wirth untersucht seit vielen Jahren die „emotionalen Leitmotive“, die rechtspopulistische Einstellungen begünstigen wie „Wut, Hass, Rachsucht, Empörung, Ekel, Neid, Ressentiments, Verbitterung, Sarkasmus, Zynismus, Destruktivität, Empathie-Verweigerung, Feindseligkeit“. Mangelnde Anerkennung mag dazu besonders beitragen, ebenso eine „misstrauische Grundhaltung zur Welt“, die oft schon im Kindesalter genährt wird.

Markus Brunner,Sozialpsychologe und Soziologe; wissenschaftlicher Leiter des Master-Studienschwerpunktes “Sozialpsychologie/Klinische Psychologie” an der Sigmund Freud Privat Universität (SFU) Wien

Hans Jürgen Wirth, Psychoanalytiker, psychologischer Psychotherapeut und Verleger des Psychosozial-Verlages; Professor für psychoanalytische Sozialpsychologie an der Goethe-Universität in Frankfurt am Main

Moderation:
Robert Misik, Autor und Journalist

Markus Brunner:
Sozialpsychologie des Autoritären
Zur Aktualität der Autoritarismusforschung der Frankfurter Schule
Psychosozial-Verlag, 2025, 24,90 €