“With extraordinary clarity, the authors present one century of sociology in Serbia. Pioneers and mediators, institutions and reviews, currents and debates, relations with the state and the civil society – nothing escapes their attention. But they accomplish much more than that. The book is also a fascinating journey through Serbian society from 19th to 21th centuries, and an original reflection on the social sciences and the ways social scientists use them, beyond geographic and disciplinary boundaries.”
—Xavier Bougarel, National Center for Scientific Research, Paris
“Sociology came late to the region, and was always the object of political hostility or efforts at political control. Some sociologists resisted, some used the tension to their advantage, but most tried to maintain the autonomy of the field. This book shows how sociologists’ successes and failures at keeping the project alive fed new ideas, new research, and new divisions.”
—Eric Gordy, School of Slavonic and East European Studies, University College London
Ivana Spasić
History of Sociology Serbia Serbian Sociology Academic Autonomy Institutionalization Post-socialist transformation
“With extraordinary clarity, the authors present one century of sociology in Serbia. Pioneers and mediators, institutions and reviews, currents and debates, relations with the state and the civil society – nothing escapes their attention. But they accomplish much more than that. The book is also a fascinating journey through Serbian society from 19th to 21th centuries, and an original reflection on the social sciences and the ways social scientists use them, beyond geographic and disciplinary boundaries.” (Xavier Bougarel, National Center for Scientific Research, Paris)
“Sociology came late to the region, and was always the object of political hostility or efforts at political control. Some sociologists resisted, some used the tension to their advantage, but most tried to maintain the autonomy of the field. This book shows how sociologists’ successes and failures at keeping the project alive fed new ideas, new research, and new divisions.” (Eric Gordy, School of Slavonic andEast European Studies, University College London)
"Tracing a national sociological tradition is never easy. It becomes maddeningly hard when the tradition in question seems to migrate across times and places following the ups and downs of meandering history of the Balkans, where state boundaries, national identities and biographies of sociologists seldom met. What is Serbian sociology, then? Ivana Spasić, Jelena Pešić and Marija Babović succeeded in producing a compelling narrative of discontinuity: “false starts, attempts cut short, legacies petering out, memories obliterated, and beginnings from scratch”. The story culminates in an account of the devastating effects of the “destruction of society” in the Yugoslav wars and the challenge of starting anew once again in the 21st century, facing the overwhelming sense of permanent social crisis. It is a story unlike any I know; it is deeply relatable for anyone who cares about the autonomy of social science under political pressures, whether in the center or in the peripheries of our conflict-stricken world." (Marta Bucholc, Faculty of Sociology, University of Warsaw/Centre de recherche en science politique, Université Saint-Louis Bruxelles)