{"id":10,"date":"2026-02-16T14:09:11","date_gmt":"2026-02-16T12:09:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sisu.ut.ee\/thenation-state\/?page_id=10"},"modified":"2026-09-28T09:36:29","modified_gmt":"2026-09-28T06:36:29","slug":"news","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/sisu.ut.ee\/thenation-state\/news\/","title":{"rendered":"News"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">September 2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The research project held its first workshop in Vihula. Various papers and works in progress were presented, with the discussions also featuring P\u00e4rtel Piirim\u00e4e, Liisi Keedus and Henri Otsing as additional guests and discussants.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Oliver Rowe\u2019s PhD dissertation was featured in <a href=\"https:\/\/news.err.ee\/1610146903\/lenin-promised-nations-the-right-to-secede-but-built-a-centralized-state\">ERR\u2019s science and research portal<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">August 2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Oliver Rowe successfully defended his doctoral dissertation, <em><a href=\"https:\/\/dspace.ut.ee\/items\/eeda421a-1c35-41c2-830f-d46a824a84f1\">Self-determination in Theory and Practice: The Reconfiguration of the \u2018Russian\u2019 Empire, 1914-1924<\/a><\/em>.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Eva Piirim\u00e4e published a review article \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.sirp.ee\/hannah-arendt-rahvusriigist-vaade-eestist\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Hannah Arendt rahvusriigist. Vaade Eestist<\/a>\u201d (Hannah Arendt on the Nation-State. A View from Estonia) in <em>Sirp<\/em>.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Eva Piirim\u00e4e and Kadi K\u00e4h\u00e4r-Peterson participated in the annual conference of the History of Concepts Group at the University of Helsinki, 19\u201321 August 2026. Together with Pasi Ihalainen, Eva Piirim\u00e4e co-organised a panel on the conceptual history of democracy. Kadi K\u00e4h\u00e4r-Peterson gave a presentation entitled \u2018Contest over the self-identification \u2018Balt\u2019 in the 20th century\u2019. On August 25, Kadi K\u00e4h\u00e4r-Peterson held a seminar entitled \u2018Solving a controversy over \u2018Amalgamation of Nations\u2019 with conceptual history\u2019 at the related summer school \u2018Introduction to Conceptual History. 20th Summer School on the History of Concepts\u2019.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Karl Lembit Laane published an article in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.muurileht.ee\/paradoksaalse-parandiga-demokraatiauuendus\/\">M\u00fc\u00fcrileht<\/a> about the intellectual history of citizens\u2019 assemblies, their relation to the theory of deliberative democracy, their history in Estonia as well as the potentialities and limitations of their use in the future.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">July 2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Karl Lembit Laane shared his thoughts on the role of the Estonian President and their elections in a reply to Martin M\u00f6lder, University of Tartu Associate Professor of Political Science, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.err.ee\/1610089048\/karl-lembit-laane-majoritaarse-presidendi-luupainaja\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">in the online portal of Estonian Public Broadcasting (ERR)<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">June 2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>A <a href=\"https:\/\/www.lexi.eco\/\">lexi.eco<\/a> project meeting was held in Tartu, organised by Eva Piirim\u00e4e.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Timo Aava gave a presentation entitled \u2018Revisiting Jewish Life in Interwar Estonia: The Jewish Self-Government\u2019 in Kaunas at the conference \u2018Jewish Life in the Baltic States, 1917-1945\u2019, organised by The Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Vytautas Magnus University, and Sugihara Diplomats for Life Foundation.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Oliver Rowe gave a presentation entitled \u2018After Godot Arrives: The Idea of the All-Russian Constituent Assembly after its Dissolution, 1918-1920\u2019 at the second \u201cParliamentary Junctures in Continental Europe\u201d conference (\u2018<a href=\"https:\/\/www.dhi.waw.pl\/en\/events\/tagungen\/detail\/recombining-representation-during-the-transformation-from-empires-to-nation-states-1905-1923\/\">Recombining Representation During the Transformation from Empires to Nation-States 1905-1923<\/a>\u2018) hosted by the University of Warsaw.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Timo Aava participated in a roundtable discussion on Jewish cultural autonomy today at the conference celebrating 100 years of Jewish cultural autonomy in Estonia. The conference was co-organised by the Estonian Jewish Museum and the Estonian ministries of Culture, the Interior, and Justice and Digital Affairs.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">May 2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>On May 22, a presentation was held for the Estonian translation of Hannah Arendt\u2019s \u201cThe Origins of Totalitarianism\u201d. The discussion, moderated by Eva Piirim\u00e4e, brought together political theorist Siobhan Kattago and translator Merily Salura.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Eva Piirim\u00e4e participated in the workshop \u201cSmall States in Central European History\u201d held at the University of Cambridge on May 15 (organized by Jean-Michel Johnston and Anna Ross).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>The project team met to continue discussing the relationship(s) between nation-statehood and federalism, centred again on several texts, this time primarily covering the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Some ideas for the project\u2019s first workshop were also discussed.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">April 2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The project team met to discuss the relationship(s) between nation-statehood and federalism, seeking to establish a typology of the latter that assists the subsequent work of the project. Numerous texts were read and discussed, with the ultimate aim of creating a set of questions for the project\u2019s upcoming first workshop in autumn (TBC).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>The April issue of Akadeemia contains a translation of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.akad.ee\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/12\/2026\/03\/merkel.pdf\">Garlieb Merkel\u2019s introduction to \u201cThe Latvians\u201d, along with an accompanying essay<\/a> by translator Kadi K\u00e4h\u00e4r-Peterson. This essay also examines how Merkel\u2019s work was received in the second half of the 19th century.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">March 2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The project team met to discuss the introduction to Timo Aava\u2019s book manuscript, Mark Mazower\u2019s works on human rights, and C. A. Macartney\u2019s <em>National States and National Minorities<\/em>.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Kadi K\u00e4h\u00e4r-Peterson presented a paper on the various meanings of the term \u2018Balt\u2019 in the 1930s and after World War II at the <a href=\"https:\/\/ehak2026.ee\/ee\/ehak\/\">2nd Annual Conference of the Estonian Humanities, titled \u201cHic sunt dracones. Humanitarian Worlds\u201d<\/a> that took place in Tartu from 8 to 10 April.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">February 2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The project team met to discuss Hannah Arendt\u2019s conceptualisation of the nation-state, mainly via <em>The Origins of Totalitarianism<\/em>.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>On February 27, Kadi K\u00e4h\u00e4r-Peterson gave a presentation on <a href=\"https:\/\/lnb.gov.lv\/en\/merkela-politikas-formula-ivara-ijaba-saruna-ar-kadi-kaharu-petersoni\/\">Garlieb Merkel\u2019s political thought at the National Library of Latvia<\/a>. The presentation was followed by a discussion with Pauls Daija and Ivars Ijabs. A recording of the event was featured on the National Library of Latvia\u2019s podcast \u201cKlaus\u012btava,\u201d which can be listened to on <a href=\"https:\/\/soundcloud.com\/nacionala-biblioteka\/merkels-political-formula?fbclid=IwY2xjawQomNtleHRuA2FlbQIxMABicmlkETB1VU5jT1p0NUlRZXB6U1NYc3J0YwZhcHBfaWQQMjIyMDM5MTc4ODIwMDg5MgABHs-2VzCGf26UwYp99WRb9Ie4LiL0np-ny4E7atJcVPiK7KAqGb-xy6TE--FI_aem_iRVDrr95LjyRIppFsrqRrA\">SoundCloud<\/a> or <a href=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/episode\/0s3S9aP2CY6IiChsS1JmQ8?fbclid=IwY2xjawQomNVleHRuA2FlbQIxMABicmlkETB1VU5jT1p0NUlRZXB6U1NYc3J0YwZhcHBfaWQQMjIyMDM5MTc4ODIwMDg5MgABHog1VbPJSajAlGgqtoEo0gRyCalqMVdp5SCoC-Bol6mxuxPTG6Vrfn8UvW-s_aem_Jx4u-Im2gLjRFeo_cSxDoA\">Spotify<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">January 2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The project team had their first official meeting, centred mainly on a discussion of Oliver Rowe\u2019s doctoral dissertation and, by extension, Russian ideas of the nation-state and related concepts.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Kadi K\u00e4h\u00e4r-Peterson attended the conference \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/macmillan.yale.edu\/baltic\/events\/2026-01-23\/baltic-empire-minority-baltic-germans-late-nineteenth-century-1930s\">From Empire to Minority: Baltic Germans from Late Nineteenth Century to the 1930s<\/a>\u201d, held in Riga on January 23\u201324 and organized by the University of Latvia, Yale University, and the Estonian Academy of Arts.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">December 2025<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>News of the project\u2019s successful application was shared, and the project team met virtually for a preliminary discussion about the goals of and practicalities surrounding the project\u2019s work.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>September 2026 August 2026 July 2026 June 2026 May 2026 April 2026 March 2026 February 2026 January 2026 December 2025<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":513,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-10","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sisu.ut.ee\/thenation-state\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/10","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sisu.ut.ee\/thenation-state\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sisu.ut.ee\/thenation-state\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sisu.ut.ee\/thenation-state\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/513"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sisu.ut.ee\/thenation-state\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10"}],"version-history":[{"count":20,"href":"https:\/\/sisu.ut.ee\/thenation-state\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/10\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":239,"href":"https:\/\/sisu.ut.ee\/thenation-state\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/10\/revisions\/239"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sisu.ut.ee\/thenation-state\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}