Head of the Laboratory
Assistant Professor Marijana Kardum, PhD
Department of Natural Sciences, Geography and History
External Associates
- Tomaž Ivešić, PhD – Director and Research Associate, Study Centre for National Reconciliation, Slovenia
- Assoc. Prof. Michal Brandl, PhD – Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Zagreb
- Assoc. Prof. Ida Ograjšek Gorenjak, PhD – Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Zagreb
Purpose and Objectives of the Laboratory
The purpose of the Laboratory for Research on Women’s History under Communism is to address the lack of systematic research into women’s history during this period in Croatia. Its primary aim is to examine women’s political engagement and reformist activities in socialist Yugoslavia, particularly during the “long 1960s” (from the late 1950s to the early 1970s), a turbulent decade in the history of the multinational one-party federation.
Although women gained the right to vote after 1945, their significant influence within party and state structures remained limited. Historiography has often marginalised this period, treating it as a lull between the revolutionary 1940s and the feminist movements of the 1970s. Challenging this interpretation, the Laboratory seeks to demonstrate that women were key actors in republican reform movements, mobilising gendered and nationalist discourses to exert pressure for systemic change.
The Laboratory’s objective is to establish a central hub for research into women’s history under communism in Croatia by connecting the research and dissemination activities of existing projects and by preparing an international, highly competitive research project proposal for Horizon Europe during the current academic year.
This is particularly significant given that the Faculty of Teacher Education is not the primary institutional home of the relevant academic field and has only one permanent historian, the Laboratory’s founder. Indirect objectives include strengthening researchers’ independence, deepening methodological expertise, and expanding international cooperation, thereby establishing a lasting foundation for academic careers at the intersection of gender history, nationalism, and the history of communism.
Expected Contribution of the Research
The first expected contribution of establishing the Laboratory is the institutionalisation of research into women’s history under communism.
The second expected contribution is the systematisation of research and dissemination activities related to women’s history under communism, with particular emphasis on Croatia and Yugoslavia and in cooperation with international experts.
The third expected contribution is not only the development of a new framework for understanding gendered power in authoritarian, multinational regimes, but also, if the research is supported through highly competitive European funding programmes, the potential to contribute to a broader reinterpretation of the global history of communism and women’s political participation in such regimes.
