Sustaining Civil Society in the Context of Multiple Crises

This project examines the resilience and resourcefulness of civil society in Poland, Hungary, Romania, Serbia, Czechia, and Sweden. By tracing how people collectively respond to overlapping crises—ranging from the economy and housing to climate, food security, the pandemic, and gender equality—we explore how civic action emerges, develops, and endures over time.

This project sets out to comparatively analyse civil society’s resilience and resourcefulness in Poland, Hungary, Romania, Serbia, Czechia

and Sweden. It examines the genealogies of the existing local/national/global crises, which include issues related to the

economy, housing, the climate, food, the pandemic and gender equality, and focuses on analysing how people respond to these crises

collectively. We ask: How does civic action emerge and develop over time in the face of multiple crises and exclusions? How do activists

manage to (re)kindle and sustain civic engagement, how do they build multi-scalar solidarities under adverse conditions, and how does this

transform their life-stories and affective responses? How alliances, cooperation and central relationships are built in contemporary civil

societies, with whom and what role these relationships play? What can we learn about the emergence and development mechanisms of

mobilisation and civic actions from comparisons of differential patterns and interconnected trajectories?

Publications

• Sustain Action Method Lab, Bródy, L.S., Fekete, D., Florea, I., Pixová, M., Polanska, D.V., Ratecka, A. and Vilenica, A. (2026), The Kitchen-Work of Collaborative Research: Recipes for Transformative Methodologies. Antipode, 58: e70098. https://doi.org/10.1111/anti.70098External link
• Bródy, L.S., Farkas, J., Gál, I., Milánkovics, K., Nagy, E. and Sági, M. (2023). Local food as resistance: Integrating women’s experiences in the Hungarian food sovereignty movement. Intersections. East European Journal of Society and Politics 9(4), 141–158.External link
• Florea, I. and Sandu-Dumitriu, M. (2024). Mișcarea pentru dreptul la locuire și susținerea populară a revendicărilor ei. In Gog & Stoiciu (eds) Ce urmează după neoliberalism. Cluj University PressExternal link
• Florea, I. and Oprea, R. (2024). Kinship and Care in Polluted Cities: The Multiple Burdens of Caring for Ourselves and Our Urban Environment. Berliner GazetteExternal link
• Florea, I. and Sandu-Dumitriu, M. (2025). The Popular Support for the Right to Housing in Romania. LeftEastExternal link
• Nica, A. and Florea, I. (2024). Rușinea de a fi… sărac/ă! Gazeta de Artă PoliticăExternal link
• Pixová, M., Spanier, J., Lara, L. G., Smessaert, J., Sandwell, K., Strenchock, L., ... & Plank, C. (2025). Building solidarities and alliances between degrowth and food sovereignty movements. Journal of Political Ecology, 32(1), 1-13.External link
• Pixová, M., and Kolářová, M. (2025). Mobilising political intersectionality in Czechia’s climate movement: Opportunities and pitfalls of coalition building in a post-socialist semi-periphery. Gender, Place and Culture.External link
• Pixová, M., and Plank, C. (2025). Quiet Right to the City: Contributing to Urban Sustainability by Converging Allotment and Community Gardens. Environmental SociologyExternal link
• Polanska, D.V. (2025). Stadsomvandlingsrörelsen och rätten till staden. In: Sociala rörelser i Sverige: politiska protester och aktivism från 1945 till idag, by M. Wennerhag, M. Lundstedt & J. Jämte. Lund: StudentlitteraturExternal link
• Florea, I., & Vincze, E. (2025). Institutional investors and the state: Reciprocal ‘catching-up’ in a ‘super-homeownership’ housing regime. European Urban and Regional Studies, 33(1), 132-147.External link
• Vincze, E., & Florea, I. (2026). The ‘launching grounds’ of housing financialisation: public housing programmes with social legitimisation in Romania. International Journal of Housing Policy, 1–26.External link