The Workers and Punks University

The Workers and Punks University in Ljubljana, capital of Slovenia, is an educational project that since 1998^[1] each year from November to May on a topic selected by the WPU board runs a series of lectures based on social theories critical towards neoliberalism, including World-systems theory, applying selected, but not all, Marxian concepts to understand Slovenia as peripheral country, such as the theoretical work of Antonio Negri, Andre Gunder Frank,^[2] with participation from notable international academics,^[3] including American geographer David Harvey from City University of New York and philosopher Peter Hudis^[4] from Oakton Community College, British economist Michael Roberts,^[5] economist Joachim Becker from Institute for International Economics and Development Department at the Vienna University of Economics,^[6] Dutch economist Angela Wigger^[7] from Radboud University Nijmegen.

Lecture topics by years

The topics by years were:^[8]

• 2013/2014 Democratic Socialism (with accompanying round tables with members of German Die Linke, French Front de Gauche, and Greek Syriza)
• 2012/2013 Euro crisis
• 2011/2012 Financialization,
• 2010/2011 Class Struggle after Class Struggle^[2]
• 2009/2010 School as an Ideological Apparatus of Economy,
• 2008/2009 Stupidity,
• 2007/2008 Totalitarianism,
• 2006/2007 On Sin,
• 2005/2006 Political Ecology,
• 2004/2005 Post-Fordism,
• 2003/2004 Love and Politics,
• 2002/2003 May ‘68 – REvision,
• 2001/2002 Utopistics,
• 2000/2001 The Left,
• 1999/2000 The New Right,
• 1998/1999 Neo-conservatism.

References