WBHCEE 2025

Business and the Natural Environment in the History of Central and Eastern Europe 

Place: Institute of Contemporary History, Ljubljana  

Date: October 23-24, 2025 

October 23, 2025 – Thursday

8:30–9:00 MORNING COFFEE

9:00 WELCOME SPEECH AND INTRODUCTION

9:15–9:45 KEYNOTE LECTURE

Viktor Pál: Environmental Controversies Around Megaprojects in Socialist and Contemporary East-Central Europe 

9:45–11:00 PANEL 1: PRODUCING FOOD

Chair: Ivan Smiljanić

Lea Horvat: “No Fruit Can Bring the Farmer Greater Benefits Than Planting Chicory”: The Habsburg Empire, South Slavic Nationalisms, and Its Root Vegetables

Alejandro Gómez de Moral: Possibility, Peril, and Wool-Covered Pigs: Spain-Eastern Europe Cured Pork Trade and Business-Nature Intersections in the Era of European Expansion, 1980s-Present

11:00–11:15 COFFEE BREAK

11:15–12:30 PANEL 2: FROM RAW MATERIAL TO GARBAGE

Chair: Alfred Reckendrees

Jelena Rafailović: Environment and the Textile Industry: Natural Raw Materials and the Textile Industry in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia (1918–1941)

Eduard Kubů and Barbora Štolleová: Garbage Dumps in the Second Half of the 19th and the First Half of the 20th Century in Prague from the Perspective of Business History (the Case of the Use of Garbage as Fertilizers)

12:30–15:00 LUNCH BREAK AND VISIT TO THE MUZA MUSEUM

15:15–16:30 PANEL 3: NATURE UTILISATION

Chair: Valentina Fava

Iva Lučić: Business-Nature Nexus in Socialist Regimes: the Case of the Forestry Enterprise ŠIPAD in Socialist Yugoslavia in the 1960s

Martin Gumiela: On the shores of the “Warsaw Balaton”. State owned Enterprises and the Tourist Utilisation of the Zegrze-Reservoir in People’s Poland, 1960s-1970s

16:30–16:45 COFFEE BREAK

16:45–18:00 ROUNDTABLE DISCUSSION (HYBRID EVENT)

How to Write the Business History of (not just) Central and Eastern Europe?

Main discussant: Judit Klement

Participants: Ágnes Pogány, Alfred Reckendrees, Barbora Štolleová, Tomasz Olejniczak, Valentina Fava, Volodymyr Kulikov

October 24, 2025 – Friday

9:00–10:15 PANEL 4: ACQUIRING ENERGY

Chair: Judit Klement

Jacob Weisdorf: Property Rights, Coordination Failure, and Technological Inertia: Evidence from the Electrification of Switzerland

Walter M. Iber and Christian Schmidt: Hydropower and Entrepreneurship. Case Studies from Styria

10:15–10:30 COFFEE BREAK

10:30–12:20 PANEL 5: FOSSIL FUELS BETWEEN POLLUTION AND NATURE PROTECTION

Chair: Daniel Raff

Lilija Wedel: Oil Rush in the Imperial Baku. Reciprocal Impacts between Industry, Environment, Urbanization, and Public

Jesse Siegel: Bohemian Coal Mining Magnates and the Politics of Environmental Economic Justice in Interwar Central Europe

Márton Simonkay: Socialist mining companies and nature protection: the case of Pannolit in 1980s Hungary

12:20–14:00 LUNCH BREAK

14:00–14:30 EVALUATION AND PERSPECTIVES

Participants: Alfred Reckendrees, Daniel Raff, Judit Klement, Valentina Fava

14:30–17:00 PAPER DEVELOPMENT WORKSHOP

Organizers: Wim van Lent, Alfred Reckendrees

ORGANIZER

Smiljanić, Ivan: Institute of Contemporary History, Ljubljana

The workshop is supported by the Slovenian Research and Innovation Agency (ARIS) and the European Business History Association (EBHA).