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Resumen basado en el de la publicación Monográfico con el título, Enseñanza superior en Europa : objetivos contemporáneos para instituciones históricas Se describe el desarrollo de las universidades en Letonia desde la década de 1950 hasta la actualidad. Lo más alto del sistema educativo experimentó cambios junto con las transformaciones políticas del país. Letonia paso a ser parte de la Unión Soviética en 1940 y recuperó su independencia en 1991, pasando a unirse a la UE en 2004. Desde 2012 Letonia es una participante incipiente del Espacio Europeo de Educación Superior. Se describen las transformaciones de las universidades en Letonia desde la perspectiva de una teoría del aprendizaje cultural y la transferencia de conocimiento definida por Gita Steiner-Khamsi. Eso proporcionará la referencia a un modelo de educación externa, su modificación y metamorfosis en un entorno educativo local modelo. Letonia, como país pequeño y cultura relativamente nueva, se había encontrado en la situación de aprender de las experiencias culturales de países que tienen más experiencia con la democracia y tuvieron que superar las ideas de los sistemas educativos de otros países y adaptarlos a las necesidades locales. ESP

The paper is an outline of the author’s research project to be undertaken in 2006. It is focused on the process of transition from authoritarian to democratic order in Serbia after 2000. Starting from the findings of previous studies of transition, in Serbia and in other post socialist countries, the research will adopt a socio-anthropological approach and deal with the following topics: the model of transition being applied in Serbia preconditions for democratic transformation; a balance sheet of positive achievements accomplished and, on the other hand, "lost chances"; socio economic, political and cultural obstacles to articulating a coherent strategy of democratic development; psychological and anthropological aspects of current processes; alternative paths of democratic development feasible within given conditions. A central question the research will aim at resolving is why the current situation in Serbia is often described as suffering from a "democratic deficit".

In the last decade and a half the process of desecularization has been undoubtedly verified in Serbia. Not only that the changes have been verified in the religious complex in general, but in traditional religious groups in particular as well. The revival of religiousness and people?s attachment to religion and church have been clearly proved in all aspects of religious life: in the areas of religious identification, doctrinaire religious beliefs and ritual religious practices. It should also be noted that in times of extremely turbulent political and social changes in the Balkans, all traditional religious complexes, orthodox, catholic and Muslim, began forming close ties with political and state, public and binding domains, which was absolutely unthinkable of a decade and a half ago. Which leads us to the crucial question: can religion make a contribution to the process of integration coming form the surrounding countries as the imperative of foreign powers on one hand, and as the striving of the majority of population in all the post socialist countries in the Balkans on the other hand, or will it only cause damage and interfere with the process of integration of those societies into the European commonwealth of nations? This article discusses different opinions that view the traditional complexes of religion, language and nation as disruptive factors of modernization of the Balkan countries, as well as completely opposite opinions based on the experiences of traditional Islamic societies in which religion is not a factor that hinders their rapid modernization.

Considering this issue to be particularly significant as a research challenge for the sociologies of religion in the so-called post-socialist countries, the subject of this research has been to determine the character, status and direction of religious changes in predominantly orthodox territories of Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro) and Russia that became evident in the last decade of the twentieth century marked by turbulent socio-political changes in those countries. With the subject of the research being defined in that way, the main goal of the research has been to identify and examine basic tendencies in religious changes. Relying on the huge empirical material on the changes in question, an attempt has been made to precisely detect the scope of these changes in the various areas of religious, spiritual and social lives of people in the period of the so-called post-socialist transformation (transition). Therefore, the goal of the research has not been just to determine the scope and direction of changes of religiousness with people, but also to try to set the above mentioned religious changes into the proper social context, which is the starting point in their theoretical explanation.

Roma are a highly dispersed ethnic communicate. After international protectorate was established in Kosovo. Roma have become the most numerous ethnic minority in Yugoslavia. When discrimination against and integration of Roma people are concerned, it has to be kept in mind that thus far Roma have been exposed most often to negative discrimination, while integration for them has often meant de facto assimilation. As positive discrimination of minority groups in a society is also a viable option, the approach to the 'Roma issue' basically implies a strategic shift in the conduct of all state institutions and other social factors - from negative to positive discrimination, and from assimilation towards genuine integration of Roma. The basic approach suggested by this author is the one that enables Roma to be equal citizens of this country. The circles of poverty hi which Roma population finds itself are increasingly deeper. However, the realm of poverty is spreading across the entire space of Yugoslavia. Pauperization prevails. The devastation of living conditions for all citizens of Yugoslavia, i.e. of Serbia and Montenegro, except for the narrow circle of war profiteers and people involved with power centers, has been underway for over a decade. Middle classes have disappeared from the social scene, while many families have dropped to the sub-proletarian zone of poverty.

Nationalism, Consumption and Political Culture in Interwar Europe This review article provides an overview of some recent work on the cultural history of interwar Europe as well as some general reflections on the interpretation of a period that has often been reduced to a plethora of deficiencies. Studies on nationalism from Hungary to Spain, on consumer culture in France or Germany, and on political culture from the comparatively stable Netherlands to Stalinist Moscow converge in bringing out the heterogeneous, open-ended and productive character of the 1920s and even the 1930s - decades that point not only to the Second World War but also to post-war developments. Such a perspective can also explain why extremist movements and dictatorships were legitimate outcomes of this complex modernity, while having to employ unprecedented violence to bring this modernity under control.