Dr Primorac presented two papers at the IAMCR 2026 Galway conference: first paper entitled ‘Film Industry on the Digital (Semi)Periphery? Impact of the Service Production Model in Croatia’ was a result of the CresCine Horizon Europe research project, and it was presented within the Political Economy Section. The second paper entitled ‘Everyday Digital Embeddedness and (Dis)comfort with AI at Semi-Periphery. Evidence from Croatia was prepared in collaboration with Dr Branko Ančić from the Institute for Social Research in Zagreb (IDIZ) and was the result of the International Social Survey Programme; it was presented within the Digital Divide Working Group. As a member of the IAMCR, Dr Primorac actively participated in the Association’s meetings, especially in the work of Political Economy and Media Production Sections, of which she is a member.

More information about the STSM visit can be found at the website of the COST Action P-Will, which is available here: https://pwill.eu/

Dr Jaka Primorac gratefully acknowledges the support of COST Action P-WILL in enabling this research mobility and fostering international academic collaboration, and thanks Prof. Kylie Jarrett for her time, comradeship and expertise.

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During the fellowship, Dr. Bužinkić advanced her ongoing research on digital racial capitalism and AI-mediated migrant labor in Europe’s semi-periphery, examining how artificial intelligence and digital labor platforms are reshaping migration governance, labor exploitation, and racialized inequalities in Croatia as a productive periphery for the  transnational circuit of capitalism.

As part of the fellowship, she presented her research at the workshop “Social Reproduction and AI”, organized by the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), contributing to interdisciplinary discussions on the social and political implications of artificial intelligence and platform capitalism.

Dr. Bužinkić also participated in the four-day Summer School on the “Political Economy of AI”, held at King’s College London, which brought together international scholars and researchers working at the intersections of artificial intelligence, political economy, labor, and social justice.

The fellowship further strengthened collaborative research on AI, migration, labor, and critical political economy, contributing to ongoing international dialogue on the implications of emerging technologies for workers and societies on Europe’s semi-periphery.

This research fellowship also marked the conclusion of Dr. Bužinkić’s work at the Institute for Development and International Relations (IRMO), where over the past three years she worked on research projects dedicated to migration, social inequalities, pandemic crisis governance, and transnational solidarities.

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LTS is an independent initiative that brings together stakeholders from the global academic community, trade union organizations and civil society organizations, and is co-organized by the University of Cagliari, Italy, Queen Mary University, UK, CONICET, Argentina, Feminas, Sardinia, Italy, with the support of a number of domestic and international partners such as the Antonio Gramsci Institute, Notes from Below and others. Dr Primorac gave a presentation at the summer school as part of the session ‘Art, Work and Organizing’, and participated in a series of workshops and individual consultations with doctoral students and activists.

This year, the Labour Transfer School brought together over eighty participants interested in collaboration, synergy and knowledge exchange between academia and social organizations, with the aim of creating emancipatory knowledge on labour and social issues. The program was structured around a series of sessions, workshops, public discussions, and study visits, one of which included a visit to a nearby closed mine, a key site of the initial trade union actions in Sardinia and Italy in general.

More information about the program can be found on the website: https://www.labourtransferschool.org/

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The programme featured 15 paper sessions, 7 panels, and 59 posters, showcasing research on collaborative infrastructures for cultural heritage, the CARE principles, pedagogies of engagement, and other current topics in the field of digital humanities.

In the session Heritage Infrastructure as Critical Infrastructure – Strategies to Build Resilient Infrastructure for Engagement and Public Good, Barbara Lovrinić Higgins presented the paper “Excavating the Archive: A Critical Examination of the EU’s Triple-Infrastructure Nexus for Digital Cultural Heritage.” The paper critically analyzes the European infrastructure for digital cultural heritage formed by connecting three infrastructural layers: research infrastructures, data spaces, and initiatives such as the European Collaborative Cloud for Cultural Heritage (ECCCH). The study explored the ways in which policies, standards, and governance models for digital cultural heritage are shaped, as well as the potential consequences of such infrastructural transformations for cultural institutions, researchers, and cultural heritage users.

The joint paper by Aleksandra Uzelac and Barbara Lovrinić Higgins, titled “Beyond Digitisation Metrics: Towards Impact-Oriented Evaluation in Cultural Heritage,” was presented in the session Evaluating Impact and Value in Digital Cultural Heritage: Infrastructures, Institutions, and Engagement. This paper addressed the issue of assessing the impact of digital cultural heritage. It questions the prevailing approaches to evaluating digitization projects, which often measure success primarily through quantitative indicators—such as the number of digitized objects or the usage of digital platforms—and advocates for the development of approaches aimed at understanding the broader social, cultural, and institutional impact of digital heritage. Special attention was dedicated to existing European impact assessment frameworks and the challenges of measuring long-term and qualitative changes that digital cultural heritage can stimulate.

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In her lecture, Dr Praznik addressed the persistent invisibility of labour in the cultural sector, the precarity of artistic and cultural work, and the relationship between research, cultural policy, and collective organising. Drawing on social reproduction analyses and experiences of organising art and cultural workers in Slovenia and Croatia, the lecture examined how artistic labour is often framed as individual creativity or a ‘labour of love’, obscuring exploitation, unpaid work, and precarious working conditions.

Particular attention was given to the organising experiences of the Zasuk union in Slovenia and the SKUPA initiative in Croatia, as well as to the limitations of decades of policy advocacy and research which, despite extensively documenting precarity in the cultural sector, have often failed to produce structural change without organised collective power.

The lecture was followed by a rich and productive discussion involving researchers, representatives of cultural organisations, and a range of actors from the Croatian cultural and creative sector. The discussion focused in particular on labour conditions in culture, possibilities for collective organising, and the challenges cultural policies face in the context of increasing precarity in cultural work.

The lecture was organized in connection with the publication of the new book ‘Creative and Cultural Work in Europe’  edited by Bård Kleppe, Jaka Primorac, Miikka Pyykkönen and David Wright (published by Routledge).

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What happens when research seeks not only to analyze cultural production, but to intervene in its conditions of labor? This lecture examines the persistent invisibility of labor in the cultural sector through the lens of social reproduction analyses and participatory research conducted with freelance art workers in the post-Yugoslav context. It argues that artistic labor is systematically essentialized as “creativity”—an individualized expression of passion or talent—thereby obscuring the labor process, normalizing unpaid work, and enabling the extraction of value under precarious conditions.

Drawing on organizing experiences with art workers’ unions in Slovenia and Croatia, the lecture shows how this ideological framing is increasingly challenged through collective action that reasserts art work as labor. At the same time, it critically reflects on the limits of decades of policy advocacy and research, which have extensively documented precarity in the cultural sector yet failed to produce structural change.

The analysis suggests that the central obstacle is not a lack of knowledge, but a lack of organized power capable of transforming entrenched labor relations shaped by divergent class interests. In this context, participatory research emerges as a politically ambivalent practice: while it can contribute to building collective agency, it also risks being absorbed into institutional frameworks that reproduce the very conditions it seeks to critique.

The lecture ultimately poses a question to researchers and policy actors alike: are we positioned as expert colleagues producing knowledge about cultural workers, or as comrades engaged in struggles to transform the conditions of cultural labor? This tension calls for a reflexive rethinking of the role of research in relation to organizing, class formation, and the future of cultural production.

The lecture is organized in connection with the publication of the new book ‘Creative and Cultural Work in Europe’ edited by Bård Kleppe, Jaka Primorac, Miikka Pyykkönen and David Wright (published by Routledge), and it will be moderated by Dr Jaka Primorac from the Department for Culture and Communication, Institute for Development and International Relations (IRMO).

The lecture will be held in English, and the discussion will be held in Croatian. You can sign up to attend the lecture by May 18 at kultura@irmo.hr.

The post Save the date: Culturelink Guest Lecture Series – Dr Katja Praznik: Comrades or Colleagues? The Class Challenges of Participatory Research and Policy Advocacy for Cultural Workers appeared first on Kultura.

The Oracle Cultural Network brings together an international community of experts in cultural management and cultural policy, connected through the Marcel Hicter Diploma programme. It serves as a platform for the exchange of knowledge and experience, as well as for professional collaboration.

The discussion programme took place on 24 April in the IRMO library and featured two thematic sessions. The first session, New Approaches to Cultural Cooperation, focused on emerging models and practices of international cultural collaboration. The second session, Strategies to Foster Cultural Democracy and International Cooperation in Times of Disruption, opened a discussion on the role of culture in strengthening democracy and international connections in the context of contemporary social and technological change.

As part of the programme, IRMO’s research activities in the field of cultural policy were also presented, with a focus on projects carried out by the Department for Culture and Communication, including CULTMED project. The activities of the Culturelink Centre were highlighted, particularly those aimed at the development of cultural policy, international cooperation, and the promotion of culture as a public good.

In addition to the programme held at IRMO, participants visited several cultural institutions in Zagreb, including the Museum of Contemporary Art, Pogon – Zagreb Center for Independent Culture and Youth, the Museum of Broken Relationships, and MaMa / Multimedia Institute. These visits provided insights into different models of governance and practice in the cultural sector.

The meeting offered a valuable opportunity for exchange, networking, and strengthening professional ties, as well as for connecting the international Oracle Cultural Network community with the local cultural context.

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