The IXth ISHA conference, "Revolution?!", Helsinki 1998.

The 1998 annual conference of ISHA (International Students of History Association) took place in Helsinki between April 8th -12th. ISHA Helsinki, who also organised the annual meeting of 1992, became thus the first section in the short history of the association to host two major conferences. This is hardly surprising, as the Helsinki section has always showed a particular interest in the activity of ISHA and can be considered one of the strongest sections - at the conference in Wroclaw the representatives of Finland (and of Helsinki in particular) were by far the most numerous delegation.
Following a tradition established from the very beginnings of ISHA, the topic of the conference was very general, allowing every participant to find a place for his/her presentation under this huge umbrella which in Helsinki was called "Revolution ?!". However, the theme of the conference almost inevitably favoured essays on modern and contemporary history, for the very good reason that revolutions, as they are commonly perceived, belong essentially to the these ages. The organisers had thought that this problem can be solved by creating an workshop dedicated to the "non-existing revolutions"; but since nobody applied for that workshop it finally had to be cancelled. The explanation is that young historians focusing on Antiquity preferred to present their papers in other workshops; as for the medievalists, they seemed to be more concerned with the Late Middle Ages as well as with the relations between the medieval and the modern society. The seminar on the "non-existing revolution" being cancelled, the conference was reduced to six workshops: Moments of madness, Revolutionary propaganda, Revolution - before and after, Revolutionary mentalities and mental revolutions, The icons and personalities of revolution, Revolution, structure, economy, society. As always, the conclusions of each workshop were presented in a general assembly.
The annual conference gives perhaps the best image of the academic level of ISHA. The quality of the papers presented in such occasions has always represented a problem, frequently debated between participants, but never discussed in administrative meetings - for reasons that transcend my comprehension. In Helsinki it seemed that the general level had improved since the last conference. There were still a lot of essays whose value can hardly be underestimated. But the number of interesting and well researched works was considerably increased, and generally speaking, the discussions were more professional and stimulating.
The conference did not enjoy a very high rate of attendance. Initially the organisers were thinking at a participation of 200 delegates from the various sections of ISHA, but it finally turned out that only 100-150 people were present (no statistic regarding the number of the participants has been made public so this is only an estimation). Finally, at the Legislative Assembly there were registered - and thus voted - representatives from 22 local sections, besides the International Secretariat. Nevertheless, a lot of new faces animated the conference while the smaller amount of participants made discussions in the workshops more alert, and the only question was whether the distance to Helsinki or a certain lack of interest was responsible for the somehow lower rate of attendance.
The degree of interest that members show in the activity of ISHA was actually the main issue discussed in the administrative meetings. For quite some time it became apparent that most of the members of ISHA did not really get involved in its current activity. It seemed that, apart from the local achievements of every section and from the work of the International Secretariat - the head of ISHA - the only thing that people did was attending congresses. The very scarce relations between the International Secretariat, located in Leuven, and the local sections reduced the co-operation within ISHA to participating to conferences where papers where presented and discussed. Of course, this only happened two or three times a year, and for the rest of the time ISHA looked as a dead organisation. Moreover, people were not willing anymore - partly because of financial problems - to go to Leuven and join the International Secretariat. Every year, there were fewer and fewer candidates for the International Secretariat, and once elected, the people assigned to co-ordinate the work of ISHA complained that nobody showed any interest at all. All this problems have been analysed at the previous congresses - in Wroclaw Tvrtko Jakovina, Academic Co-ordinator for the year 1996/1997, presented a statement which emphasised the weight of the situation and called for immediate measures [1]. But things did not substantially improve and in Helsinki there were serious debates about the future of ISHA - Vera Constantini, president of ISHA for the year 1997/1998 proposed that the headquarters be removed from Leuven and the International Secretariat be held each year by one of the sections, which would provide candidates for the offices within this committee[2]. Finally, the Legislative Assembly decided that the organisation of ISHA should not be changed. The improvement of ISHA’s activity, demanded by all participants was to be achieved by individual effort, stronger co-operation, regional joint projects, all within the same framework.
The conference was excellently organised and the participants seemed to enjoy the excursions and all of the moments of relaxation which made the sojourn in Helsinki very agreeable. The Finnish sauna and the visit to the beautiful island of Suomenlinna were among the most interesting experiences I had in Helsinki. For the success of the conference all credit should go to the great people of ISHA Helsinki; I will only mention three of them - Mr. Mikko-Olavi Seppala, head of conference arrangements, Ms. Rae Haikio, conference corespondent, Mr. Sakari Saaritsa, academic co-ordinator.

Ionut EPURESCU PASCOVICI.

FOOTNOTES

[1] Also see Tvrtko Jakovina, Where are we going, where have we been?, in "Man and Sea. Papers of the International ISHA Seminar, Pula, Croatia, 15-20, Sept., 1997", edited by Igor Duda, Tvrtko Jakovina, Renata Mikloska, 81-83.

[2] Ms. Constantini's position has also been expressed in "ISHA News", 29, 1998, 2.