PhD students host second edition of LSE Joint Sessions on Critical Europe to interrogate right-wing narratives

On 26-27 February 2026, the second edition of our PhD-led LSE Joint Sessions on Critical Europe took place at the LSE European Institute. The two-day workshop-based symposium brought together around 30 early career academics and PhD students from the UK, Europe, and beyond, to interrogate right-wing narratives across Europe.

This year's theme explored what right-wing narratives insisting on the "protection and promotion of a European way of life" reveal about European memory politics, and the way in which contemporary European politics appears to be haunted by the idea of a "home under threat" from a variety of "internal and external" adversaries.

Congratulations to our PhD students Andréa Delestrade, Daniela Roxana Movileanu, Noa Krikler, and Rosa Golchin, and our Fellow in International Migration Dr Jacob Lypp for putting this fantastic conference together!

Bringing together anthropologists, political scientists, historians, political theorists, heritage academics and others made for an incredibly rich and generative environment, and reiterated - for myself and for other participants - the value of mutual learning and engagement across disciplinary divides to think through the pressing social issues and deeply concerning political realities we face today.