Abstract

In recent times many scholars have used comparative approaches and transnational examinations to show how national frameworks of memory are not self-sufficient and impermeable. In this article, by presenting the case of Slovenia and Italy, I will argue that politics of memory in post-socialist societies are not per se unique or different from those in parts of what is generally considered Western Europe. Moreover, if post-Cold War politics of memory in Slovenia are as they are, it is not only because of the country’s socialist past. Furthermore, thanks to a transnational focus on the borderland, which is today shared by Slovenia and Italy, I will argue that the redefinition of collective identities and the reinterpretation of history after 1991 are not solely a post-Yugoslav or Eastern European peculiarity but rather a European phenomenon.