Within the Annual Topic Series 2020/21 “Horizons of Freedom” we explore the intrinsic link between freedom and engagement with the aim to broaden the conceptual and political horizons of freedom as the central action-guiding principle of democratic politics and spark a more intense dialogue between the antagonistic traditions of thinking freedom in the face of urgent challenges and threats posed to freedom and democracy.

Starting from a definition of engagement as a social practice that has at its base reflection on values, norms and rules of one’s own social reality, the lecture series for the academic year 2019/20 is dedicated to the horizons, projections and representations of (un)desired reality towards which engagement is directed. If horizons are something yet to be achieved, does engagement then not assume some form of imagination, utopia, perhaps even fiction?

While engagement is often equated with civic activism or political protest, domination frequently becomes the synonym for oppression, exploitation or the existence of societal inequalities. Yet the concept has an equal potential as that of engagement for bridging different levels of abstraction and sparking a holistic reflection on social reality

Should we conclude that violence has become constitutive of the modern world? Can one take a critical stance toward violence and what would such stance require? What kind of critique in general, and what critique of violence in particular, do we need in these times, the times that we belong to and that we wish to shape through our engagement?