Central and Eastern Europe are currently experiencing the second major systemic upheaval since the end of the Cold War and the upheaval in Eastern Europe in 1989/1990, with its immediate consequences still continuing to have an impact. Once again, the region has become one of the central areas of conflict in the reorganization of the system of international relations. In this context, various attempts to correct the development paths taken after the collapse of state socialism can be observed, some of which are accompanied by geostrategic reorientation. The focus of the department's work is the interplay between these two major transformations, their actors, programs and effects on the respective societies.  One important comparative axis is the contrast between the members of the European Union and the European successor states of the USSR outside the EU. The topics currently being addressed by the department include Russia's turn to conservatism and the consequences of Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine. The disciplinary focus of the department includes economic sociology, political sociology, and the sociology of knowledge.