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What is Red in Hungary's Red Sludge Disaster?

1,199 views · Published 1 March 2012 · 1:13:07 · Indexed 26 September 2026

Channel: The University of Chicago · 2012 · Education

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Sociologist Zsuzsa Gille places the October 4, 2010 toxic spill in Hungary and political reactions to it in context of the country's post-socialist transition and the rise of a peculiar right wing party that is implementing an anti-neoliberal agenda. She describes how locals make sense of the tragedy, include their views on the toxins in the reservoir, on victims, and on local politics.

The seven-foot wave of red mud that burst from an alumina plant reservoir covered over 15 square miles, flooded towns, killed 10 people, injured over a hundred, and extinguished all wildlife in the Marcal river. 

Zsuzsa Gille is Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Her book, "From the Cult of Waste to the Trash Heap of History: The Politics of Waste in Socialist and Postsocialist Hungary," explains changing rationalizations, ideologies, and unintended consequences of industrial waste under state socialism and capitalism in Hungary.

The World Beyond the Headlines is a project of the Center for International Studies, which brings scholars, journalists, and world leaders to the University to discuss issues of current global importance. 

For more information on this event, visit https://cis.uchicago.edu/events/2010-2011/110224-gille

Information on the entire The World Beyond the Headlines series can be found at http://cis.uchicago.edu/wbh

This program was organized by the University of Chicago Center for International Studies and co-sponsored by the Program on the Global Environment and the Center for East European and Russian/Eurasian Studies.

February 24, 2011

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