Through memory narratives of political activists of a specific generation born between 1974 and 1982 in Slovenia, Croatia and Serbia in post-socialist transitional peripheries, we try to identify how an identity of an activist is being created in a given context. Can we call the generation of the last pioneers a political generation, formed through their shared Yugoslav childhood, early pioneer education and adolescent trauma of the dissolution of the country and war experience? Beyond asserting which elements are central to political positioning of an activist, we are interested in the narratives activists create in order to tell the story of their political subjectivity. Based on extensive field research through qualitative interviews with over 60 political activists conducted throughout 2017 and 2018, we look into how and why activists create narratives that complement their ideological stance. Which elements do activists see as crucial in their childhood, their upbringing, their education in their political formation? Which stories do activists choose to tell about their political identities? Which stories do activists choose to tell about their family background? Does their current ideology or their intimate memory play a more prominent role in the creation of their narratives? As communicative and cultural memory on Yugoslavia intersect influencing the activism of the last pioneers, we discover divergences and convergences among the last Yugoslav generation creating solidarity networks of multidirectional memory, as per concept by Michael Rothberg.
