Meet the Thinker: Timothy Snyder | Bozar Brussels

How do we understand freedom not only as a right, but as a responsibility? What can the past teach us about resisting the erosion of democracy? Timothy Snyder, renowned for his work on Central Europe, Ukraine, the Soviet Union, and the Holocaust, remains one of today’s most incisive historians. After the urgent clarity of On Tyranny (2017), he returned with On Freedom (2024), a book that reminds us that freedom is never simply the absence of constraint. It is relational: something to be practiced, shared, and defended together. The conversation was moderated by Pieter Lagrou, Belgian historian specializing in the history of the Second World War. 𝐓𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐰𝐚𝐬 𝐨𝐫𝐠𝐚𝐧𝐢𝐬𝐞𝐝 𝐛𝐲 𝐁𝐨𝐳𝐚𝐫, 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐇𝐚𝐧𝐧𝐚𝐡 𝐀𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐝𝐭 𝐈𝐧𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐭𝐮𝐭𝐞 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐕𝐔𝐁, 𝐚𝐬 𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐭 𝐨𝐟 𝐢𝐭𝐬 𝐓𝐢𝐞𝐬 𝐓𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐁𝐢𝐧𝐝 𝐔𝐬 𝐬𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐬, 𝐨𝐧 𝐉𝐚𝐧𝐮𝐚𝐫𝐲 𝟏𝟔, 𝟐𝟎𝟐𝟔.