Albania in the 1980s was the last bastion of Stalinism in Europe. It was difficult to visit, and a place of poverty, executions and secret police, but for LSE politics professor Lea Ypi it was also home. She talks to Alex Andreou about her astonishing memoir Free: Coming of Age at the End of History, which details her childhood in one of Europe’s most repressive countries, what came afterwards, and what it truly means to be free.
- “The fall of the Berlin Wall was brushed aside as something that didn’t concern Albania”
- “At some point the state slogan was gone and was replaced by a coca-cola advert”
- “I’ve spent half my life under socialism, half my life under liberalism… neither of these systems delivered what they set out to”
- “To live in real democracy means to have a real say in the laws that are made”
- “What we have is not a democracy, but rather a liberal representative system”
Presented by Alex Andreou. Produced by Andrew Harrison. Assistant producers: Jelena Sofronijevic and Jacob Archbold. Music by Kenny Dickinson. Audio production by Alex Rees. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production
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