For a transnational Danube, beyond Sissi and the Sachertorte

Erhard Busek (1941-2022), an Austrian politician active in Balkan regional cooperation and lover of a Europe of minorities in dialogue, opened the work of the Interreg Transdanube Travel Stories project by talking about history, languages, landscapes and international protests: a synergistic approach, in search of a shared narrative

“When I was young, the Danube stopped in Vienna for us”. Opening the kick-off meeting in October 2020, Erhard Busek spoke to the numerous delegates from the seven partner countries in the Interreg Transdanube Travel Stories project with frankness and liveliness, irony and passion. Invited to provide expert insights, he ranged from his past as a politician – first in the City of Vienna as deputy mayor, then in the federal government as Vice Chancellor of Austria and minister – to the fascination for history, art and music.

And there was nothing to suggest that in two years' time, at the final conference of the project, Busek would not be there; although eighty years old, he was in fact in the midst of frenetic cultural activity, relations and mediation, both as an initiator and at the top of institutions such as the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester, the Institute for the Danube Region and Central Europe (IDM), the European Forum Alpbach and the No Borders orchestra (transnational musical formation from the Balkan area inspired by the West-East Divan Orchestra, Daniel Barenboim's WEDO with Israelis and Palestinians). Yet, six months before the closure of Transdanube, the announcement of his passing arrived: Erhard Busek was suddenly taken ill one night in March 2022, a few hours after attending a benefit concert in favour of Ukraine.

It seems then that we cannot talk about the Danube stories supported by the EU with Interreg without mentioning those who were undoubtedly their inspiration and strong precursors. Hence our posthumous homage to Erhard Busek, in an outlet that has written about him several times and which also encountered him several times in the Balkans: when, from 2002 to 2008, he was Special Coordinator of the Stability Pact for Southeastern Europe, or even before, in 2001, when he created – and every year financed with his own means – the SEEMO Award for Better Understanding, a journalistic award from the South East Europe Media Organization, designed for reporters who promote better understanding, tolerance and communication in the SEEMO region, either within one country or cross border.

Eighty years of proto-Europeanist vitality

An environmentalist already at the end of the Seventies, pro-European but far from Eurocentric, with a passion/dedication for South Eastern Europe, a lover of music and art, Erhard Busek had – quoting journalist Conrad Seidl in the Austrian newspaper Der Standard on March 14, 2022 – “the talent of sniffing out important issues, reformulating them in an original way and placing them on the political agenda”. Already vice-president of the Austrian government, minister, leader of the People's Party, and then involved in a myriad of international initiatives for enlargement to the east, Erhard Busek is remembered in his Austria and also in "his" Balkans with concrete, supportive actions for young people, to promote dialogue, to support journalism. In addition to the SEEMO award, for example, two other awards are named after him, two initiatives ranging from cross-border cooperation to artistic activities: the Erhard Busek Award for Engaged Artists and the “Dr. Erhard Busek Champion of Regional Cooperation Prize” from the Austrian Ministry of European Affairs and the Regional Cooperation Council (RCC).

Busek dedicated to the Balkan region a life of commitment and reflections – linguistic, historical, diplomatic – and also of "betrayals", when at the height of the Cold War he maintained relationships behind the Curtain with dissidents who, despite criticising their own regime, did not intend to move to the West. Busek also mentioned it at that first project meeting in Linz in October 2020: “For my generation there was no Danube region: because of the Iron Curtain, and even before that because of the weight of the Habsburg monarchy, which we as Austrians contributed to covering it with kitsch, for us what was Danubian was Sissi and the Sachertorte. This is why my strongest appeal to those who will work on this project – he said without losing his knowing, ironic smile – is that we fight kitsch and study the common history of this area, in search of a shared narrative".

The appeal did not go unheeded, with an impressive amount of pages of analysis, proposals and development of guidelines dedicated to the narrative, or rather narratives, that Transdanube Travel Stories has studied to tell the story of the Danube. The historical narrative is something that has fascinated Busek not only as a teacher: "With the European Union we managed to start the rewriting of the history of the Balkans from a transnational perspective, placing the versions side by side, seeking a synthesis, sharing", he explained, referring to another EU project in which he had been involved. Yet, he was deeply saddened that that project , Entangled Balkans, which had produced texts in eight languages and started teacher training, had not been taken up again. “There is an ongoing need to find shared narratives, especially in this area”, Busek confirmed.

Rereading history, but also geography

The immediate charm of Busek, for those who discovered him late and have only listened to some of his speeches without delving into his vast editorial production, lies in his ability to suddenly change register and connect apparently distant levels of reasoning and dialogue; you can see it in his affectionately professing to be Viennese, in his joking about the Hungarians almost admitting that he was talking about himself ("In Hungary one can lose everything, but not the accent"), in his passion for protest and the pregnant word of sense, which makes him, for example, cite Mexikoplatz in Vienna, not so much to remember how Mexico in 1938 was the only country in the world to protest against Hitler's Anschluss of Austria, but to regret how even today, in 2020, the protests, for example against the Belarusian regime, are unable to raise their voices. “Our vivacity in international protests still leaves much to be desired”. With his friendliness and correctness, Busek knows how to win over his interlocutor with his ability to disorientate and not be pigeonholed.

“Not only history, but also geography deserves some kind of attention”, he recalled in his intense speech in Linz in October 2020: “There is an error of perspective when we talk about enlargement to the east, we should rather talk widening in the centre. Nobody wants to see, for example, that Prague is further west than Vienna...". Subtly provocative, Busek does not shy away from linguistic challenges until the end; his goal is not to conclude, his intent is actually to open up, insinuate doubts, sow new furrows. “Don't begrudge me, but I have to reproach you for an error that appears in the preparatory documents”, he told the Transdanube working group: “here it reads that 10 countries belong to the Danube area, but I tell you that there are 14, for example, there are some waterways in Montenegro that are tributaries of the Danube, and supplies of water also arrive from Poland. So, let's not limit ourselves to stereotypes, but let's reinvent this space by looking at both its history and geography with plural eyes".

The beautiful Danube and its many shades of blue

Consulting the results of Transdanube Travel Stories, from texts to videos, from maps to photo galleries, it seems that Busek's suggestions found receptive listeners.

“By abandoning the stereotypes that dominate the river cruise tourism industry” – writes Professor Georg Steiner, director of the Linz tourist agency, introducing the over one hundred pages of the final document – “we want to embark on a narrative excursion on the Danube that is literary, cultural, ecological, personal and political". And accepting what had been Busek's objection two years earlier at the kick-off meeting, Steiner specifies how the project covers the entire Danube region, which consists not only of ten nations, but also the major tributaries of the Danube from 14 countries.

The change of perspective and its practical translation are apparent. “We must free the
Danube of its clichés”, reiterates Professor Steiner. So there is space for contrasts, for the juxtaposition of beauty and traces of environmental havoc, for the diversity of landscapes, for the wounds of history, because the Danube is neither a nature reserve nor a tourist leisure and pleasure ground. It is a living environment for people. It's not about perfection but about improvisation. It's about surprise and emotion, and not about those pseudo-industrial procedures that mass tourism simply replicates".

The objectives and instruments are clear, summarised in the guidelines for creating a story: it is about protecting local communities from tourism access, abandoning simply numerical indicators and aiming for the quality of arrivals, for example facilitating “neighbourhood” tourism and promoting the use of sustainable transportation and accommodation, from bicycles to campsites. The partners from Austria, Germany, Hungary, Slovenia, Croatia, Romania and Serbia, representing cultural-tourist itineraries such as the Road of Emperors and Kings /Austria, the Via Sancti Martini /Hungary, the European Route of Jewish Heritage/Slovenia, Iter Vitis – The Ways of Vineyards /Croatia, the Art Nouveau Network /Romania and DANUBEPARKS – the network of Danube protected areas /Austria, have tried to reinvent themselves through collaboration.

The work developed along six thematic areas: the Danube and its political meaning for Europe; Nature; the Romans; Culture and Architecture; Trade; Religion and Spirituality. For each of these themes there was a focus on diversity (biodiversity, landscapes, peoples, architectural styles, ideologies) and change (change over time, influence on the present, search for roots, historical traces). The result is six itinerary proposals to discover new hidden gems or to rediscover, according to new approaches, already famous places. And thanks to European funds, in total almost 2 million Euros, the creation of each trail – from reception to mobility, from promotion to variants – has involved the creation of new jobs and instruments: for example the STOMPs (Sustainable Travel and Mobility Plans), public transport timetables integrated at a transnational level; refresher courses for tourist operators and municipal employees; the creation of eco-sustainable promotional material (through the reproduction of a QR code on paper flyers and brochures, so you can update information online without having to reprint everything).

Outputs included the publication of the transnational Danube Cookbook and the re-publication of a photographic book on the naturalistic treasures of the area, the organisastion of the TIKFEST festival of revived history and gastronomy in Croatia; and the development of a new app to accompany visitors along the Jewish trail in Slovenia. Bloggers and software developers, local officials and tourism consultants were involved. On a broad spectrum, as asked by Erhard Busek, who in Linz, once again changing tone and leaving aside the academic jargon, had said: "To reread history we don't need new academic lessons, but new stories, stories told where they happened. This is why you who deal with tourism are so important and have a fundamental role, along the Danube, in this shared narrative of the Balkans". Knowing full well that it is precisely tourism that has drawn, and continues to draw, some significant profit from the kitsch of Sissi and the Sachertorte.