Transformative Solidarities with Displaced Ukrainians in Prague and Budapest

This paper explores the relational and transformative dimensions of solidarity with displaced people from Ukraine in Prague and Budapest, drawing on qualitative mixed-method research. It brings together two distinct yet related urban contexts through the exploration of solidarity practices and relations that emerged in learning spaces and sites of political activism. By bringing these two urban contexts and two sites of solidarity into conversation, we highlight how such practices and relations can function as a form of commoning and care – emotional, practical, and political. Across both urban spaces, solidarity moved beyond acts of help directed only toward displaced people from Ukraine; instead, practices and relations of solidarity led to the emergence of co-created sites with various groups of marginalised locals and excluded non-citizens, challenging exclusionary structures and redefining belonging. At the same time, contestations over language, visibility, and institutional control simultaneously unsettled and transformed these sites. Bringing together the concepts of contested solidarity, care, and prefigurative politics, we highlight how displaced people and local solidarians co-create and re-negotiate spaces of cooperation, healing, and resistance in the urban contexts of Prague and Budapest.