This article discusses the Yugoslav socialist narratives and memory culture of the heroic, antifascist Partisan resistance during the Second World War and their suppression with the emergence of contested accounts of history, rise of nationalism and right-wing ideologies. The outcome of the post-communist transition in Yugoslavia was not only the disintegration of the common state, but wars, atrocities and genocide in Bosnia and Herzegovina. In multi-ethnic Bosnia and Herzegovina, ravaged by nationalism and religion-based conflicts, the return of the progressive socialist narratives of unity and social cohesion can have emancipatory potential. Such potential is explored in the Treasures of Socialism exhibition, the project in which I participated as one of the curators; thus, it is presented from my experience of working with this subversive material and institutional constraints involved in its presentation and interpretation.
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