Miroslav Konvalina, Director of Czech Center New York, presented the award to Milan Babík during the conference "Havel and Our Crisis" at Colby College. The conference dealt with the current world challenges like COVID-19 pandemic, inequality and fragmentation, fake news and disinformation, populism, Russian invasion of Ukraine and destabilizing the European order. About all these issues, which are threatening the current democracy as we know it, were spoken speakers such as Michael Žantovský, Timothy Snyder, Marci Shore and many more.
Milan Babík is a professor in the International Studies department at Colby College, where he has introduced new study abroad programs in Prague and Salzburg and often organizes conferences related to Central Europe and the Czech Republic. He has also written several books and articles on foreign policy, international affairs, political religions, and narrative theory and has taught at Williams and Dartmouth.
The Crystal Heart, designed by Czech glassmaker Lukáš Šulc, has been awarded by the Czech Center New York since 2019. Previous recipients of the Crystal Heart include opera singer Kristýna Kůstková or Director of the National Czech and Slovak Museum & Library (NCSML) in Iowa Cecilia Rokusek.
The conference was organized by many institutions like Colby College, Václav Havel Library in Prague, Czech Center New York and Havel Albright Transatlantic Dialogues.
