Postsocialist Pathways


Book Description

This book, first published in 1998, analyzes democratization and economic change in the postsocialist societies of East Central Europe.




Does East Go West?


Book Description

Does East Go West? examines the study of post-socialism from an anthropological perspective. These social systems have posed a challenge to anthropological theory that has been the subject of lively exchanges for over 20 years now. Can post-socialism as a concept adequately apply to the current situation in Eastern Europe? One of the answers proposed here is that specific elements derived from postcolonial studies may prove very useful in analyzing Eastern Europe's post-socialist countries. (Series: Freiburg Studies in Social Anthropology / Freiburger Sozialanthropologische Studien / Etudes d'Anthropologie Sociale de l'Universite de Fribourg - Vol. 38)




Post-Communist Welfare Pathways


Book Description

This book adopts novel theoretical approaches to study the diverse welfare pathways that have evolved across Central and Eastern Europe since the end of communism. It highlights the role of explanatory factors such as micro-causal mechanisms, power politics, path departure, and elite strategies.




From Shock to Therapy


Book Description

The great transformation undertaken by the countries of the former communist bloc exhibits immense diversity–in terms of initial conditions, shifting target models, consistency, paths, speed, progress to date, and economic performance. This is the first comprehensive study of the economics and politics of postsocialism to be written by an author so deeply–and so successfully–involved in the reform process. Many people writing on the reform process offer advice that is not really credible; as a member of the Polish government, and architect of the successful Polish reform, Grzegorz Kolodko actually solved many of the difficulties of transition, which allows him to come forward here with policy proposals and long-term forecasts. The treatment of the transition from plan to market as a historical process is an important feature of the book. The author claims that there is no historical fatality–that sound policies in the present are more determining than the favourable or unfavourable legacies of the past. The aim is to create and maintain the conditions for sustainable growth and durable development.




Remains of Socialism


Book Description

In Remains of Socialism, Maya Nadkarni investigates the changing fates of the socialist past in postsocialist Hungary. She introduces the concept of "remains"—both physical objects and cultural remainders—to analyze all that Hungarians sought to leave behind after the end of state socialism. Spanning more than two decades of postsocialist transformation, Remains of Socialism follows Hungary from the optimism of the early years of transition to its recent right-wing turn toward illiberal democracy. Nadkarni analyzes remains that range from exiled statues of Lenin to the socialist-era "Bambi" soda, and from discredited official histories to the scandalous secrets of the communist regime's informers. She deftly demonstrates that these remains were far more than simply the leftovers of an unwanted past. Ultimately, the struggles to define remains of socialism and settle their fates would represent attempts to determine the future—and to mourn futures that never materialized.




Post-Communist Party Systems


Book Description

Examines democratic party competition in four post-communist polities in the 1990s. The work illustrates developments regarding different voter appeal of parties, patterns of voter representation, and dispositions to join other parties in alliances. Wider groups of countries are also compared.




Restructuring Networks in Post-socialism


Book Description

This book is about change in Central and Eastern Europe, and about how we think about social and economic change more generally. In contrast to the dominant 'transition framework' that examines organizational forms in Eastern Europe according to the degree to which they conform to, or depart from, the blueprints of already existing capitalist systems, this book examines the innovative character, born of necessity, in which actors in the post-socialist setting are restructuring organizations and institutions by redefining and recombining resources. Instead of thinking of these recombinations as accidental aberrations, the book explores their evolutionary potentials. The starting premise of Restructuring Networks in Post-Socialist Societies is that the actual unit of entrepreneurship is not the isolated individual personality but the social network that links firms and the actors within them. Drawing insight from evolutionary economics and from the new methods of network analysis, leading sociologists, economists, and political scientists report on changes in organizational forms in Hungary, Poland, Eastern Germany, Russia, and the Czech Republic.




Post-Soviet Power


Book Description

Post-Soviet Power tells the story of the Russian electricity system and examines the politics of its transformation from a ministry to a market. Susanne A. Wengle shifts our focus away from what has been at the center of post-Soviet political economy - corruption and the lack of structural reforms - to draw attention to political struggles to establish a state with the ability to govern the economy. She highlights the importance of hands-on economic planning by authorities - post-Soviet developmentalism - and details the market mechanisms that have been created. This book argues that these observations urge us to think of economies and political authority as mutually constitutive, in Russia and beyond. Whereas political science often thinks of market arrangements resulting from political institutions, Russia's marketization demonstrates that political status is also produced by the market arrangements that actors create. Taking this reflexivity seriously suggests a view of economies and markets as constructed and contingent entities.




Democracy and Post-Communism


Book Description

The collapse of communism was widely heralded as the dawn of democracy across the former Soviet region. However, the political outcome has been much less uniform. The post-communist states have developed political systems from democracy to dictatorship. Using examples and empirical data collected from twenty-six former Soviet states, Graeme Gill provides a detailed comparative analysis of the core issues of regime change, the creation of civil society, economic reform and the changing nature of post-communism. Within these individual cases, it becomes clear that political outcomes have not been arbitrary, but directly reflect the circumstances surrounding the birth of independence. Students of Comparative Politics, International Relations and Russian and Post-Soviet Studies should find this book essential reading.




Explaining Post-Soviet Patchworks


Book Description

This title was first published in 2001: Based on extensive research, this trilogy provides new insights into Post-Soviet transformations without taking refuge in the traditional assumption that Russia is unique. Using powerful analytical tools, this trilogy marks the re-integration of the Former Soviet Union (FSU) into the main current of political science. An invaluable resource for all those interested in Russia and the Post-Soviet states. This first volume focuses on state, sectoral, and transnational actors from a predominantly rational choice perspective. The book includes an extensive introduction by the editor which uses additional material gathered by the project team on two polls, 1999 and 2000, which, in addition to the individual studies, provide sufficient data to obtain unprecedented insights into the basic preferences and the logic of action of the main players in Russia. The outcomes of this research will be particularly relevant for students, researchers, journalists and decision-makers interested in Russia and the Post-Soviet states’ politics, international relations, economics, social policy and sociology.