Slovenia: On the Edge of the European Union by Bogomil Ferfila Paul Phillips (review)

Abstract

REVIEWS 387 ideocracy, that is, in the reign of an idea, implemented by a ruling party representing the idea'. They advocated a 'demotic [government], broadly supported by the people and acting in the interests of the people, but not democratic' (p. I 20). Clearly, the classical Eurasians were a group of academics and publicists to be taken more seriouslythan the 'neo-Eurasian' would-be theorists of contemporary Russia. Some of them, in distinction to most of the more extreme 'neo-Eurasians', made a number of widely acknowledged, substantialand even seminal scholarly contributions in such fields as ethnology, linguistics, and history. Nevertheless, a newcomer to Eurasianism,like myself, would have preferreda more explicit argument on what actually makes the political implications of classicalEurasianideas (e.g. their idea of 'ideocracy' or their radical anti-Europeanism) qualitatively different from the ideologies of the above mentioned pseudo-neo-Eurasians (e.g. Dugin's anti-'Atlanticism').Perhaps,this is, however, askingtoo much of this volume which was merely conceived as a general surveyof, and guide to furtherreadingson, the thinkingof the classicalEurasians.In that regard,one should surelycongratulatethe editorson theirexcellent achievement. TheUralsStateUniversity at Yekaterinburg ANDREAS UMLAND Ferfila,Bogomil, and Phillips, Paul. Slovenia. OntheEdgeof theEuropean Union. UniversityPressof America, Lanham,MD, New Yorkand Oxford, 2000. vi + I97 pp. Notes. Tables. Bibliography.Index. $27.50 (paperback). PERHAPS the strongest feature of Slovenia: OntheEdgeof theEuropean Unionby Bogomil Ferfilaand Paul Phillips is the breadth of material it encompasses. While a large section of the book focuses on the public finances, with a particularemphasis on the mid-iggos, it also provides extensive coverage of the partypolitical scene;other aspectsof macroeconomic policy, the structure and after-effects of privatization, labour relations and monetary union. Although the political background is better covered elsewhere (see for example, Slovenia andtheSlovenes: aSmallStateandthe NewEurope, London, 2000), this work includes a considerable body of material which those unfamiliar with Slovenia might find hardto find elsewherein one volume. That one strong point does not, however, outweigh the many weaknesses and oddities of this work. It does not contain an introduction, and one is left without a strong sense of what the authors are tryingto achieve. Is this book intended as an analysisof Slovenia's economic performance in the aftermath of independence? Or is it, as the title might suggest, focused on assessingthe country's suitability for EU accession, and the likely impact of eventual accession?It appearsto try to achieve all of these goals, but succeeds at none of them. While the first section of the book, entitled 'Slovenian Political Economy' includes an interesting discussion of the labour market, the coverage of the public finances, have some obvious weaknesses.This is most evident in chapter four, which purportsto provide a comparative analysisof the budget process in Slovenia and other transition countries, but is greatly handicapped by its excessive reliance on a comparison purely between Hungary and Slovenia, focusing on one, increasinglyirrelevantyear I994. 388 SEER, 8o, 2, 2002 The second section, entitled 'European Union Problems and Perspectives ' is perhaps the weakest,venturingsomewhat inexplicablyfor a book with this title into a comparison of relations between Japan and the European Union, and a discussion of the likelihood of the establishment of an Asian monetary union. The thirdsection, is describedas 'Slovenia in a comparative perspective',but providesfew comparisons. A large number of typographical errors, the most glaring of which is a referenceto 'Slobidan (sic)Milosevic' (p. 67), suggestthat thisvolume has not been proof-read. An unfortunatebyproduct of tryingto cover so many areas in 197 pages is that a large body of thisworkinculcatesfacts,without any real analysis, leaving it feeling somewhat dated. Thus the authors venture to inform us that 'if all goes according to current Slovenian plans, accession to the EU will be followed by itsjoining the EuropeanMonetary Union, the final frameworkof Europeanization' (p. I5). This raises so many questions:what monetary policy is appropriate in the run-up to accession? Why should Slovenia even try to meet the Maastrichtcriteria?What influence, if any, will Slovenia, have on the European Central Bank? Such issues have been exercising policy-makers across the region, and have been addressed, for instance, in a range of IMF working papers (see, for example, Implications of EMUfor Exchange RatePoliy in...