Central East European Countries Research Articles

The EU polycrisis and hard populism in East -Central Europe: From the Copenhagen dilemma to the Juncker paradox

AbstractAnalyses of populism in East -Central Europe (ECE) necessarily depart from the general crisis of representative democracy in the EU and describe the ECE as a specifi c regional case reflecting the failure of the catch -up process. The first part of this article adopts this “classical” approach and considers the backsliding of ECE democracy alongside the rise of populist identity politics in the global context. In the second part, I turn to the historical trajectory of ECE populism as a “nested” or two -level game in the EU context of ECE developments. The third part of this article outlines the main contradictions in this process that has led to what I call the Juncker paradox. To understand this paradox, we need to return to what the Commission noted in the early 2010s as the Copenhagen dilemma: aft er the EU accession of ECE states, the EU had no means to control rule -of -law violations and, in fact, supported autocratic populist ECE regimes through European transfers. This article explains the worsening of this situation in the late 2010s as the EU polycrisis caused Juncker’s Commission to focus on Core -based priorities and marginalise rule -of -law violations in ECE. This inaction and neglect have produced a special case of negative externalities - the Juncker paradox - that has largely been counterproductive and further strengthened anti -EU populism in all ECE countries, especially Hungary and Poland. Despite this situation, I conclude that Juncker’s 2017 State of the Union address should be a turning point in the EU’s policy towards ECE; in particular, it should promote a better understanding of the regional situation and more effective enforcement of the rule of law.

TOO WEAK TO INFLUENCE? A CASE STUDY OF THE LITHUANIAN NGDOs IN FOREIGN AID POLICY MAKING

For the East Central European Countries (ECE), the membership in the European Union also meant an entry into the foreign aid donor community. To understand the international development policy change in over a decade and a policy divergence among the ECE countries that have started from relatively similar situations, this article offers the case study of Lithuania and the analysis of domestic policy actors, namely the non-governmental development organizations (NGDOs) as one of the policy change facilitating factors. It provides an empirically-rich account of how Lithuanian NGDOs participate in the national foreign aid policymaking and explains factors that affect Lithuanian NGDOs’ capacity to influence government decisions. Szent-Ivanyi’s and Lightfoot’s theoretical model guided the analysis of the Lithuanian NGDOs umbrella organisations composition and power relations, their organizational capacities, foreign donor assistance and attitudes of the state actors. The article concludes the limited, yet increasing Lithuanian NGDOs’ role in shaping Lithuanian foreign aid policies, as undermined as they are by the chronic lack of resources to fund advocacy from national sources and the dependency on the EU project-based funding. Consequently, these circumstances constrain the NGDO Platforms’ focus mostly on the EU development agenda and therefore mimic the European NGO networks’ policy agenda. The lack of capacities among the NGDOs to adapt a European policy agenda to the national foreign aid policy reality makes it of limited relevance to the policy makers domestically.

Spatial association of population pyramids across Europe: The application of symbolic data, cluster analysis and join-count tests

Demographic processes across European regions show great diversity, but because of this diversity, it is hard to gain an overview of similarities and differences. This paper aims to examine the application of a new combination of existing approaches to the analysis of regional population pyramids to offer such an overview. Symbolic data analysis and cluster analysis are used to identify typical shapes of population pyramids, before applying join-count tests to examine the spatial distribution of these pyramid shapes. The data used are for 1397 NUTS regional units in 37 European countries in 2015.We find that Irish regions, Cyprus and some of the capital cities of Western Europe present the youngest population across Europe, while the population of Eastern Germany is the oldest and shrinking in size. Countries of East-central Europe are the most homogeneous in their demographic processes for the chosen period, while the large demographic discrepancies occur within Spain, France, the UK, Finland, and Sweden between NUTS regions. A spatial study indicated positive spatial autocorrelation, and the transnational character of demographic processes across Europe. For a detailed examination of East-central Europe, we applied local statistics, and revealed three transnational spatial clusters resulting from historical and socio-economic processes.

Credit risk determinants in Sub-Saharan banking systems: Evidence from five countries and lessons learnt from Central East and South East European countries

Banking systems in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) have grown notably over the past decades due to benign macroeconomic, regulatory and financial trends. Nonetheless, downside risks remain elevated by structural issues, commodity price fluctuations, reversal of capital flows and spill-over effects from external shocks in a manner similar to the Central East and South East European (CESEE) countries. In the light of the 2008–2009 Global Financial Crisis, great attention has been given to understanding the causes of banking instability with most of the research focusing on advanced economies and, to a lesser extent, large emerging markets while little attention has been paid to the bank-based financial sectors of Sub-Saharan Africa. Furthermore, there is scarcity of studies aiming at knowledge-sharing among different emerging economies. This paper aims to identify the determinants of bank credit risk by focusing on five SSA countries: Kenya, Namibia, South Africa, Zambia and Uganda. Using the ARDL approach to cointegration, findings indicate that increased money supply conditions have a decreasing effect on NPLs in all counties, banking industry-specific variables play a significant role in the case of South Africa and Uganda while NPLs are driven by country-specific variables in the case of Kenya, South Africa and Zambia. The effect of the Global Financial Crisis is evidenced indirectly. Drawing on evidence from CESEE countries with long experience in banking crises, reforms and financial deepening process, the paper provides lessons for SSA countries and offers policy recommendations in the direction of strengthening banks’ balance sheets to ensure financial stability.

Returning home: An evaluation of Hungarian return migration

This paper deals with the Hungarian return migration process and the importance of identity changes for migration decisions. Outmigration of labour force from Hungary and other East Central European countries has intensified after the EU accession in 2004 and 2007. The possibility of free movement encouraged many Eastern and Central European citizens to leave their country; however, this is not a one-way process. A significant number of migrants returned to the home country with newly acquired skills and other assets. The majority of migration theories evaluate return migration by the role of family, motivations or different kinds of acquired capital, but the importance of identity change is less considered. Our primary aim is to investigate the future migration strategy of Hungarian returnees. The paper is based on national policy analysis and indepth interviews. According to our results, interviewees highlighted the role of work experience and family status. In general, highly skilled returnees met fewer obstacles during their return due to higher flexibility and former employer contracts, but family issues might represent more obstacles during the return. Lower skilled returnees were more dissatisfied with their return, especially those who migrated together with their family members. Hence, the chance for another emigration was higher than in the highly skilled group.

“A Book Never Dies”: The American Library Association and the Cultural Reconstruction of Czechoslovak and Polish Libraries, 1945–1948

ABSTRACTThe American Library Association (ALA)'s role in the postwar cultural reconstruction of East Central European countries such as Czechoslovakia and Poland has not been widely studied. The paper contributes to a better understanding of American cultural influence in that part of Europe by examining the ALA's efforts of sharing the works of American culture and science with war-devastated libraries in the context of war losses suffered by Czechoslovak and Polish libraries and a rising tide of totalitarianism in Eastern Europe. Particular attention is given to individual requests for books and periodicals as they offer a firsthand account of the war devastation and an insight into various needs of Czechoslovak and Polish libraries in early postwar years.

Sacrifice and Rebirth: The Legacy of the Last Habsburg War by Mark Cornwall and John Paul Newman

Reviewed by: Sacrifice and Rebirth: The Legacy of the Last Habsburg War by Mark Cornwall and John Paul Newman John E. Fahey Mark Cornwall and John Paul Newman, Sacrifice and Rebirth: The Legacy of the Last Habsburg War. Austrian and Habsburg Studies 18. New York: Berghahn, 2016. 295 pp. How a war ends is at least as important as how it begins. There is no lack of excellent recent scholarship on the start and course of World War I, which should be matched by work on the aftermath. Mark Cornwall and John Paul Newman's Sacrifice and Rebirth: The Legacy of the Last Habsburg War is an insightful look at the many varied veterans' groups, commemorative events and societies, political ramifications, and memorials in the former Habsburg lands. The book offers valuable perspectives on the individuals and groups most affected by the war, that is, veterans and their families who remained active in commemorative groups. Memorial activity naturally varied widely between successor states and became acutely tied up in post-Habsburg political narratives, making the memory of Austria-Hungary's unusually fragmented among the newly expanded, contracted, formed, and divided countries of east central Europe. While there have been books and articles on individual communities or nations, Sacrifice and Rebirth offers useful comparisons [End Page 149] by exploring the entire post-Habsburg world. Cornwall and Newman and their contributors find enough commonalities to argue that a shadow of the Habsburg mental space lingered on well after the war. Cornwall and Newman divide the postwar legacy of Austria-Hungary geographically between places where the war was seen as a defeat (Austria, Hungary, the Sudetenland, and Transylvania), a victory (Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia and Romania), and a mixed state—areas annexed by new or expanded victor states (Croatia, Slovenia, Polish Galicia, and Tyrol). In all regions, individual wartime experience had to be adapted and molded into broader narratives, an exceptionally difficult task for countries like Yugoslavia or Poland, made up of former and current enemies. Catherine Edgecombe and Maureen Healy examine perhaps the most fundamental questions of interwar Austria and the former Habsburg Empire more generally. Virtually everyone in the Austrian First Republic had sacrificed in some way during the war, but for what? While interwar commemorative ceremonies and organizations offered a variety of lenses to find meaning in wartime suffering, including "fatherland," "God and religion," or just "comradeship," no interpretation was universally or even widely accepted. Naturally, this lack of a unified narrative was accompanied by a sharp rise in paramilitary and revanchist groups in Austria and Hungary, as discussed by Robert Gerwarth. In contrast to defeated Austria and Hungary, the "victor states" were usually able to create a somewhat coherent narrative of struggle and reward. This was only possible by ignoring large minority populations and producing approved memorabilia. For example, the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes (Yugoslavia as of 1929) exhibited hundreds of Serbian wartime photographs from the Balkan Wars and World War I. Melissa Bokovoy's chapter examining the exhibits and accompanying photo albums shows how the Serbian ideal of militarized manhood was first created and then spread, as were narratives of wartime suffering and solidarity. This naturally prioritized the Serbian experience of war and removed Croat and Slovene memories from the national pantheon. Czechoslovakia had a similarly conflicted experience of war. Nancy M. Wingfield's chapter on interwar commemoration of the Battle of Zborov illustrates the new state's difficult position. Zborov was a minor engagement [End Page 150] during the Kerensky Offensive; as the first major action by Czechoslovak Legions, it became a key part in the new national pantheon. Of course, the accepted version overlooked the loyal Czech and Slovak forces fighting for the Habsburgs and instead focused on approved Czech soldiers and leaders to the exclusion of much of the rest of the multinational state. Katya Kocurek's chapter complements Wingfield's nicely by looking at the political activity of Legionary veterans' associations, particularly the more right-wing Independent Union of Czechoslovak Legionaries. Other countries completely overwrote the memory of World War I. For example, millions of Poles served in World War I in the armies of Austria-Hungary, Germany, and Russia. However, these victims and...

Entrepreneurial Parties: A Basic Conceptual Framework

The paper offers a conceptual framework to investigate the phenomenon of entrepreneurial parties in the countries of East-Central Europe. The authors evaluate existing concepts related to increasing interdependence of party politics and the business sector, such as business-firm parties. These concepts are typically much too bound to a particular example of historically emerging entrepreneurial party and therefore the paper offers a more general concept of entrepreneurial party. The concept is based on five basic features: (1) the central role of the leader and his private initiative, (2) the party as a personal vehicle, (3) the crucial formative influence of a leader over the political project. Two other features are related to the social and institutional un-rootedness of the entrepreneurial party which is neither a product of (4) a promoter/sponsor organisation or social movement, nor it is an outcome of (5) a parliamentary split or emergence of a new faction.

Editorial Note: Populism and Its Impact on the Political Landscape

During recent decades, populism and populist political parties have become an integral part of European party systems. With the growing number of successful populist challengers and stabilization of their electoral support in many countries both in the Western and East-Central European countries, an important question has arisen: what is the impact of populism on the political landscape in Europe? This question was addressed by the 2nd Prague Populism Conference which took place in May 2016. It was organized by the Institute of International Studies at Charles University and the Heinrich Böll Foundation in cooperation with the Goethe-Institut. To understand the impact of populism on the political landscape, various researchers from all around the world discussed the growing success of populist parties and movements from a theoretical point of view and as case studies in individual European countries (60 researchers from 20 countries presented their research and findings, including the key note speeches by Michael Freeden, Paul Taggart, and Reinhard Heinisch). The present issue of the Czech Journal of Political Science consists of selected papers presented at the conference.

Динамика индекса глобальной конкурентоспособности стран Центральной и Восточной Европы в 2006–2014 годах [На англ.

Динамика индекса глобальной конкурентоспособности стран Центральной и Восточной Европы в 2006–2014 годах [На англ.

Vidiniai neramumai Lietuvos Respublikoje 1919–1940 metais | Internal Disturbances in the Republic of Lithuania, 1919–1940

During the interwar period in Europe, internal disturbances were not an uncommon form of domestic tension and conflict. This paper looks into the concept and characteristics of domestic disturbances in Lithuania in the period 1918 to 1940. The aim is to show the opportunities for organising such disturbances and the legal regulation of their control, including the use of the army to quell them. The legal regulation of the possibilities to use the army during the disturbances, and the situational circumstances of using troops in such cases in Lithuania, are compared with similar cases in other East-Central European countries, such as Estonia, Latvia and Poland.

Strategiczne porozumienia ponad podziałami – Grupa Wyszehradzka jako przykład integracji i emancypacji w ramach Unii Europejskiej

Functioning of the Visegrad Group since its beginning was not an easy issue. V4 was established to integrate East-Central European countries into Euro-Atlantic structures in the atmosphere of cooperation. However, it was a partnership o f countries which in many cases guided by different interests. From the beginning, there was no sympathy inside the Group, but over time it changed. Since joining into the European Union in this cooperation experienced moments of common mobilizing such as: a struggle under the EU Cohesion Policy, the fight for the Union budgets, and the last one position against the welcome of refugees arriving to Europe. It should be noted that properly develop cooperation of Visegrad Group at the elementary level in areas such as: environmental protection, infrastructure, transport and energy projects and tourism. An important new motivation to this cooperation is founded in 2016 EU Battle Group of the Visegrad Group with almost 4 thousand soldiers.

Determinants of civil society influence: The case of international development and humanitarian NGOs in the Czech Republic and Hungary

Accession to the EU has had ambiguous effects on civil society organizations (CSOs) in the East Central European countries. A general observation is that accession has not led to the systematic empowerment of CSOs in terms of growing influence on national policy making. This article investigates the determinants of successful CSO advocacy by looking at international development and humanitarian NGOs (NGDOs) in the Czech Republic and Hungary. Reforms in the past decade in the Czech Republic have created an international development policy largely in line with NGDO interests, while Hungary’s ministry of foreign affairs seems to have been unresponsive to reform demands from civil society. The article argues that there is clear evidence of NGDO influence in the Czech Republic on international development policy, which is because of the fact that Czech NGDOs have been able solve problems of collective actions, while the Hungarian NGDO sector remains fragmented. They also have relatively stronger capacities, can rely on greater public support and can thus present more legitimate demands towards their government.

Are the Central East European Countries Pollution Havens?

The aim of this article is to investigate the relationship between environmental stringency and intra–European Union (EU) trade flows. Two main hypotheses are tested. First, we test whether the stringency of a country's environmental regulations may result in pollution havens. Second, we test whether the results differ by industry and by the EU membership tenure (EU-15 vs. the newly added Central East European Countries). An augmented gravity model is estimated using panel data for 21 countries during the period from 1999 to 2013 for the full sample and also separately for the Central East European Countries and the EU-15 members. Our results show weak support for the pollution haven hypothesis for some dirty industries, mainly for net exports from western EU countries to the rest. Instead, support for the “Porter hypothesis” is found for trade in clean goods.

Comparative Assessments of the State of Democracy in East-Central Europe and Its Anchoring in Society

In this issue we aimed to evaluate the state of democracy in four East-Central European (ECE) countries ten years after their accession to the European Union (EU). Critical analyses of the sustaina...

Foreign Direct Investment in the Western Balkans: What Role Has it Played During Transition?

The paper explores the impact of foreign direct investment (FDI) on the economies of the Western Balkans during their transition to a market system. The paper recalls the political and historical circumstances that have delayed transition in the Western Balkans economies, and draws attention to the specific features of FDI that have influenced their economic development. The main hypotheses are formulated and basic tests performed on data from the manufacturing sector. However, data limitations mean that we can only test for horizontal, rather than vertical, spillovers and in practice we are not able to identify many significant horizontal spillover effects. This finding can probably be explained by various factors – institutional, economic and political – that have constrained FDI effects in the Western Balkan economies in comparison with the Central East European countries. Our work has important policy implications; in order to accelerate economic development, Western Balkan policymakers may need to implement more effective economic policies.

Value Priorities of Younger and Older Adults in Seven European Countries

This paper addresses the question of whether the value priorities of older and younger adults differ, and if so, whether the pattern of differences is similar in countries with different experience of economic, political and social change. The data from the 2008 wave from ESS about responses to a 21-item version of the Portrait Values Questionnaire (PVQ, Schwartz 2003) were used to compare value priorities in younger (under 30 years) and older adults from five East-Central European countries—Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, and Russia—and two relatively stable Nordic welfare states—Finland and Sweden. The study found a clear general trend for younger adults toward Openness to Change and Self-Enhancement on the two value dimensions. Age group differences were more pronounced in East-Central countries, and on Conservation—Openness to Change dimension. Younger people from different countries had more similar values than older adults in regard to the importance placed on Openness to Change. The discussion focused on possible reasons of the findings such as the different effect of societal change on value priorities of people from different age groups.

Competitiveness of Metropolitan Regions in Visegrad Counties

Nowadays competition between regions and consequently the examination of regional competitiveness has become a research question of outstanding importance. In our study we will first look at the definition of competitiveness and the frames of interpretation related to its definition. Afterwards we will proceed to analyse the competitiveness of 93 NUTS3 level regions of 4 East-Central European countries (Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia) with the help of an empirical data base, using principal component analysis method. Regional competitiveness studies tend to be relative, that is why we mostly compare the competitiveness of the metropolitan regions to each other.

A cost of living longer: Projections of the effects of prospective mortality improvement on economic support ratios for 14 advanced economies

The economic implications of increasing life expectancy are important concerns for governments in developed countries. The aims of this study were as follows: (i) to forecast mortality for 14 developed countries from 2010 to 2050, using the Poisson Common Factor Model; (ii) to project the effects of the forecast mortality patterns on support ratios; and (iii) to calculate labour force participation increases which could offset these effects. The forecast gains in life expectancy correlate negatively with current fertility. Pre-2050 support ratios are projected to fall most in Japan and east-central and southern Europe, and least in Sweden and Australia. A post-2050 recovery is projected for most east-central and southern European countries. The increases in labour force participation needed to counterbalance the effects of mortality improvement are greatest for Japan, Poland, and the Czech Republic, and least for the USA, Canada, Netherlands, and Sweden. The policy implications are discussed.

Facing Marxist Orthodoxy: Western Marxism,The Making, and the Communist Historiographies of Czechoslovakia and Poland, 1948–1990

AbstractAlthough the impact of Thompson’s work outside the UK has been recognized and pointed to many times, the ways in which Thompsonian categories and concepts, or Marxist thought from the West more broadly, was received in the countries of the former Eastern Bloc remain rather unclear. AlthoughThe Makinghas never been translated into Polish, Czech, or Slovak, the historians of East-Central European countries were not totally cut off from Western scholarship. Major academic institutes and universities throughout the communist bloc maintained basic contacts with colleagues in the West, and Thompson’s work was known among some local social historians. Marxism from the West in general and Thompson’s work in particular posed challenges that had to be dealt with. This paper traces the ways in which historians of Poland and Czechoslovakia responded to these challenges to the official position of Marxist orthodoxy. TakingThe Makingas an example, it highlights the reception (or lack thereof) of Western influences on local scholarship, and the dynamics of these encounters – whether they were affirmative or critical – in relation to the changing political landscape of East-Central European countries after World War II.