Central East European Countries Research Articles

The Emergence of Patronage and Changing Forms of Rent Seeking in East Central Europe

ABSTRACT The foreign direct investment (FDI)-led development path of the East-Central European (ECE) countries has been queried most recently. Using mainly the evidence of Hungary and Poland the paper analyses one of the potential reasons of this strategic turn: the struggle between political elites. One elite was bound to the strong presence of multinational business and the institutions of the ‘competition state’. Their positions were challenged by another political elite that allied mainly with local bourgeoisie. One main arena of conflicts is the economy where political elites try to widen their influence in order to gain financial support. New forms of rent-seeking and corruption became possible after the V4 accession to the European Union (EU) when the flow of financial aid increased. Aid was channelled to partisan firms in public procurement tenders that made legal corruption possible. Political and social control over this practice declined with the demise of classic program parties’ role in politics and the raise of populist ‘business firm’ political parties.

The neoliberal hybrid in East-Central Europe. The ‘treason of intellectuals’ and its current re-assessment

Abstract The Europeanised, progressive intelligentsia in East-Central Europe (ECE) made a fundamental mistake in the nineties that amounts in some ways to the ‘treason of intellectuals’ and the basic reassessment of these naïve illusions has only begun nowadays. Motivated by the radical change in the ‘miraculous year’ (1989) the progressive intellectuals uncritically accepted and supported the Europeanisation in that particular form as it entered into the chaotic days of the early nineties, since they naively thought that its negative features would automatically disappear. In good faith, they created an apology for the established neoliberal hybrid and they sincerely defended this perverse Europeanisation against the increasing attacks of the traditionalistnativist narrative. With this action they have been unwillingly drifting close to the other side by offering some ideological protection for the ‘really existing’ neoliberal hybrid instead of criticising this deviation from genuine democratisation in order to facilitate its historical correction. However, due to the emergence of the neoliberal hybrid, the ‘external’ integration by the EU has resulted in the ‘internal’ disintegration inside the ECE member states. There has been a deep polarisation in the domestic societies and after thirty years the majority of populations in the ECE countries feel like losers, and they have indeed become losers. This controversial situation needs an urgent reconsideration, which is underway both in the EU and in the ECE as a self-criticism of the progressive intelligentsia. Thus, this paper concentrates on the reconsideration of the main conceptual issues of Europeanisation and Democratisation in ECE.1

The Emergence of East Central Europe in a Welfare Regime Typology

The paper contributes to the welfare state regime literature by assessing the existence of the East-Central European welfare state regime. The article empirically tests whether East-Central European countries constitute a distinct welfare regime or they can be classified into existing regimes by using hierarchical cluster analysis. The paper defines clusters for two distinct time periods, in order to shed light on the changes over time. The research provides two substantive contributions. First, welfare states in East-Central Europe constitute a distinct welfare state regime only for the period of 2014-2016, and they might be subdivided into two groups: (1) Visegrad countries and (2) Balkan and Baltic countries together. Second, countries within the East-Central European welfare regime has become more similar over time.

BANKING SECTOR DEVELOPMENT AND ECONOMIC GROWTH IN WESTERN BALKAN COUNTRIES

Since the collapse of the centrally-planned system, countries in transition have walked a rough road to recovery. Almost instantly, national economies opened to global markets, enforced price liberalization measures, combined with macroeconomic stabilization policies and structural reforms. At the beginning of the 1990s, they experienced a fall in output, accompanied by other deteriorating features, such as high unemployment, emigration, high level of informal economy, deteriorating balance of payments, growing debt, wars, ethnic problems etc. The annual real GDP per capita growth of most transitive economies during the early periods of transition (1990-1993) was. A major caveat in assessing the depth of the output fall is that it refers to official estimates and thus ignores the shadow economy or informal sector, which has grown very rapidly in the early transition years. The South-East European countries, additionally affected by the wars of Yugoslav secession, recorded notably larger output losses at the beginning of the transition than Central-East European Countries, reaching a negative peak of -20%, and an average decline of 10.90%, but exhibited high growth rates in the mid and late 1990s, as hostilities ended, macroeconomic stabilization took hold and structural reforms advanced. The speed of recovery differed significantly across countries, particularly in the period 1994-2001.This is particuly case in countries from Western Balkan where they were faceing and still face many economic problems like as prolonged recessions, due to differing reform progress, varying impact of the war, unemployment, poverty, low living standards and inflation. Thus, these countries always try to increase their national income and hence create more jobs with maintained economic growth. Bearing this in mind it is essential the countries from this region consider steps towards financial liberalization and deregulation which will help open the borders for capital flows and attract new investments. In fact, financial and banking sector development leads to the increase in economic growth in any economy through financing economic development.Banking system is important to the economic growth through its ability in gathering and attracting deposits from savers. Secondly, its role in providing loans to encourage investment and production. Thirdly, its ability in creating economic expansion to the most of economic sectors such as; Agriculture, industry and trade sector. Fourthly, its intermarry role between savers and borrowers. Finally, banking industry provide entrepreneurs with required loans in order to finance the adoption of new production techniques. This paper examines the question whether in 6 countries from Western Balkan the banking sector influences economic growth. The empirical investigation was carried out using fixed effect model. In this study we use two measures for the level of banking development bank credit to private sector in relation to GDP (private credit) and interst margin. Namely, private credit still appears a superior option to the pure ratio of broad money to GDP used in some studies, because it excludes credits by development banks and loans to the government and public enterprises. We expect positive relationship between private credit and economic growth. The second variable is interest margin is likely a good estimator for efficiency in the banking sector as it describes transaction costs within the sector. If the margin declines due to a decrease in transaction costs, the share of savings going to investments increases. As growth is positively linked to investment, a decrease in transaction costs should accelerate economic growth. The results suggests that credit to the private sector is positively and significant, while interes margin is negatively and insignificant related to economic growth.

Džihádističtí zahraniční terorističtí bojovníci: soudobé hrozby a výzvy ve středovýchodní Evropě

This paper deals with the phenomenon of Jihadist foreign terrorist fighters from the perspective of East Central European countries. Over the past decade, the term 'foreign terrorist fighter' has become established in scholarly literature, international law and the popular consciousness. Today, Jihadist foreign terrorist fighters are closely watched globally for the security threat they pose. Although the greatest danger in Europe is seen to be to nations in the west, several cases in East Central Europe - involving terrorists travelling through the region and attempting to radicalise local jihadists - have led Poland, Hungary, Slovakia and the Czech Republic to adopt important legislation to eliminate this threat.

Principal Component Analysis of the Potential for Increased Rail Competitiveness in East-Central Europe

Increased rail competitiveness has been the objective of many countries around the world, including member states of the EU. Although railway market liberalization has always been accompanied by high expectations of increased efficiency and competitiveness, the overall impact of such decisions can be considered controversial. This paper aims to contribute to the scientific debate by conducting a factor analysis of some East-Central European countries from the aspect of rail freight competitiveness. Since many highly correlated factors influence competitiveness, its mathematical–statistical representation and analysis is difficult due to the high number of dimensions of the factor space. Moreover, competitiveness cannot be measured directly only as a latent variable which is a feature of Principal Component Analysis (PCA). The introduced PCA, model by way of reducing the number of dimensions, can highlight the relations among the attributes and determine the most crucial issues capable of increasing rail competitiveness in the given countries and also of clustering those national railway markets. Recommendations for structural changes in national rail freight markets of the region are also supplied. Our results show that international rail competitiveness depends rather on market efficiency than on market liberalization due to the fact that the Global Competitiveness Index and Export/Import attributes did not significantly correlate with market concentration. As for the larger domestic rail freight sectors, small freight forwarders—spawned by liberalization—are shown to play a significant role in increasing competitiveness.

Analysing the course of public trust via hidden Markov models: a focus on the Polish society

We investigate public trust among the society by a statistical model suitable for panel data. At this aim, using trust’s levels measured from individual items recorded through a long-term survey we dispose of key variables with appropriate meaning. We account for the repeated and missing item responses by a hidden Markov model using longitudinal sampling weights. Since trust may be conceived as a psychological unobservable process of each person that fluctuates over time we consider observed time-varying and time-fixed individual covariates. We estimate the model parameters by a weighted log-likelihood through the Expectation–Maximization algorithm by using data collected in an East-Central European country like Poland. The latter is a country where the level of support to the national and international institutions is one of the lowest among the European member states. We apply a suitable algorithm based on the posterior probabilities to predict the best allocation to each latent typology. The proposed model is validated by generating out-of-sample responses and we find reasonable predictive values. We disentangle four hidden groups of Poles: discouraged, with no opinion, with selective trust and with fully public trust. We reveal an increasing number of people that are going to trust only some selected institutions over time.

To Economic Patriotism: New Trends in Post-Socialist Countries – EU Members

The paper analyzes the premises and impacts of dependent capitalism model formation in Central-East European (CEE) countries, new EU members; the model is based on large-scale inflow of foreign investments and coordination of economic ties by hierarchies of transnational corporations. It is stated that CEE countries’ leaderships run into a neoliberal democracy paradox, i. e. the need to meet citizens’ social demands while exercising ever less control over national economies. The prospects of dependent capitalism model continuance in the region are assessed under new post-crisis trends in world economy, in particular, in view of reduction of transborder capital flows and decelerating international trade growth.The sources of economic growth operationalized in CEE countries in order to evolve from long-running stagnation they found themselves in after the world financial crisis, are researched. It is proved that reliance on growing domestic consumption accompanied by weaker export orientation of the economy leads to CEE countries losing their important comparative advantages. The higher-than-anticipated growth of wages compared to labour productivity growth, depletion of reserves in utilization of labour resources cause deterioration of regional economy competitiveness.Special attention is paid to analyze the premises of spreading of economic nationalism ideology in the region. Exemplified by Hungary, years long leader among CEE countries in foreign capital inflow, tools are demonstrated which are applied in the framework of economic policy aimed to restore state control over market economy; an attempt is made to evaluate the effectiveness of this policy. The conclusion is drawn that – contrary to liberal dogmata dominating in economic theory – making use of tools of economic nationalism can be rather efficient even under conditions of small size post-socialist countries of Europe.

Inconvenient National Discourse and the People Who Walk to Hear It: the Case of the Slovak National Pilgrimage

The presence of nationalism in the Catholic Church, ostensibly global in its mission and outlook, has been a contentious issue especially in the post-communist countries of East-Central Europe. Events like the Slovak national pilgrimage to Šaštín, broadcast across the country on television, radio and internet, offer Catholic elite in Slovakia a rare chance to freely weave national history and national devotion into religious practice and discourse, but what does elite discourse actually tell us about the production and reproduction of nationhood in the Church? This article calls for increased exploration of reception of elite discourse in the media, not only to gauge audience reaction, but to better understand how the would-be recipients of these messages play a role in producing, reproducing or contesting these media constructions of national identity.

Crowdfunding jako innowacyjna metoda finansowania start-upów

An innovative form of financing, crowdfunding consists of raising cash online to realise charity and commercial projects. It has played a smaller role than other forms of innovative financing that do not rely on traditional intermediaries. With a relatively short history, advantages and constraints that are not well known and, in many countries, a lack of right legal regulations, confidence in its effectiveness is rare. This holds particularly in the countries of East Central Europe, including Poland, which have only gradually adopted the global economy’s instruments and innovative methods of financing. There is therefore a need to disseminate knowledge on crowdfunding and to show that it can meaningfully increase development, especially of small firms and start-ups, as a complementary and sometimes alternative source of financing. The paper uses empirical, theoretical and general logic methods to analyse the subject literature, reports from international organisations and online sources of information.

A BREXIT lehetséges makrogazdasági hatásai az Európai Únióban és Kelet-Közép-Európában

The referendum, which was held on 23rd June 2016 about the membership of the United Kingdom in the European Union, caused political and economic uncertainty in the country and had negative impacts on the further development of integration process. However, the conservative government led by Theresa May is interested in striking a compromise on the EU’s withdrawal agreement, the main problem is that hard-liner MP’s of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) from Northern Ireland and the majority of tory representatives rejected the withdrawal agreement, which was signed between the United Kingdom and the European Union at the end of November 2018. The objective of my essay is to analyse the possible macroeconomic impacts of Brexit on Great-Britain and the countries of East Central Europe. Besides the evaluation of different scenarios related to Brexit, it is a crucial issue to answer which consequences might have the UK’s withdrawal from the EU on the economies of the Eurozone and the Central and Eastern European countries. As far as the trade of goods and services is concerned, exports to the UK from CEECs is negligible in terms of their GDP, but a ‘hard Brexit’ would have negative impacts on trade linkages. Because of close relationship with the Eurozone countries, one of the main problems would be the slowdown of the Euro area, which would have negative consequences on the economic outlook of the region as a whole. Because of length constraints, I will not highlight the content of the UK’s withdrawal agreement and the evaluation of British domestic politics.

Dependent capitalism and the middle-income trap in Europe na East Central Europe

Abstract The post-2008 slowdown in economic convergence by countries of east central Europe towards the level of western Europe is interpreted with the help of a concept of dependent capitalism. Convergence appeared to be rapid up to that year, but then stalled, albeit with differing results depending on the measure used. Dependent capitalism meant that the driver for economic growth comes from inward investment by multinational companies (MNCs). Domestically owned businesses failed when faced with international competition, and their agenda hampers policies supporting an active role from the state. Inward investment is attracted by low wages and has contributed to substantial growth, but the slowdown in investment was accompanied by much slower economic growth and dangers that past investment could turn into a burden on the external balance. The strategies pursued by incoming MNCs have brought areas of upgrading, but frequently leave technological levels somewhat behind those of western Europe. Even where they use the same technologies as in their home countries, wages still remain significantly lower. Achieving full convergence would require a different growth model following a substantial change in economic policies: this does not appear likely in the near future.

Nuclear Weapons in Europe: around the Status Quo

By the end of the las decade, a new “nuclear” status quo was asserted in Europe as a result of deep reductions of non-strategic weapons of Russia and the US, the elimination of Russian and American intermediate-and shorter-range missiles, and the reduction of the arsenals by Great Britain and France. The commitment of NATO states not to station nuclear weapons on the territory of new members and the mutual commitments of Russia and the members of the alliance to exercise restraint in stationing of conventional forces are important elements of this status quo. Twice during the past decade, different options of amending this status quo were on the NATO’s agenda. In 2010–2012, proposals were put forward to unilaterally completely or partially withdraw the remaining American nuclear bombs from Europe. In 2014–2016, in the context of NATO’s returning to the policy of deterring Russia, debates concentrated on the expedience of returning to a fully-fledged nuclear deterrence that would imply an increase in the stockpile of non-strategic weapons and a different geography of their deployment in Europe, including the option of deploying them in the East-Central European countries. However, both rounds of the debates resulted in a draw. The nuclear status quo established in Europe after the end of the Cold war was preserved. Against the background of the Ukraine crisis, the option of a full or partial withdrawal of American non-strategic weapons is off the agenda for a foreseeable future. The option of mutual negotiated further reductions of Russian and American non-strategic weapons is currently not considered either. At the same time, the proponents of strengthening nuclear deterrence in Europe failed to convince their opponents within the alliance of the expedience of returning to the Cold war time strategy. It is premature to conclude, however, that the testing of the nuclear status quo is over. Ongoing debates are further affected by the critical status of the 1987 INF Treaty and the continued erosion of the conventional arms control regime in Europe.

The rise of film production locations and specialised film services in European semi-peripheries

The research on a creative economy has been gaining momentum globally in the recent years, but the associated concepts such as the cultural economy, the creative class, creative cities and so on, have typically been urban or national in orientation. There is evidence showing that many important developments in creative industries take place now in almost all parts of the globe. One of the creative industries which may serve as a vivid example of the complex interplay between the global core and the local periphery is film industry. The paper aims to discuss rise of film production locations and specialised film services in European global semiperipheries. Globalisation of film industry involves the expansion of production away from the established and globally recognised centres, such as Hollywood or Western Europe. While some researchers refer to this development as a ‘runaway production’, this paper examines it through a broader look to core-periphery relations and points out their implications and consequences from the perspective of European countries (with a focus on post-socialist countries of East Central Europe).

Indacaterol/Glycopyrronium versus Salmeterol/Fluticasone in Patients with COPD—A Cost-Effectiveness Analysis in the Czech Republic

BackgroundChronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) represents an illness with significant healthcare and societal impacts. Fixed combinations of long-acting beta-agonists (LABA) and inhaled corticosteroids have been used for COPD treatment as the standard of care for many years. A daily dose of indacaterol and glycopyrronium (IND/GLY) at 110/50 µg has recently been gaining attention due to its improved efficacy and tolerability versus the standard of care.The study aims to evaluate the cost-effectiveness of once daily IND/GLY vs. twice daily salmeterol/fluticasone propionate (SFC) at 50/500 µg in COPD patients. MethodsA microsimulation model in MS Excel was adapted to the Czech setting. Effectiveness data and disease severity stages were obtained from the FLAME study, which is a head-to head trial comparing IND/GLY vs. SFC. Quality of life data were derived from a literature review. Costs (medication, monitoring and complications) were taken from published Czech sources. The incremental cost-effectiveness ratio (ICER) was expressed as cost per quality-adjusted life year (QALY) gained. Costs and outcomes were discounted at 3 %. A lifetime horizon was used for the analysis. Cost-effectiveness was studied from the perspective of a health care system in the Czech Republic. ResultsMean QALYs were higher in the IND/GLY arm (difference 0.167 QALYs). The ICER of IND/GLY compared with SFC was €13,628 per QALY gained. Deterministic sensitivity analyses and probabilistic sensitivity analyses confirmed the base-case result to be robust. ConclusionsFrom the perspective of the Czech health care system, managing COPD using IND/GLY is cost-effective in this analysis because the base-case is clearly below the willingness-to-pay threshold in the Czech Republic, which is automatically set at 3 times GDP/capita (approximately €44,000/ QALY). This is the first available economic analysis utilizing FLAME study results in the Central East European (CEE) countries showing IND/ GLY as a highly cost-effective investment into COPD patients.

Herta Müller’s <i>Atemschaukel (The Hunger Angel)</i> in the Context of Twentieth-Century Forced Migration in East-Central Europe

My paper elaborates Herta Müller’s Gulag novel, Atemschaukel (2009; published in English under the title of The Hunger Angel in 2012), in the historical, political and ethical contexts of twentieth-century forced migrations by placing the novel among those exodus narratives that have unfolded the parallel history of Romanian-German and Jewish communities during and after the Second World War. Given the fact that the memory of forced migrations and of the Gulag is a “soft memory” (Etkind 2004), there are no consensual remembrance policies in any concerned East or East-Central European country regarding their history. In the absence of official ownership, the legacies of these colletive and individual traumas became predominantly text-based (rather than image- or monument-based). One must therefore study those aesthetical forms by which literature is able to encode the physical, psychological, moral, social-political conditions of any totalitarian rule—and thus, attempt to establish the perceptional and sensational frames on which the universe of the Gulag can be re-constructed. Accordingly, my paper gives an amplifying view of the tendencies by which Müller’s Atemschaukel both preserves and subtly re-orchestrates the conventions of the genre of the Gulag novel. One of the main achievements of her (politics of) aesthetics consists in re-creating the image of the labor camp through an ethically grounded conception of literary testimony, which, at the same time, gains and fulfills a mediative (mimetic) function.

The trade network of the Belt and Road Initiative and its topological relationship to the global trade network

Unimpeded trade is one of the cooperation priorities in the Belt and Road Initiative proposed by China. On 15 May 2017, the Joint Communique of the Leaders Roundtable of the Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation reaffirmed the participants’ shared commitment to build an open economy and ensure free and inclusive trade. The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) is not only China's new action to drive its open and global development, but also a platform for an increasing number of countries to explore free and inclusive trade and promote a universal, rule-based, open, non-discriminatory, and equitable multilateral trade system. It is therefore important to examine the topological relationship between the BRI and global trade networks. More specifically, this article first analyzes the community structure of trade networks using a community detection algorithm, and then estimates the topological relationship between different trade communities. The findings of this article are as follows. First, this research identified three trade communities and two sub-communities in the BRI trade network, in which China is the core, Russia is the sub-core of the biggest trade community, and India, United Arab Emirates, and Saudi Arabia are cores of the second trade community (South Asia-West Asia). Second, it identified five trade communities in the global trade network, centred on China, USA, Russia, India-United Arab Emirates, and Germany- Netherlands-France-Britain and other European developed countries. Third, the topological analysis indicated that in the global trade network, most BRI countries are attracted by the core nodes of the BRI regions, such as the China, Russia and India-United Arab Emirates core nodes, and have strong trade contacts with BRI countries. Most Central-East European countries are mainly attracted by Germany-Netherlands-France-Britain and other developed European countries with a low penetration of BRI trade. Although some Southeast Asian countries are incorporated into the Asia-Australia-South Africa community with China as the core, they still need to strengthen trade linkages with BRI countries.

Between retrospect and expectation: trends and dimensions of education in East Central Europe

Twenty years of transformation have gradually opened the educational systems of the East Central European countries to the common challenges of Europeanisation and Globalisation. On the other hand, the ‘educational map’ gives insights into existing or even re-awakened di erences among the individual national patterns tracing back to socio-economic, political and cultural particularise. Recognising this fundamental tension lays the ground for the recent history of education reforms and for contextualising them within their speci€ c societal frameworks. Special emphasis will be laid on the outcomes of reforms due to controversial approaches and political decisions within given constellations within their national ranges and their involvements in the policies of the European Union.

Editor's Introduction

Editor’s Introduction Catherine Chatterley, Founding Editor-in-Chief In this, our third consecutive, issue we turn our attention to three countries in east central Europe—Slovakia, Latvia, and Hungary—to investigate contemporary forms of antisemitism. Which attitudes continue to linger in these complex post-Soviet societies, and what new forms of anti-Jewish hostility, if any, exist today? How is antisemitism affected by Europe’s migrant crisis, for example? Has the upsurge in ethno-nationalism made Jews into targets once again? In all three countries, the Jewish population is a tiny fraction of what it was before World War II, and those same communities were reduced again after the fall of the Soviet Union. Despite small numbers of Jews, however, antisemitism persists and is recognizable by its familiar themes. Blaming Jews for the crimes of Soviet communism is a recurrent trope among antisemites but the general assumption of a close association between Jews and communism in this part of the world is perhaps even more common than most people assume. So much so, that this accusation, summed up by the compound phrase “Judeo-Bolshevism,” requires further study and analysis by scholars. Also present, and sometimes connected to this accusation, is the relationship to the Holocaust and the resentment it provokes, especially given the fact that EU membership for former Soviet states was dependent upon implementing Holocaust memorialization and educational programming designed to Western standards. The fact of the matter remains that in many countries in central and eastern Europe, to celebrate those who defended the nation and the goal of independence—positive and respectable actions by definition—is to also celebrate those who allied themselves with Nazi Germany (against the Soviet Union) and who participated in antisemitic activities, and even in the perpetration of genocide. This paradox, unique to this region of Europe, [End Page 1] continues to divide these societies internally and to isolate parts of the population from mainstream opinion. This is also a part of the world untouched by Vatican II (1961–1965) and the changes it dictated with regard to the Jewish people and how they are to be understood and represented by the Catholic Church after the Holocaust. The suppression of religion in the Soviet Union and its powerful reappearance in many places after the collapse of communism created a very different reality for Jewish-Christian relations in the Orthodox and Eastern Catholic worlds than that of the Roman Catholic and Protestant communities of the West. The Internet is the most powerful vehicle for the transmission and dissemination of antisemitism across the planet, and this is also true in east central Europe. The anonymity of the Web allows people to express honest feelings of hatred and to connect with others who share the same sentiments, emboldening groups of people who had previously been isolated in their silence. Hatred for Jews, homosexuality, and Muslims have formed a new triad against which traditional ethno-nationalists feel the need to organize and defend themselves. In a classic antisemitic framework, Jews are sometimes depicted as orchestrating the migrant crisis and the “homosexual agenda” to undermine traditional societies and to perpetrate a so-called “white genocide.” What is astonishing at this late date is to know how long Jews have been residents of Europe and to see that in so many ways they are still thought to be outsiders and not members of these nations. They are still Jews rather than Slovaks, Latvians, and Hungarians, and they are not even offered the option of a hyphenated identity. In this issue, Nina Paulovičová provides a valuable overview of Slovakia’s history from the Nazi period to the present day, focusing on the nation’s changing relationship to the Holocaust under communism and after independence. A masterful analysis of the complex layers of Latvian society is provided by Matthew Kott, who explains the changing position of Jews in the Latvian imagination and how the Holocaust—and the memory of the Rumbula Massacre in particular—impacts current thinking. Contemporary [End Page 2] Hungary is examined by Ferenc Laczó, who uses three case studies to analyze current attitudes toward Jews in a cultural and political context of growing ethnic nationalism. All three...

Східний напрям європейської політики сусідства: польські ініціативи.

The article analyzes the contribution of Poland to the formation of the Eastern policy of the European Union. The goals of the EU in Eastern Europe are outlined. The reasons for Poland’s considerable interest in expanding the Eastern border of the united Europe are explored. The article proves that among the EastCentral European countries which declared the intention and committed themselves to integration to European and Euro-Atlantic structures Poland firmly supported the need for creation and realization of effective Eastern policy on the part of the EU. The origins and evolution of the Polish concept of the «eastern dimension» of the EU policy are explored. The article argues that the absolute majority of Polish concepts reveal the wish of Poland to identify its place and role in the reference system of national interests and relations with neighrouring countries, ensure its safety and avoid possible threats primarily from Russia.The main aspects and directions of implementation of the European Neighborhood Policy are presented. It is telling that the EU expressed a wish to deepen its relations with its Eastern neighbours, although without concrete prospect of their integration. Meanwhile, Poland supported a possible future integration of countries which became the objects the ENP. The particular leading role of Poland in the formation and implementation of this international initiative is also determined. Furthermore, the efforts of Polish diplomacy regarding the EU enlargement to the East are specified. The article outlines the attempts of Poland to adopt the «Eastern Dimension» and analyzes the Polish eastern policy concerning Ukraine and Belarus. It is conculded that uncertainty of goals and stimuli, lack of membership prospects have become the main obstacle to effective realization of the EU’s Eastern Policy towards its addressees – Ukraine, Moldova, Belarus, Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan. Finally, the contribution of Poland to the implementation of the EU’s Eastern policy is traced.