Collapse Of Communism Research Articles

Lustration: A Post-Communist Phenomenon

The phenomenon of transitional justice appears when authoritarian regimes transform into democracies—a topic that has been studied for many years. One main focus has been the question of the responsibility of the former ruling elite and their subordinates, and in particular, criminal responsibility. After the collapse of communism in Europe, secret police informers were perceived as sharing responsibility, alongside the regime’s functionaries. The first steps toward bringing them to justice were taken in March 1990 in Czechoslovakia. The process was called “lustration,” harking back to an ancient tradition of cleansing newborns of evil. In the jargon of the Czechoslovak security apparatus, “lustrace” meant checking an individual’s secret police records. The best known example of lustration took place in Germany, but the basic idea was carried out in all post-communist Central European countries. This kind of transitional justice was not associated with criminal responsibility, and—except in Poland—the courts were not involved in lustration, which was conceived of as a purely administrative procedure. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, only the Baltic states adopted lustration legislation; in other post-Soviet states, such initiatives failed. A similar situation emerged when Yugoslavia disintegrated, where the ethnic wars overshadowed society’s memories of communist wrongdoing. Lustration was unique to post-communist states and was not seen in any other transitional context.

Iron Curtain: A Love Story by Vesna Goldsworthy

Reviewed by: Iron Curtain: A Love Story by Vesna Goldsworthy Damjana Mraović-O'Hare VESNA GOLDSWORTHY Iron Curtain: A Love Story New York. W. W. Norton. 2023. 336 pages. MILENA URBANSKA, the main character of Vesna Goldsworthy's Iron Curtain: A Love Story, is a child of privilege. An offspring of one of the two founders of a politically restrictive Soviet satellite state, Milena's life in the 1980s is marked by indulging in foreign pop culture, designer clothes, and trips abroad. Despite having a "dismal" attendance record and average performance, she is recognized as the top college student. She and her boyfriend, a child of another high-ranking state politician, are considered the Diana and Charles of her country. Milena claims that she is a rebel, both against the system and, consequently, her father, but her trespasses amount to decadent parties, sullen moods, and verbal outbursts to her parents. Milena is misunderstood and unhappy—she claims—and yet her discomfort is rather generational than political. When Milena complains about the constant lack of toilet paper in public bathrooms, she laments that she had to "waste another handkerchief. I like the touch of silk, but it was a pity always to have to throw these things away." Milena, though, changes when Misha, her Charles, kills himself playing drunk Russian roulette after serving only a few weeks of mandatory army service. Milena did not stop the game in which she also participated, and the guilt transforms her into a dedicated student and, later, a successful translator. The second change is instigated by Jason, a visiting British poet for whom she translates at a literary conference: an intense and brief love affair is followed by plans to continue their life in London. Expectedly, when Milena finally reaches the West, nothing lives up to its promise, while Jason's ultimate betrayal can be avenged only by asking for help from those against whom Milena supposedly initially revolted: her motherland and her father. The decision to acknowledge the political power of an eastern country, however, is ironic: the novel opens in December 1990, with the fall of the Iron Curtain. Milena's happiness is unattainable, regardless of politics. In her third novel, the well-established Goldsworthy revisits some of the themes she has previously discussed in her fiction and academic work, notably the ways in which the West and the East perceive each other, as well as questions of identity and freedom. Her Inventing Ruritania: The Imperialism of the Imagination (1998) is an essential contribution to Balkan studies; Gorsky (2015) follows a Russian oligarch living in contemporary London but is inspired by The Great Gatsby; Monsieur Ka (2018) is about Anna Karenina's son in post-World War II Britain. Iron Curtain, although "just" a love story, is Goldsworthy's finest novel so far: it is nuanced, funny, and relevant in a world that seems to be actively working on a new Iron Curtain. Damjana Mraović-O'Hare Carson-Newman University Copyright © 2023 World Literature Today and the Board of Regents of the University of Oklahoma

Economic complexity and environmental pollution: evidence from the former socialist transition countries

This study examines the link between economic complexity and environmental pollution by exploiting a massive and unprecedented decline of CO2 emissions and complexity in the former socialist transition countries after the fall of the iron curtain. We refer to the extended theories of the Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC), stating that environmental pollution follows an inverted u-shaped course with respect to economic complexity. Using comprehensive data of 27 countries for the period 1995–2017, our results show that the EKC can be found for countries whose complexity rose over time. Additionally, since the results for production-based and consumption-based CO2 emissions are similar, we can discard emissions offshoring as a major explaining factor. Consequently, our findings suggest that more complex products have influenced the u-shaped course of the EKC. However, as the turning point is associated with high levels of pollution, our estimates imply that complexity may even exacerbate environmental issues in the short and middle run in less developed countries.

The Serbian and Yugoslav Reception of Werner Sombart (1895-2022)

Following the publication of voluminous works such as Socialism and the Social Movement, German Economic Life in the 19th Century and Modern Capitalism, Werner Sombart (1863-1941) became one of the most prominent, most widely read and most translated European intellectuals of the first half of the 20th century. Sombart became very popular not only in Germany but also in other countries in Europe and beyond (particularly in Italy and Japan). As Reiner Grundmann and Nico Stehr have observed, the period after Sombart’s death in 1941 was marked by great changes in European and global sociological and economic thought. Consequently, Sombart was gradually marginalized and removed from the ranks of mainstream authors. Although he was held in high regard by, among others, Fernand Braudel and Joseph Schumpeter, Sombart’s work was neglected due to the paradigm changes in economics and sociology, with priority given to authors who based their research on traditions opposed to German historicism and Marxism.
 The history of this author’s reception among the Serbian and Yugoslav public is characterized by disontinuity and, compared to Max Weber and Karl Marx, insufficient comprehensiveness in its approach. It can be argued that the Serbian academic community has followed the trends in European scholarship from the late 19th century to the present day. In all analyses to date, Werner Sombart’s extensive oeuvre has been reduced to certain aspects (capitalism, social pluralism, a critique of his conceptions).
 Werner Sombart had a significant presence up until 1941. Even in these circumstances Serbian scholars, unlike Croatian ones, devoted more attention to ideas about the twilight and crisis of capitalism, the relationship between the state and the economy, the role of luxury and spending by the rich in the genesis of modern economic life. During communism Sombart’s work was completely marginalized due to ideological factors, a change of paradigm and a negative perception of his role in Germany’s political life. Also, Serbian sociology and social sciences more generally followed the trend of according great recognition to Max Weber, which, until the collapse of communism, had been limited, but following the breakup of Yugoslavia and the beginning of transition, increasingly overt and widespread, replacing the absolute dominance of the Marxist paradigm.
 And while Sombart has been completely neglected by the Croatian public, in Serbia there has been a revival of interest thanks to the recent translations of the study Luxury and Capitalism (2011) and the wartime pamphlet Traders and Heroes (2018). New research has drawn attention not only to the geopolitical aspects of Sombart’s thought, but also to his wartime engagement and the genesis of his ideas, which can be situated within the traditions of reactionary modernism.

Performances of Memory

The public space of post-socialist Europe has been marked by contested collective memories in the aftermath of violent invasions and national wars following the collapse of state socialism. This becomes even more evident in the Balkans. What forms of collective resistance can be activated in the aftermath of past atrocities? More crucially, what is the role of actions within communities that have witnessed and survived past atrocities? Examining the relationship between live art and the activist potentials of memory politics, this article explores two contemporary participatory art performances that were created in the aftermath of the Bosnian War (1992–5): Što te nema (Why are you not here?) (2006–20) by artist Aida Šehović and Our Family Garden (2021) by artist and activist Smirna Kulenović. By analysing the distinct ways in which Šehović and Kulenović employ participatory practices of remembering and collective care in their performances, the article also engages with activist interventions such as that by Women in Black (Žene u Crnom), who employ in their protests practices of public mourning. The article argues that such participatory performances that enable collective remembering in the public space function both as acts of affective resistance in the aftermath of violence as practices of care in securing a possible present.

624 Economic Development and Trends of Cerebrovascular Disease Mortality in Eastern Europe: 1992-2019

INTRODUCTION: Several studies have shown that a country's overall mortality rates are inversely related to it's gross domestic product (GDP). Eastern Europe experienced rapid economic growth after the fall of communism, and as such its public health sector swiftly improved. How this economic growth has affected mortality rates due to cerebrovascular disease has never been studied. METHODS: Eight countries were included in this study, representing the Warsaw Pact founding members: Albania, Bulgaria, Poland, Romania, Hungary, and Czechia, with Russia and Ukraine representing the former Soviet Union. As East Germany joined West Germany in 1990, it was excluded. Age standardized death rates from cerebrovascular disease per 100,000 people from 1992-2019 were taken from the World Health Organization (WHO) Mortality Database using the ICD-10 (International Classification of Disease) codes 160-169. Each country’s GDP per capita (inflation adjusted to 2015 dollar amount) during those years was taken from the World Bank World Development Indicators Database. RESULTS: Cerebrovascular disease mortality decreased from 1992-2019 in every country, despite divergent trends in economic development. Indeed, Ukraine’s cerebrovascular disease mortality rate decreased by 42.9% even though its GDP per capita decreased by 4.8%. The countries with the largest decreases in mortality are Czechia (-78.9%), Hungary (-62.7%), and Russia (-49.3%) while Albania had the smallest decrease (-29.4%). CONCLUSIONS: Rates of cerebrovascular disease mortality among the Warsaw Pact’s founding members decreased after the fall of communism, despite differing rates of economic development. Further research is warranted regarding these countries’ healthcare practices during this period. Hopefully, lessons can be gleaned to improve public health and neurosurgical care in other developing nations.

Jüdische Stadtdeputierte in der Zweiten Polnischen Republik: Projekte – Strategien – Dynamiken[The Jewish city councilors in the Second Polish Republic: Plans, strategies, dynamic

Jüdische Stadtdeputierte in der Zweiten Polnischen Republik: Projekte – Strategien – Dynamiken[The Jewish city councilors in the Second Polish Republic: Plans, strategies, dynamic

From Cotton and Smoke: Łódź—Industrial City and Discourses of Asynchronous Modernity, 1897–1994

From Cotton and Smoke: Łódź—Industrial City and Discourses of Asynchronous Modernity, 1897–1994

Kazharski, A.: Central Europe Thirty Years after the Fall of Communism. A return to a Margin?

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Representing the Warsaw Ghetto in Polish Literature

Abstract This article discusses depictions of the Warsaw ghetto in Polish poetry, prose fiction, and drama. Of all the ghettos established by the German authorities in the former Second Republic of Poland, the Warsaw ghetto is portrayed most frequently by writers. Here, representations of the Warsaw ghetto are presented in chronological order. The article covers portrayals of the Warsaw ghetto during the war, in the immediate postwar years, in the period between the 1950s and 1980s, and after the fall of communism in 1989. The article also discusses selected literary topoi related to the Warsaw ghetto. The biggest changes in the literary portrayal of the ghetto took place after 1989 and were related to the abolition of censorship, the influence of popular culture, and the emergence of writers born after the war, including representatives of the “third generation.”

The Czech Republic: From the Center of Christendom to the Most Atheist Nation of the 21st Century: Part II: The Martyred Church: The Clandestine Catholic Church (Ecclesia Silentii) in Czechoslovakia After Communism 1991-2021)

This manuscript consists of two parts, Part I. and Part II. Part I., written by the same author and titled "THE PERSECUTED CHURCH: THE CLANDESTINE CATHOLIC CHURCH (ECCLESIA SILENTII) IN CZECHOSLOVAKIA DURING COMMUNISM 1948 – 1991," was published in the January issue of the Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe (OPREE), ISSN: 2693-2148.2 It includes a brief historical overview and introduces the Clandestine Catholic Church (Ecclesia Silentii) in Czechoslovakia during Communism from 1948 to 1991. Part II. directly follows Part I. and continues with the following sections: Results, Discussion, Conclusion, and References. Part II considers the collapse of the Czech Roman Catholic Church and the end destruction of the Clandestine Catholic Church by the Holy See, along with the process of secularization after the fall of communism in Czechoslovakia from 1991 to 2021.

From Wallerstein to Rothschild

This article investigates a neglected issue of the influence of systemic transformation in Central and Eastern Europe on the (sub)field of social sciences and more broadly on local fields of power. Our case study concerns a vibrant and internationally connected network of scholars from various disciplines and generations who were involved in developing and popularizing a dependency paradigm in communist Poland. As we show that the fall of communism and related transformation in the Polish field of power brought about dramatic shift in terms of their career trajectories as well as their ideological orientation and in consequence a sudden disappearance of this academic ecosystem. On this basis we argue about wider changes—encompassing marginalization of the “critical,” autonomous tradition and strengthening of heteronomic trends in social sciences in the region but also at the global level.

The Collapse of Communism as the End of the Modernity Project? Post-Soviet Transformation Narratives of the Lithuanian Population

The article analyses how Lithuanian inhabitants remember and assess the post-communist transformation and searches for the narratives that can be interpreted through the lens of modernization theories. The paper draws on a dataset of 43 biographical interviews collected in 2021 in Panevėžys city and Panevėžys district. Employing the method of thematic narrative analysis, four dominant narratives of post-soviet transformation were identified: “demodernization”, “real modernization”, “continuation of neo-traditionalism” and“continuation of modernity”. In the narrative of “demodernization”, the Soviet regime is seen as the true modernity, and the post-Soviet transformation is perceived as a process of demodernization, when progress is replaced by stagnation or regression, manifested in the decline of industry and the disappearance of other attributes of modernity. In the narrative of “true modernity”, on the contrary, the Soviet era is seen as a false or failed modernity characterized by inefficiency and backwardness, and the features of modernity are attributed to the new order emerging after the restoration of independence. The narratives of “continuity of neo-traditionalism” and “continuity of modernity” observe similar features in both the Soviet era and the period of transformation, but the former emphasizes the neo-traditionalist or “anti-modern” features of both periods, such as inefficiency, corruption, and privilege, while the latter sees both periods as progressive in their own ways.

Remembering and Forgetting the Korean War in the Republic of Korea

The Korean War had no official ending and has continued in a form of Cold War since 1953, the year the cease-fire agreement was signed, and yet, during the past five decades, it appears to have faded from South Korean memory. Anti-communism became a national ideology in post-war South Korea. For a country that was endeavoring to establish a national identity that differs from communist North Korea, the establishment of an anti-communist state was inevitable. However, the collapse of the Communist Bloc and a humanitarian crisis in North Korea in the 1990s led to attitudinal changes in the South Korean public toward North Korea. The forgetting and remembering of North Korea in conjunction with the memory of the Korean War has left the South Korean people ambivalent toward North Koreans. This paper explores social encounters between North and South Koreans in the late 2000s in Seoul that illustrate the uneasy interactions that stem from past anti-communist education as well as the subsequent erasure of social memory about North Korea as part of Korean culture.
 
 Keywords: history, memory, migration, North Korean refugees

True Life: Poems by Adam Zagajewski

Reviewed by: True Life: Poems by Adam Zagajewski Magdalena Kay (bio) ADAM ZAGAJEWSKI True Life: Poems Trans. Clare Cavanagh. New York. Farrar, Straus and Giroux. 2023. 80 pages. THERE IS SOMETHING MAGICAL about receiving a new book by an author who is no longer living. It is an unexpected gift, bringing with it a sense of excess or what Seamus Heaney called overlife, something over and above our expectations. Although it was inevitable that Adam Zagajewski's last volume in Polish, Prawdziwe życie (2019), would be translated into English, the poet's sudden death in 2021 created a deafening silence. Zagajewski represented something more than just a talented writer—he wrote with a voice that was, and is, inimitable and enigmatic. There is nobody who sounds like Zagajewski. The curious mixture of melancholy and gratitude, of mingled horror at history and celebration of beauty, was always infused by a tenderness that was his only. Something about his voice made us readers feel as if we were speaking with a dear friend, someone with whom we had moved past awkwardness, posturing, and drama for drama's sake. His ability to create such an impression in thousands of readers and in a variety of languages is truly a feat. This is not the sort of achievement that one encounters often. The fact that Clare Cavanagh manages to translate this indefinable quality of voice from Polish into English testifies to her skill. Her work has helped earn Zagajewski a large audience in English-speaking countries; indeed, the poet states that he has come to feel as if her translations were poetic originals. If there are occasional turns of phrase that will seem more familiar in Polish than in English (such as glancing historical references that depend on shared cultural freight), they are never alienating. Such gestures have been earned by a writer who is too often seen as a historical poet pure and simple. Zagajewski will always be associated with the anti-Communist resistance that remains an integral part of his legacy, but the mature poet who continued writing after the fall of communism in eastern Europe employed a different style and tackled different subjects than the young dissident of the 1970s. Today, Zagajewski is known for his everyday subjects, his aestheticism, his tender melancholy, and his indefinable spirituality—we may call it a type of mysticism. The poet's personal history claims as great a share of our attention as the public history that he is associated with. True Life retains the same ordering of poems as its Polish predecessor, which usefully allows readers to experience Zagajewski's range: rather than clustering poems that treat similar topics, the volume is organized according to the principle of variety and surprise. It opens with "The Twentieth Century in Retirement," thus summoning the historical awareness of what Czesław Miłosz dubbed the Polish School of Poetry, yet continues with an evocation of the poet's parents, of other poets, of bygone acquaintances, of the poet's travels, and, eventually, intensely personal anecdotes. Zagajewski has asserted that his poetry is more autobiographical than that associated with the Polish School. Readers of Miłosz, however, may counter that the difference between the two is not so much in the eschewal or embrace of autobiography as in the approach taken toward it. Zagajewski's tone is strikingly modest; his emphasis is often on belonging to a humbled collective ("Rain in Lvov") or an individual self that admits its capacity for error and for growth ("Enlightenment"). His poetic self that does not cover up its vulnerability, and the unguarded quality of his poetry, are among its most welcoming qualities. Such qualities breed both tenderness and humor: as the poet is tempted to stretch out a conceit (say, the practice of noting errata, or misprints, in books as a practice that begs to be applied to life itself), so he realizes the humor this may entail. It is both self-deprecating—he can feel the ponderousness of his own metaphor—and deftly ironic, as the poet concludes that errors may be incorrigible, and the urge to correct should be treated with gentle irony rather than moralistic zeal. Click for...

Https://hrcak.srce.hr/294970

The past few decades have been marked by a substantial increase in health spending in Central and Eastern European countries. At the same time, healthcare systems have experienced significant changes, as a consequence of economic and political transformation processes that these countries have undergone after the fall of communism. The aim of this paper was to briefly present current situation and trends in healthcare financing in Central and Eastern European countries. Our approach is based on an analysis of a number of healthcare expenditures indicators which are connected to healthcare spending patterns in each of these countries. Comparative research of these countries aims to demonstrate a degree of similarities or variations in the structure and finances in health systems. According to results, public involvement in health financing is still dominant in the majority of countries, but it has recorded a downward trend. On the other hand, private spending has been increasing mostly due to increase in out-of-pocket payments. Key words: healthcare expenditures, public health spending, out-of-pocket payments, CEE countries

A Different Kind of Heroes: The Romanian Anticommunists during Postcommunist Era

In Romania, a hero was always considered to be a historical or cultural figure who fought for the union of all Romanians, for the preservation and transmission of the Romanian language, as well as for the Romanian traditions and values. A person who defied the state (considered as a national asset, Barbu (2004, p. 106)) and cherished values such as freedom, solidarity, communality was perceived as a negative charac-ter. However, the fall of communism in 1989 changed this perception and brought along a new perspective on this category of people. The anticommunist fighters, most of them former political detainees, were/are depicted as a new type of heroes, animat-ed by ideals and values which characterized the West to which Romanians wanted to adhere. My paper investigates this new category of heroes and its main symbols. It discusses the importance of the national myths and the cult of dead in the heroization process. Furthermore, my paper argues that the victimization paradigm and the male dominated Pantheon hinder the acceptance of former political detainees as national heroes.

Double-edged sword: persistent effects of Communist regime affiliations on well-being and preferences

During Communism, party members and their relatives were typically privileged elites in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) and the former Soviet Union (FSU). At the same time, secret police informants were often coerced to spy and report on their fellow citizens. After the fall of Communism, CEE countries and the Baltics underwent decommunization, unlike most FSU countries. This paper is the first to empirically distinguish between these two Communist party regime affiliations and study their long-term implications for the well-being and preferences of affiliated individuals and their relatives. In the FSU, we find that individuals connected to the former Communist party are more satisfied with their lives, but those linked to secret police informants seem to have lower life satisfaction than those without such ties. The life satisfaction benefit of having former Communist regime party connections in the FSU is, on average, equivalent to one month’s household income. Simultaneously, the psychological costs of being an informant can amount to two monthly household incomes. In CEE countries, having informant connections is not associated with life satisfaction, but having links to the former Communist party is negatively correlated with subjective well-being. Formal and informal decommunization efforts are an important mechanism behind our findings. We also show that those connected to the former regimes differ from those without such connections in their preferences for democracy and market economy, levels of optimism, and risk tolerance, which provides suggestive evidence for the mechanisms underpinning our findings. Our results underscore that the former Communist regimes produced winners and losers based on the trustee status of their collaborators that decommunization efforts further shaped and solidified. Future decommunization efforts in the FSU may thus have important welfare implications.

Parental Involvement and School Choice in Hungarian Primary Schools

ABSTRACT In this study, we examine the features of school choice by comparing parental involvement between denominational and public schools. In Hungary, denominational schools reemerged after the fall of communism in 1989, and their share increased further after 2010. The survey data, we employ, refer to primary school children’s parents and were focused on parental involvement at home and at school. Our hypothesis is based on the work of Epstein and Coleman and suggests a prominent role for denominational schools in parental involvement. However, our results show that Hungarian denominational schools differ in terms of parental involvement and school choice from what theory or practice in other western countries suggests. School choice of Hungarian parents is primarily driven by the intention to ensure a more culturally and economically homogeneous and safer environment for their children. Parental involvement tends to be stronger at home and at school due to higher parental religiosity, regardless of the school sector. The novelty of our findings is, that opposite to the literature, mostly not the school type but parents’ religiosity increase both the home based and the school based parental involvement.

Immigrants' Contribution to Innovativeness: Evidence from a Non-Selective Immigration Country

The economic consequences of migration are hotly debated and a main topic of recent populist movements across Europe. We analyze Polish immigration in the context of the 2004 enlargement of the European Union and find a positive and significant spillover effect of the immigrants on the number of local inventors in German counties in 2001-2010. For causal identification, we exploit a historical episode in the Polish migration history to Germany before the fall of the Iron Curtain and construct a shift-share instrument. Our results differ from findings for high-skilled migration to the United States, which is particularly interesting as Polish immigration to Germany was not based on selection by qualification in our period of analysis.