Post-communist Period Research Articles

‘The Whole of Poland Saw It, and You Gentlemen are Blind’: Match-Fixing in Polish Football – A Case Study from 1993

This paper focuses on one of the most famous match-fixing cases in the history of Polish football – when in 1993 the Polish Football Association decided to subtract points due to match-fixing in the last match round of the season, an action which meant that Legia Warsaw were stripped of the Polish title. The paper initially presents a brief overview of the history of match-fixing in Polish football and then moves on to an informed narrative of the 1993 case. Two primary analytical focuses are adopted: first the 1993 case study is analyzed in the light of a typology established by criminologist Declan Hill explaining why corruptors decide to fix football matches. Second societal reactions to the 1993 scandal are analyzed. The paper questions to what extent reactions to the 1993 match-fixing scandal were affected by the profound social, political, and cultural transformations of the immediate post-communist period. To do so, the sociological concept of ‘cultural trauma’ is scrutinized in the context of football match-fixing. It is argued that the 1993 scandal was a ‘trigger’ which allowed cultural trauma to emerge and that reactions to the scandal were heavily influenced by wider societal events.

History of the oil and gas industry in Romania

Abstract Oil and gas activities in Romania cover a long time interval from antiquity until the present day. Most importantly, the year 1857 represents the starting point for industrial production in Romania when three world oil firsts were achieved: the first country with a crude oil production formally recorded in domestic and international statistics (275 tons); the first petroleum industrial refinery, located in Ploiești, with a processing capacity of 7.5 tons/day; Bucharest became the first city in the world to have public illumination, using lamp oils. After 1857, the evolution of the oil and gas industry in Romania was controlled by important historical events: World Wars I and II, the communist regime (1945–89), and the post-communist period (1990–today).

Europe as Other in Contemporary Balkan Literatures

The Balkans are a region where different images of the world have continuously been offered, as well as different points of view regarding the idea of Europe itself. The richness comes from the diversity of nations, people, languages and cultures, and is the basic characteristic of this particular region. However, some ideas have already grown as a «regional» concept, created and developed within the above-mentioned diversity. Although the Balkans belong to Europe, both geographically and historically, from the moment the concept of «Other Europe» was invented for them, the distinction was already made. Usually seen by Europeans as Others, the Balkan people started to create their own idea of Europe as Other. Balkan nations have mostly supported the idea of Europe, as a dream, desire, or reality, longing to join (or to return to) the big European family. Some of them have recently become Member States of the European Union; others are still waiting their turn. But, another concept is also present, very close to the idea of Occidentalism, created as an answer to Edward Said’s Orientalism or Maria Todorova’s Balkanism. This is mostly related to the new social circumstances during the post communist period of transition. Different stereotypes and prejudices of Europe have been created, and can easily be found in literature works, too. In our paper we deal with some of these imaginary concepts, which are present in different works of fiction, published in the last few years in several Balkan countries: Macedonia, Serbia, Romania, Bulgaria, Greece, Albania and Turkey.

Nature Writing in Romania during the Post-War and Post-communist Period

Nature Writing in Romania during the Post-War and Post-communist Period

Determinanty spadku płodności w Polsce – próba syntezy

This paper presents a theoretic synthesis of determinants of fertility decline in Poland in the post-war period. The differences in fertility determinants between the communist and post-communist periods are of particular interest.
 First, we present the changes in the number of births and their direct determinants: the number of women in reproductive age, forming lasting heterosexual relationships and the quantum and timing of fertility. The births’ decline in Poland is attributed to both quantum and timing effects and changes of union formation. In the second part, we discuss indirect determinants of fertility change by referring to main theoretical approaches to nuptiality and fertility, and by making use of research conducted in Poland.
 In the last section, we present a conceptual model distinguishing fertility determinants operating on the interconnected levels of production and reproduction system (the macro level), labour market and family (the meso level), and work and family social roles (the micro level). By showing how different factors operated differently in the Polish People’s Republic (until 1989) and during the post-communist transition, we analyse links between these determinants and importance of each of them.

Ukrainian-Romanian Relations at the Background of Russia’s Revisionist Policy

The purpose of this article is to analyse relations between Ukraine and Romania in the post-communist period. It provides a deep insight into the evolution of these relations in the context of Russia’s aggression against Ukraine. The study gives a general overview of the bilateral relations between the two neighbouring countries since the collapse of USSR and restoration of Ukraine’s independence in 1991, focusing on a wide range of irritants both great and small. Further, the research highlights turbulent relations between Kyiv and Bucharest from the historical and socio-cultural perspective. Another neuralgic issue analysed in this paper is Russian illegal annexation of the Crimea and its aggression against Ukraine, which not only destabilised the security balance in the Black Sea, Eastern Mediterranean and Middle East by establishing a large anti-access/area-denial exclusion zone but also caused the greatest threat to the national security of Romania. In fact, with Russia being its direct maritime neighbour Romania cannot cope with this threat alone. Furthermore, the study shows that Russian aggression against Ukraine resulted in intensifying rapprochement between Ukraine and Romania since 2014. Subsequently, Romania condemned the Kremlin’s aggression and became one of the Ukraine’s advocates within the international organisations like the EU, NATO, and the UN. Finally, it is also noteworthy that summit meetings between Kyiv and Bucharest reveal the new phase in their bilateral relations based on the “security first” approach.

Convergence or Divergence? Life Expectancy Patterns in Post-communist Countries, 1959\u20132010

In the 1960s and 1970s, the countries of Central and Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union experienced an unanticipated stagnation in the process of mortality reduction that was accelerating in the west. This was followed by even starker fluctuations and overall declines in life expectancy during the 1980s and 1990s. We identify statistically the extent to which, since the 1990s, the countries of the post-communist region have converged as a group towards other regional or cross-regional geopolitical blocks, or whether there are now multiple steady-states (‘convergence clubs’) emerging among these countries. We apply a complex convergence club methodology, including a recursive analysis, to data on 30 OECD countries (including 11 post-communist countries) drawn from the Human Mortality Database and spanning the period 1959–2010. We find that, rather than converging uniformly on western life expectancy levels, the post-communist countries have diverged into multiple clubs, with the lowest seemingly stuck in low-level equilibria, while the best performers (e.g. Czech Republic) show signs of catching-up with the leading OECD countries. As the post-communist period has progressed, the group of transition countries themselves has become more heterogeneous and it is noticeable that distinctive gender and age patterns have emerged. We are the first to employ an empirical convergence club methodology to help understand the complex long-run patterns of life expectancy within the post-communist region, one of very few papers to situate such an analysis in the context of the OECD countries, and one of relatively few to interpret the dynamics over the long-term.

Greece and EU enlargement to the Western Balkans: understanding an ambivalent relationship

Greece’s position towards the EU’s enlargement to the Western Balkans remains ambivalent: on the one hand, Greece remains declaratively one of the most ardent supporters of integrating the whole Balkan region into the EU; on the other hand, Greece is also a persistent obstructing factor whenever its multiple interests in the Balkans produce friction. We investigate this ambivalent position to understand its origins. We argue that Greece’s position can be understood with reference to three key factors: (a) the particularities of Greece’s foreign policy-making and its persistent traits, (b) the background of Greece’s relationship with the region and the legacy of multiple disputes that were created or exacerbated in the early post-Communist period and (c) the legacy of turning EU enlargement policy into a Greek foreign policy tool during the 1990s. These factors not only explicate the existence and persistence of Greece’s ambivalent policies, but also are likely to continue to shape Greece’s enlargement policy in the future. In that context, we expect that Greece will engage in a delicate balance of, on the one hand, strategically placing conditionality to ensure favourable compromises with neighbours, and, on the other, not jeopardizing the continuation of the enlargement process per se.

The assessment of socio-economic vulnerability to drought in Southern Romania (Oltenia Plain)

Oltenia Plain is one of the most important agricultural regions in Romania and one of the most sensitive in terms of extreme weather phenomena i.e. drought, due to its location in the south-western part of the country, combined with the natural and socio-economic conditions. During the post-communist period, Oltenia Plain was subject to major transformations which triggered environmental consequences i.e. land use/land cover changes, excessive fragmentation of farming land, individual farms practicing subsistence agriculture, poor services in agriculture. All of these have turned this area into one of the most vulnerable to extreme weather phenomena leading to severe degradation of agricultural land with direct impact on crop production, human health, and rural welfare. The paper aims to develop a multi-criteria vulnerability assessment using both quantitative and qualitative methods. The authors are seeking to identify relevant indicators to assess various components of socio-economic vulnerability to the drought phenomenon, using the statistical data available at LAU 2 level. As a result, three main categories of statistical variables and indicators were taken into account: demographic and social features, economy and public utilities. Based on the resulted outcomes, the selected indicators are grouped in three major indexes: demographic and social vulnerability, economic vulnerability and infrastructure vulnerability based on which, an integrated socio-economic vulnerability index to drought (using the Hull score, average 50 and standard deviation 14) was computed. For the particularities of drought, the authors performed relevant climate indicators based on the meteorological data of the most representative weather stations in the study area.

Forms of Recall – Politics of Memory. Memory as the Non-Chronological Narrative Form of Historical-Political Identity Quest in the Kádár Regime and Its Survival in the Postcommunist Period

Abstract In the film art of the Kádár regime the modernist non-chronological narrative mode became the dominant form of remembrance and communicative memory. In the 35-year period between 1956 and 1990 we can find thirty-five films of this type (e.g. Dialogue [Párbeszéd, János Herskó, 1963], Twenty Hours [Húsz óra, Zoltán Fábri, 1965], Cold Days [Hideg napok, András Kovács, 1966], Love [Szerelem, Károly Makk, 1971], Lovefilm [Szerelmesfilm, István Szabó, 1970], Diary for My Children [Napló gyermekeimnek, Márta Mészáros, 1982]), the majority of which thematize the communicative memory of the recent past of the period (World War II, the Hungarian Holocaust, the 1950s, 1956, the Kádár consolidation) as opposed to the amnesia politics of the time. Although this cinematic corpus is connected to the film history of the Kádár era with all its elements (form: modernism; theme: communicative memory; political discourse: recollection; official politics of memory; the counterdiscourse of Kádár’s amnesia politics), it survives in the postcommunist period (e.g. Hungarian Fragment [Pannon töredék, András Sólyom, 1998], White Palms [Fehér tenyér, Szabolcs Hajdu, 2006], Mom and Other Loonies in the Family [Anyám és más futóbolondok a családból, Ibolya Fekete, 2015]). After presenting the non-chronological narrative form of historical-political identity quest, the paper seeks to find reasons for the survival of this form and tries to draw conclusions regarding the social aspect and modes of expression of the Hungarian film history of the postcommunist period.

Ethnic Politics of the Hungarian Minorities in Slovakia, Romania, and Serbia in 2015

In the post-communist period, the driving forces behind minority rights protection have been international—the incentives surrounding membership in the European Union and relations with Hungary—and domestic—the minority’s capacity to gain representation, and therefore leverage, in the political system. In this analysis of the current state of minority affairs, we focus largely on the domestic context—the politics of Hungarian minority representation in Romania, Slovakia, and Serbia—and the ramifications of relations with Hungary. In this overview, we will contextualize the key strategic situation in all three cases: the demographic challenge of inexorably declining minority populations. Given the size of their electorates, neither the half-million Slovak Hungarians nor the 1.2 million Romanian Hungarians can afford the kind of partisan split that could push all minority parties below the five percent electoral threshold. In Serbia, the Hungarian minority of around a quarter million benefits from the waiving of the electoral threshold. Nonetheless, they are a distinct minority even in Vojvodina, the region of their greatest concentration. We will also review ongoing controversies that have surrounded minority issues since the collapse of communism: language, education, and the issue of territorial and cultural autonomy.

Analýza české institucionální kultury. Proměny hranic mezi soukromou a veřejnou sférou v podmínkách každodennosti a svátečnosti od poloviny 19. století do současnosti

The aim of this article is to propose an interpretation and a critical assessment ofinstitutional culture and its transformation in the Czech historical context. The framework of the analysiscovers four succeeding nation-forming periods, from the mid-19th century up until the present day. Itdraws upon a sociological interpretation of the visual fact depicting a memorial of statehood, whichwas erected in 1919 in the village of Dolní Černošice. The analysis is further based on seven semistructuredinterviews with local councillors (from Černošice), on the quantitative questioner, and onparticipant observation. Silhouetted against the interpretation of the statehood memorial, the articleattempts to answer questions regarding the main determinants of the transformation of institutionalculture by drawing upon the dynamics of the relationships between the public and private spheres, theirconfigurations and implications. The article contends that historically rooted asymmetries between thepublic and private spheres, which were embedded in the emancipation process of modern Czech society,have been greatly strengthened by the Communist period. In the post-communist period, institutionalculture in the Czech Republic has been characterised by a high degree of institutional distrust and publicstigmatisation of politics, as well as by a weakly developed virtue of (cognitive and political) oppositionwhich is imbued with a discernible disrespect for discursive civic culture. A system of civic education isurgently needed if Czechs want to overcome the ominous deficits of their institutional culture.

Intraparty democracy in Central and Eastern Europe

In the postcommunist period, political parties in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) had to convincingly demonstrate that they are a vital part of a functioning democratic society. Well-developed intraparty democracy (IPD) is one way of accomplishing this. By asking what factors are relevant to an explanation of IPD formation, we present an analytical framework in which the formation of IPD can be investigated and explore the patterns of IPD and their determinants. We draw on a newly constructed data set based on standardized content analysis, including 129 party statutes from 14 major political parties from Hungary, Romania, and Slovakia between 1989 and 2011. Relying on unit fixed-effects regression approaches, our analyses suggest that especially imperatives related to party origin and Europeanization have important implications for the formation of IPD within CEE parties.

Belgrade: Imaging the future and creating a European metropolis

Belgrade is a European city, the capital of the Republic of Serbia and previously capital of Yugoslavia. The city lies on the confluence of two major European rivers, the Danube and the Sava. Throughout its long history, Belgrade has often been a border city between the East and West and as a result has often been attacked. This has not only influenced, but also shaped its urban structure, especially in the 19th century, when most of the structures related to its oriental Turkish character were demolished and reconstruction of the city began. Belgrade's need to develop itself as a European metropolis in accordance with European standards reveals the discrepancy between its political and cultural pretensions and the real economic opportunities. It also reveals the need of the political and intellectual elite to keep Belgrade, Serbia and Yugoslavia in a state of general development that leaves enough space for political and ideological manipulation, as well as social and national experiments, particularly in the communist and post-communist period. Based on its specific character, Belgrade is recognized as a useful case study that is not simply a “post-communist” city, but a palimpsest of every catastrophe that has been experienced in Europe over a century or more. The connection between the political and urban changes in Belgrade throughout the 20th century is more than evident. Accordingly, this paper will explore what has driven the urban change and the extent to which the balance between state, market and civil society is present in Belgrade, both during its history and today.

Heritage for Development, Multiethnic Communities, and the Case of Butrint National Park on the Albanian-Greek Border

The case study presented in this paper is an account of six months of ethnographic fieldwork that I conducted between 2010 and 2013 in the villages within the UNESCO World Heritage site of Butrint National Park, located on the Albanian-Greek border. My ethnography reveals the particularly complex tangle that exists between development and heritage projects in transitioning countries such as Albania, which is re-positioning its governance within a neoliberal framework. The research takes an anthropological approach to investigate how the “heritage for development” projects at Butrint National Park are affecting the local community and distressing local power relations and social inequalities, while at the same time are instilling a sense of place for many of these communities that have relocated or were forced from their homes during the post-communist period as a result of confusion over land ownership. This case study demonstrates that while sustainable heritage practices are often overpowered by neoliberal agendas, heritage repurposed towards development has real and powerful effects on the communities connected to the site. In this paper I argue that we need anthro­pologically informed studies that give due attention to the realities of the communities connected to the site in order to reveal how sustainable heritage policies that are not set up to protect the community can have detrimental effects on the locals, including reinforced structural inequality, marginalization of minorities, and divisions among communities.

Alternative Forms of Spirituality and the Socialization of a Self-Enhancing Subjectivity: Features of the Post-Secular Religious Space in Contemporary Romania

AbstractMy paper focuses on the shift in religious values in post-socialist Romania and explores the emergence of alternative spiritual beliefs and practices among the younger generations socialized during the post-communist period. It analyses some of the changes that occurred in the wider traditional religious field and looks at the various spiritualized technologies of the self that produce a distinctive type of religious subjectivity and an immanent ethics of authenticity. By departing from the idea of an integrated religious community and from the relational understanding of religious transformation, the field of alternative spiritualities operates a radical break with traditional religion and emphasizes the possibility of spiritual self-realization and self-discovery. It is this process of the individualizing sacralization of the self that constitutes the object of various workshops, blogs, personal and spiritual development literature, courses, spiritual retreats and counselling services. My research looks at how innovative technologies of the self are developed within these spaces that emphasize creativity, wellbeing and a new understanding of subjective interiority that learns how to find in itself the resources it needs to live in a spiritualized ontology of the present.2

Hungarian Minority Politics in Post-Socialist Romania: Interests, Strategies, and Discourses

AbstractThis paper analyses the integration strategies formulated by the Democratic Alliance of Hungarians in Romania and the Hungarian political elite in the post-communist period. It argues that the internal debates of the political community are formulated in a field where other actors (the Hungarian and the Romanian state, political parties, European institutions, etc.) carry out their activities, which deeply influences both the chosen strategies and the needed resources for their implementation. Moreover, it questions the monolithic organization of the minority organization, showing that DAHR as the representative of the minority community was shaped by several internal debates and conflicts. Also from 2003 these conflicts have grown beyond the borders of the organization and since 2008 we can follow a whole new type of institutionalization. In achieving this, I introduce three strategies - individual integration, collective integration, and organizational integration - which are chosen by different fragments of the Hungarian minority elite both toward the Hungarian and the Romanian political sphere. Throughout the 1989-2012 period, the outcome of the conflict between the supporters of these strategies is deeply influenced by the policies of the two states.

Creation and destruction in transition economies: The SME sector in Slovakia

This article analyses the survival probability of privately owned small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) in Slovakia during the post-communist period up to and including the recent recessionary period. We build models within a failure prediction context developing ‘transition’ variables that relate to the origin and ownership of the company. Using a sample of 126,649 sets of accounts of 44,597 SMEs in Slovakia, we identify 793 exits by failure during the period 1997–2012. We find that supplementary information relating to the transition process, in combination with the financial and non-financial variables, makes a significant contribution to the default prediction power of risk models built specifically for Slovakian SMEs. We find strong support for our hypothesis that, to some degree, foreign ownership reduces failure probability in addition, there is support for our ‘privatisation trap’ and ‘post-transformation recession’ hypotheses.

A Study Of The Economies Of Poland And Romania During Communism Period (1945- 1989)

The present economic crisis has highlighted a country in transition to a market economy, which has not experienced economic recession: Poland. The Polish experience cannot be overlooked because the country‘s positive economic evolution was completely different from the evolution of the largest European economies, many of them facing distressful situations for long periods of time. The question to be addressed in this paper is „Could the present economic realities be partially influenced by the historical evolution of a country?“ In an attempt to provide an answer to this question, the present paper will highlight the social and economic developments in Romania and Poland in relation to developed countries for the period 1945-1989 and will conduct a comparative analysis between the two countries. The conclusions of the present study will be the starting point in a comparative analysis of the two countries in the post-communist period.

A Study Of The Agriculture Of Poland And Romania In Post-Communist Period

In terms of size of territory and population, Poland and Romania are the largest former socialist countries, now, members of the European Union. In the last 25 years of transition to a market economy, Poland has excellent managed its natural potential and is, now, an economic model for other former socialist countries, including Romania. Poland has not experienced economic recession; its positive economic evolution was completely different from the evolution of the largest European economies, many of them facing distressful situations for long periods of time. The question to be addressed in this paper is: „How could we explain the present success of Polish agriculture? Could the present economic realities be partially influenced by the historical evolution of a country? “ In an attempt to provide an answer to this question, the present paper will highlight the economic developments in Romania and Poland in relation to developed countries for the last about 100 years in terms of “path dependency theory” and will conduct a comparative analysis between the two countries.