Post-communist World Research Articles

Why Is Media Trust Low in Post-Communist Countries?

ABSTRACT Do long-term propaganda and indoctrination undermine media trust? Building on studies of communist legacies, I examine whether trust in media in post-communist countries can be explained by past or contemporaneous experiences. I find that trust in media is lower in post-communist countries, but this trust deficit is more likely a consequence of the post-communist period. It is higher among authoritarian regimes, which suggests that contemporaneous experiences matter; citizens with longer exposure to communism trust the media more; finally, the deficit grows as the communist past becomes more distant. These findings have implications for institutional development in the post-communist world.

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SEEKING INDEPENDENCE: DE FACTO ETHNIC AUTONOMIES IN THE POST-YUGOSLAV SPACE The violent breakup of Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union in the early 1990s meant that the link between territorial autonomy and accommodation of groups in the post-communist world has been regarded almost uncritically as an anathema and a threat to the territorial integrity of the state. Nevertheless, territorial solutions are still taken into consideration as suggested tools for regulating ethnic and national tensions – in the post-communist area, three forms of their implementation can be identified: federalism and formally existing autonomous regions; decentralisation, which can be reduced to classical self-government with a strong ethnic component (e.g., Macedonia); and de facto ethnic autonomies based either on formal structures, as in the case of Macedonia, or informal ones, as in the cases of Kosovo and Bosnia and Herzegovina. Having said that, the aim of this article is to compare these three de facto ethnic autonomies, i.e. structures existing outside formal territorial arrangements, that have been developed in the post-conflict and post-Yugoslav space: Serb in Kosovo, Albanian in Macedonia and Croat in Bosnia. Moreover, I also assume that their level of autonomy depends on the policies and support of kin states connected to these entities by ethno-national ties.

Geneza traktatu z Maastricht i jego znaczenie dla integracji i bezpieczeństwa Europy

The Maastricht Treaty was signed thirty years ago, on 7 February 1992 and, after ratification, it came into force on 1 November 1993. It was a milestone on the path to European integration, which began after World War II, and an important element of the transatlantic international security system. On its basis, the European Union (EU) was created.Its genesis and decisions were influenced by such events and processes as: the Autumn of Nations 1989, which led to the fall of communism in the countries of Central and Eastern Europe, the unification of Germany on 3 October 1990, the collapse of the Soviet Union in December 1991 and the end of the Cold War.This article aims to analyse the origins of the Maastricht Treaty and show its importance in the integration and security of Europe after the collapse of the Yalta–Potsdam order and the end of the Cold War. The main thesis is that without the fall of communism in the countries of Central and Eastern Europe and the collapse of the USSR, the unification of Germany and the end of the Cold War, the Maastricht Treaty would not have been signed and the EU would not have been created. Moreover, without the Maastricht Treaty and the EU, the international situation after the end of the Cold War would have been less stable as the competition between a united Germany and France for leadership in Europe would have intensified. Russia could have used this to strengthen its position in the post-communist world.

When promises reach boundaries: political participation in post-communist countries

ABSTRACT Political participation increased and diversified in the post-communist world in the last decade. This may create great expectations in terms of societal impact. This Special Section seeks to understand the complexity of this picture by analyzing instances in which the promises of political participation reach boundaries in post-communist countries. It aims to achieve two theoretical and empirical objectives. It outlines several theoretical frameworks that can be used to understand who participates and why they do so, and to identify and explain various ways in which individuals engage in politics, what are their reasons and with what expectations. The articles in this Special Section cover a range of post-communist countries in the form of comparative perspectives across countries with contextualized case studies (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Georgia and Hungary) and use both qualitative and quantitative analyses.

Voting from Abroad in the Postcommunist World: Elections and Labour Migration in Kyrgyzstan

Using census materials, electoral laws and voting results from polling stations [uchastki] abroad, this study reveals the ways in which the Kyrgyzstani experience with expatriate voting aligns with, and diverges from, that of other labour-exporting countries, including those in the postcommunist world. A central concern of the article is explaining how and why Kyrgyzstan exhibited significant variation from 2010 to 2021 in rules and behaviour relating to voting from abroad (VFA). The study also illustrates that the electoral behaviour of the Kyrgyzstani diaspora is far from uniform across space as well as time.

Spatial distribution of military bases and power of interest groups in an emergent democracy

Abstract Policies in liberal democracies can never be fully sheltered from the influence of interest groups. This is especially true for the flawed or immature democracies that can be found also in the post-communist world. In this study, we argue that the progress of democratization in Czechia has been accompanied by a growing influence of interest groups (local/regional governments, political parties, industrial corporations) on national defence strategy. Focusing on the spatial policy of military base distribution, the study documents deviations from a rational strategy of restructuring and relocations of military bases declared by the General Staff in the 1990s, 2000s, and 2010s in response to a changing geopolitical situation. The content analysis of the interviews with former actors of the defence planning and media analysis showed that one-third of current Czech military bases experienced an influence of interested groups.

Introduction to the Special Issue on Authoritarian Resilience of Communist Regimes in Asia

This special issue focuses on the resilience of the communist regimes in Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, and China. Three decades after the collapse of the Soviet Bloc, all four not only survived a hostile post-communist world dominated by liberal capitalism but have thrived economically. The five articles in this special issue hope to build on existing scholarship on authoritarian resilience while contributing in the following ways. First, by adopting a regional framework, we hope to offer a fuller examination of varieties in communist Asia. After all, this is the only world region with such a large concentration of surviving communist parties. Second, while highlighting the critical role of revolutionary origins, our approach corrects the tendency in scholarship on democratic transition that neglects the totalitarian legacies. Third, the articles support the institutionalist approach by showing how ruling parties in authoritarian regimes are critical; yet we also seek to balance between historical legacies and contemporary developments and to analyze the interactions among ideologies, organizations, and resources.

The State and Media Financing: Bulgaria and the Mediterranean Media Model

The study examines the applicability of the comparative framework of Hallin and Mancini (2004) with their three models of media‒politics relations (Mediterranean or Polarized Pluralist Model, North/ Central European or Democratic Corporatist Model, and North Atlantic or Liberal Model) to a post-communist country like Bulgaria. The answer to this question is sought through a study of the role of the state in relation to the media system, particularly the state funding of media in its various forms. The analysis leads to the conclusion that the Bulgarian media system is most similar to the Mediterranean Model due to the power of еtatism (the state finances public media, and the government buys media love through state and municipal advertising). At the same time, ineffective media regulation favors media concentration and the instrumentalization of large government media groups. The processes of rapid liberalization, privatization and deregulation in the media sector after 1989 brought Bulgaria closer to the countries included in the Liberal Model. Therefore, its media system is hybrid to some extent, but the similarities with the Mediterranean Model remain in the lead. The clientelism through which they are tamed, resp. corrupt the media, brings Bulgaria closer to the Latin American countries where it is much stronger than in the Mediterranean region (Hallin, Papathanassopoulos 2002). The concluding part predicts that, in the future, the analysis of the Bulgarian media system can be enhanced with a study of the applicability of the concepts of the “captured liberal model” of the media (in Latin America) and the “captured media” in the post-communist world.

From the Bronze Soldier to the “Bloody Marshal”: Monument Wars and Russia’s Aesthetic Vulnerability in Estonia and the Czech Republic

The article analyzes historical monuments as instruments of Russia’s attempts to impose its aesthetic hegemony in the post-Communist world. Drawing on case studies from the Czech Republic and Estonia, it argues that this hegemony is precarious and vulnerable due to inability to deal with the inherent ambiguity and complexity of historical events and figures. The Russian approach regards historical truth in absolute terms and is underpinned by a zero-sum game understanding of historical narratives. It does not tolerate a multiplicity of perspectives on history and has no appreciation for postmodernist deconstruction of historical symbols. This conflicts with a more diverse, reflexive and inclusive politics of memory as an intrinsic element of cityscapes of Prague and Tallinn where some of the controversial monuments connected with the Soviet occupation have been removed. Russia’s reaction to these changes reveals an inherently vulnerable nature of its aesthetic hegemony which is deeply dependent on recognition of the absolute nature of its historical truth that the monuments are supposed to embody.

Social Issues in Contemporary Russia: Women's Rights, Corruption, and Immigration Through Three Sociological Lenses

This article reviews social science research on women's rights, corruption, and immigration in Russia. Intentionally diverse, our selection of topics illustrates how the same three analytical lenses have been applied across a broad range of scholarship on the postcommunist world. Each lens is bifocal and entails a tension between two extremes. The victims versus agents lens refers to a tendency of scholars to portray their subjects either as passive victims of macrostructural and cultural conditions or as agents who adapt to survive, or even thrive, despite significant challenges. The similar versus exotic lens pits the assumption that Russia is a modern European country against the view that it is too distinctive to be meaningfully compared with the West or analyzed with Western theories. Finally, the old versus new lens represents competing views on the extent to which the institutional, cultural, and structural legacies of the Soviet Union, perestroika, and the 1990s continue to shape Russian society. The broad goal of our review is to highlight the intellectual promise of studying Russia sociologically.

Nation Branding in the Post-Communist World: Assessing the Field of Critical Research

AbstractIn the second decade of the 21st century, the practices, discourses, and implications of nation branding have attracted growing interest from scholars in the humanities and social sciences seeking to understand the linkages between national identities, reputations, governance, and the phenomenon of nation branding. This strand of critical research, as opposed to instrumentalist approaches, is the focus of this review. In line with the scope of the journal, the review looks at nation branding research that relates to the countries of the former communist bloc. The analysis finds that the state of the field is fragmented due to its multi-disciplinary nature. It is also argued that the field may be suffering from methodological nationalism. The discussion identifies epistemological and theoretical approaches, pointing out gaps and limitations along the way. It is suggested that research in the field can be grouped into “identity studies” and “practice studies” as a way to better understand key theoretical influences. Finally, it is proposed that future research should look at nation branding both as a field of practice that merits critical examination in its own right and as a lens that can be used to investigate changes in the state of nationhood today.

The Exception that Proves the Rule: The Development of Central Banks as an Example of Successful Institutional Reforms in Post-Communist Countries Book Review: Johnson J. (2016) Priests of Prosperity. How Central Bankers Transformed the Postcommunist World. Ithaca: Cornell University Press. 312 p

The Exception that Proves the Rule: The Development of Central Banks as an Example of Successful Institutional Reforms in Post-Communist Countries Book Review: Johnson J. (2016) Priests of Prosperity. How Central Bankers Transformed the Postcommunist World. Ithaca: Cornell University Press. 312 p

The Russia Connection

What explains receptivity of citizens in the post-communist world to Russian influence? popular attitudes in Central and Eastern Europe about Russia's role in the world and seeks to find answers to the question: does ideology or economic factors most influence support for Russia in post-communist Central and Eastern Europe? We use survey data from the Pew Research Center (2017) to assess the drivers for popular support of Russia. We find that the primary driver of individual-level support of Russia is political attitudes associated with the Far Right, but that this relationship also varies by country.

The Interminable Transition; An Analysis of the Electoral Behavior in Albania (1991-2017)

Albania has been led by a communist regime, characterized by repression and isolationism for over 45 years. The transition, started at the ’90 toward a democratic system and to an open society based on the occidental model couldn’t be accomplished in a fast and bloodless way. There were too many reasons to explain this difficult transition, but just to mention, must be considered the absence of the democratic culture of the entire political ruling class (elite) (leadership). The transition process toward democracy in Albania began when the communist regime entered into crisis and its political elite (leadership) proclaimed the intention to open a new phase and to extend significantly freedom and rights. Starting from 1990 began to fail the obstacles that prohibited, till that time, the expression of the freedom, the disagreement and the pluralism. This transition process was characterized by its multiplicity, as the political changes was correlated with economic, cultural and social changes. Immediately after 1990, Albania had to face many challenges, but the most important concerned the institution of a new democratic order and the creation of a market economy, without, however, that this process was accompanied by a structural reform of the institutional framework. There is necessary to consider the communist heredity, while undertaking efforts to achieve a sufficient level of democracy. The heredity of the past means to consider dissimilar features like values, identity, standards, institutions, élite, behaviors and practices, that survived the transition and affected the later aspects, encouraging some changes, and hindering others.The communist regime let behind a flat socio-political landscape, a weak civil society, a fragile law domain, turbulent political coalitions and main political tendencies compromised. The experts that study this period state that Albania has undergone one of the most turbulent transformations at the post-communist world. There are, particularly, three dramatic moments that shook from the basis its institutions: a) the collapse of the communist regime at 1991-1992; b) the crisis of the financial pyramids at 1997; c) the influx of half million refugees from Kosovo in 1999. So, the transition process cannot be completely understood without considering the role of the old and new political elites, the mechanisms that regulates the internal activities of the parties, and the structure of the electoral behavior.

Adapting or Freezing? Ideological Reactions of Communist Regimes to a Post-Communist World

AbstractThis article studies the ideological reactions of communist regimes to the advent of a post-communist world. It examines two cases of reformed communist regimes (China and Vietnam) with two relatively unreformed cases (North Korea and Cuba) to understand different legitimation strategies employed during and after the downfall of the Soviet Union. Theoretically, the article compares two ideal-type approaches to ideology in autocratic regimes. The first approach emphasizes semantic ‘freezing’ over time. The consistency and coherence of ideology is underlined. The second approach argues that the success of an ideology lies in its ability to be a dynamic, adaptive force that can react with changing circumstances. Four parameters help to distinguish the freeze-frame end from the adaptation pole: (1) the autonomy over semantic changes, (2) the timing, (3) the velocity and (4) the distance that an ideology moves. Using qualitative case-based analysis that is enriched with quantitative text analysis of communist party documents, this article compares these contending conceptions of ideology with each other in the four cases. Sharing similar starting conditions in the 1970s, the article shows how China and Vietnam harnessed a flexible legitimation strategy while North Korea and Cuba adopted a comparatively rigid legitimation approach.

The structural sources of postcommunist regime trajectories

ABSTRACTRegime trajectories in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union (FSU) have diverged considerably since the collapse of communism. We argue that this variation is the product of two largely structural factors: the salience of anti-Soviet nationalism and the opportunity for membership in the European Union (EU) that was mostly the product of geography. In Eastern Europe and the Baltic states, anti-Soviet nationalism and the stimulus of EU democratic conditionality contributed to the rise of a non-communist elite that confronted serious internal and external pressure to democratize. By contrast, weaker anti-Soviet nationalism and dearth of pressure from the EU allowed for the persistence of communist elites who faced relatively weak external constraints on autocratic behavior. We argue that these structural factors played a more important role in accounting for variation in democratization across the postcommunist world than factors such as institutional design. At the same time, the different character of structural forces in Eastern Europe and the FSU has likely created greater room for voluntarist factors in determining regime variation within the former Soviet Union than within Eastern Europe.

How Neoliberal Reforms Lose Their Partisan Identity: Flat Tax Diffusion in Eastern Europe and Post-Soviet Eurasia

In the post-communist world, the flat tax was a popular neoliberal fiscal reform that initially spread through dense networks of rightwing politicians and parties. Over time, its symbolism and appeal broadened, making this specific fiscal approach attractive to a wider range of actors and regimes. By considering the full set of post-communist flat tax cases and the competitive dynamics in the region, this article examines the evolution of this reform and demonstrates how the structure and the symbolism of the flat tax offered advantages to governments that eventually transcended regime type and partisanship.

Uncomfortable Comparisons: The Canadian Truth and Reconciliation Commission in International Context

The Canadian Truth and Reconciliation Commission on Indian Residential Schools is a novel foray into a genre previously associated with so-called “transitional” democracies from the post-Communist world and the global South. This basic fact notwithstanding, a systematic comparison with the broader universe of truth commission-hosting countries reveals that the circumstances surrounding the Canadian TRC are not entirely novel. This article develops this argument by distilling from the transitional justice literature several bases of comparison designed to explain how a truth commission’s capacity to promote new cultures of justice and accountability in the wake of massive violations of human rights is affected by the socio-political context in which the commission occurs; the injustices it is asked to investigate; and the nature of its mandate. It concludes that these factors, compounded by considerations unique to the Canadian context, all militate against success. If Canadian citizens and policymakers fail to meet this profound ethical challenge, they will find themselves occupying the transition-wrecking role played more familiarly by the recalcitrant and unreformed military and security forces in the world’s more evidently authoritarian states.

Liberal Pluralism and Multiculturalism in Central and Eastern Europe (W. Kymlicka Views’ Analysis)

Will Kymlicka is widely known in the world for the research in the field of the theoretical principles of liberal pluralism and justification of the policy of multiculturalism. In his scientific work, he pays attention not onlyto his native Canada but also draws attention to other regions of the world, including Central and Eastern Europe. The scientist asks whether the export of Western model of liberal pluralism and multiculturalism policies available in the region? Are Western models of multiculturalism and minority rights relevant for the post-Communist countries of Central and Eastern Europe? In the following article, we analyze Will Kymlicka’s views on this issue. Kymlicka explains why conventional ways of distinguishing between ethnic relations in the East and West do not help in understanding or responding to ethnic conflicts in the post-Communist world. He argues why the states of Central and Eastern Europe are not inherent in the territorial autonomy in their state building. He also argues why federalism as a form of government is not the solution of interethnic interaction’s problems. In addition, Will Kymlicka tries to highlight the unique characteristics of the region, which do not suggest the possibility of the introduction of liberal pluralism and multiculturalism in Central and Eastern Europe in the near future.
 Keywords: Liberal pluralism, multiculturalism, territorial autonomy, federalism, minorities

Post-communist Transition as a Path Break: Comparing Legal Institutional Effects on Economic Growth between Path-breaking and Path-drifting Institutional Reforms

This article explains the peculiarities of institutional effects on growth rates in postcommunist countries. By proposing a certain dependence of the institution–growth nexus on the mode of institutional grafting, the distinction between drift-phase and path-breaking institutional change is introduced. Theoretical juxtapositions show that transition countries’ institutions built through path-breaking institutional reforms differ from those that emerge evolutionarily in the drift phase in a twofold manner in their relationship to growth. Growth rates of their economies are less likely to depend on the quality of legal institutions and are more likely to be a function of the maturity of political institutions. In addition, legal institutional change in the post-communist world is a product of the quality of the political environment to a greater extent than their drift-phase alternatives. These propositions are tested empirically based on a sample of 87 countries derived from the POLITY IV Project’s website. JEL Classification: O17, O43, O57, P26, P37