Download Post-Communism: A Civil Society Perspective

Post-Communism: A Civil Society
Perspective
•The transformations (the ”fall”)
•Post-Communist diversity
•Post-Communist similarities
• Introducing ”The Weakness…”
•Introducting ”Defeating Authoritarian..”
The ”Fall” Of Communist Rule – A Brief
Overview
• THE CAUSES:
• Reforms that ”got out of control”:President Gorbachev
of the Soviet Union (1985)
- perestroika: Economical changes
- glasnost: Openness to more of debate, sociatal
mobilization
• ”Nationality” question (no ’homo sovieticus’)
• Stagnated economy – big spending-less legitimacy.
• Ideological confrontation (neo-liberal Western wave)
• Other reasons?
Did the fall lead to modernization?
• Economic modernization crucial during the
Soviet empire; industrialization, high levels of
education, urbanization. BUT
• A halted political modernization, in terms of
empowerment and influence.
• Lack of societal pluralism.
Transitions from Non-Democracy
• Pacts, negotiations (Hungary, Poland)
• Revolutions, old elite overthrown (East
Germany, Czechoslovakia, Estonia, Latvia,
Lithuania?)
• Elite-initiated change (rest of Soviet Union)
• 1989 a break-point in Central Europe, 1991 in
the Soviet Union.
Post-Communist Diversity
• State-building: a scale between reasonable
strong to very weak.
• Regime type: democratic (e.g. the new EU
member states) ”mixed” regimes (Georgia,
Ukraine, Moldova), authoritarian (Central
Asia, Russia, Belarus).
• Economic reforms: real good (Slovenia,
Estonia, real bad Ukraine, Moldova, Georgia)
How to explain diversity?
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Rational institutionalists
Historical institutionalists
Structuralists (geopolitical factors)
More concrete:
-Political leadership
-International factors
Post-Communist Similarities
• Their parallel and simultanous transitions (economic, political,
often state-and nation-building)
• Rapidity in transitions
• The elite-orientation and continuos role of Communist party.
• Moving from equal to striking unequal (accentuated
differentiation). Social mobility?
• Weak civil societies
• Many, but far from all, ”mixed” regimes
”The Weakness of Civil Society..”
• Focus on citizen activity, grass-roots and the
”mass” as opposed to an elite focus in much postcommunist research.
• Citizen politics often researched by looking at
- Culture (values, attitudes, beliefs)
- Behaviour (participation,mobilization)
- Collectives (social networks and parties)
Howard: The book aims at
• Describing (levels of civil society both in postcommunist, post-authoritarian and older
democracies)
• Explain these levels.
• Thus: level of civil society is a dependent
variable, factors such as culture, economy,
structure are independent variables.
Type of explanation
• Howard claims it to be ”experential”(individual
choice is built on previous experiences)
• Other explanations could be focusing on
- values (cultural)
- self-interested calculations (rationalistic)
- norms
The concept of civil society
Civil society is defined as
- formal organizations that are autonomous,
voluntary, adhere to the principles of liberal
democracy and are of some durability.
Civil society is not the same as ”social networks”,
”social capital”, ”social movements” or ”citizen
activity”.
Research design
• Level of analysis: both clusters of countries
(by ”regime”ch. 4), comparative country-level
analysis (ch. 5) and individual-level (ch. 6)
• Type of method: statistical analysis,
quantitative and qualitative comparative case
studies, and in-depth (biographically-oriented
interviews.
• Material and data: global data-bases, own
survey (PCOMS), interviews
Descriptive results
• Present level civil society is most powerfully
explained by prior regime-type. If there is a
communist past (post-totalitarian) instead of
an authoritarian past, civil society is as much
lower level – even though all are classified as
democracies today.
Explanatory results
• Why is prior regime-type so important? What
is it in the Communist regime that could
explain the results?
• Three more specific factors emerge from the
comparative case studies: because of the
experiences from Communist time individuals
today (a) mistrust organizations, (b) still rely
on their private, social networks, (C) are
disappointed with present-day democracy.
Defeating Authoritarian Leaders..
• Bunce & Wolchik: The book aims to:
- Give an answer to when elections in mixed
regimes lead to regime change; when they are
democratizing elections (and when they lead
to continuity)
- Give an answer to when those democratizing
elections also lead to more sustained change
in democratic direction.
”Design”:
• 11 elections in 9 countries
• 6 elections lead to change, 5 to continuity.
• In all elections the opposition had united, and
popular protests are taking place after
election results are declared.
• Regime change (dependent variable)
• Regime vulnerability, economic factors, civil
society, election strategies, international
democracy assistance (independent variables).
Material & Methods
• Comparative study.
• Qualitative, micro-level study as opposed to
”high-altitude” studies (macro-level studies).
• Case-studies which makes within-group and
between-group comparisons possible.
• Based on a large number of interviews (over
200) in the 9 countries and in USA.
• Written material.
What explains change?
• Long-term institutional and structural factors
do not differ enough between those who
change and those who continue.
• International democracy assistance in terms of
money does not differ enough either.
• What differs is instead the short-term
electoral dynamics=electoral strategies.
The electoral model
• Unified opposition (necessary but not
sufficient)
• Transparent elections through techniques of
monitoring, exit polls, counting and
registration
• Bridging social networks through brokerage
• Civil society becomes political
• Cross-national diffusion
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Underlines the role of agency
Organisation and hope
Earlier civil society that can be bridged?
For developments after democratizing
elections, strong civil society and international
democracy assistance (particularly US) is
crucial.