Papers by Bela Greskovits
Editorial correspondence All correspondence or correspondence concerning any general questions, a... more Editorial correspondence All correspondence or correspondence concerning any general questions, article submission or book reviews should be addressed to the
Rival Views of Postcommunist Market Society
The GeoJournal Library, 2000
This is an essay in the short history of social thought on East European transformations1. I shal... more This is an essay in the short history of social thought on East European transformations1. I shall present the structure of the discourse on the likely economic, social and political dynamics under postcommunism. I shall also point to the historical and theoretical roots of the competing concepts and assess the contribution of transitology to our understanding of social change2. While
Cultures & conflits, 1995
Une transition vers quoi ? 1 Dans le tumulte des années 1989 et 90, nombre de politiciens, de pol... more Une transition vers quoi ? 1 Dans le tumulte des années 1989 et 90, nombre de politiciens, de politistes, d'économistes, d'experts partageaient l'idée que la chute du régime communiste en Europe de l'Est serait bientôt suivie d'une transition vers la démocratie libérale et l'économie de marché. Deux ans plus tard, les analystes devinrent moins optimistes quant à la consolidation de la démocratie. Alors que les économistes étaient frappés par la profondeur et la longueur de la récession, les sociologues et politistes signalèrent de plus en plus les carences structurelles et institutionnelles des sociétés post-communistes. Les pays en transition vers la démocratie manquaient de partis institutionnels, de leaders politiques confirmés, d'élites responsables, d'un appareil d'Etat capable et efficace, d'une société civile organisée, de classe moyenne et de capitalistes, pour ne citer que quelques éléments parmi une longue liste. S'il n'est pas très difficile de prouver l'inexistence de nombreux éléments constitutifs des démocraties occidentales, il ne faudrait cependant pas déduire de cette carence l'impossibilité d'un enracinement démocratique en Europe de l'Est, et ce quelle qu'en soit la forme. De plus, il convient de rester vigilant et de ne pas reproduire l'approche erronée, si vivement critiquée par Alexander Gerschenkron dans un contexte différent. Selon lui, ceux qui ont expliqué l'écart existant au XIXe siècle entre l'économie de la Grande Bretagne et celle du Continent par l'absence au sein de l'économie continentale des éléments fondamentaux de l'industrialisation, ont nécessairement occulté deux des vecteurs institutionnels de la révolution industrielle : les banques, qui ont fourni les investissements financiers à long terme, et l'Etat 2 . Il nous faut aussi prendre en compte l'avertissement de Guillermo O'Donnell pour comprendre le développement démocratique. En effet, on doit éviter de caractériser les systèmes politiques en « indiquant les attributs qui leur font défaut (la représentativité, l'institutionnalisation, par exemple), et en décrivant les aléas qu'ils ont pu connaître sur le plan politique et économique » car cette approche "risque d'induire une La transformation hongroise : grévistes de la faim, syndicalistes, et membres...
Demagogic Populism in Eastern Europe?
Telos, 1995
In the first years of post-communist transition in Hungary, populism emerged as a hot topic acade... more In the first years of post-communist transition in Hungary, populism emerged as a hot topic academically and a veritable curse politically. No party has claimed to be populist, and none has avoided charges of populism levelled by one or another competitor. A demagogic populism seems to be always on the agenda, yet never actually present. In the East European context, however, populism has a peculiar meaning — similar to what it means in Latin America, but very different from what it means in the US. Far from referring to, e.g., Christopher Lasch's small proprietorship or an ethic of individual responsibility, it refers to a political strategy that seeks easy popularity by making unrealizable promises to the lower classes and frustrated domestic business interests.
Journal of Democracy, 2009
West European Politics, 2013
has to admit that the editors tried their very best in the final chapter of the book in which the... more has to admit that the editors tried their very best in the final chapter of the book in which they summarise the main findings, relating them to the hypotheses and formulating challenges for possible future research. All in all, the book presents an exceptional contribution to the study of populism, and despite some minor drawbacks it offers both an original theoretical framework and well-written in-depth case studies that illustrate the performance and impact of different kinds of populist parties in different institutional and democratic settings. The authors and the editors of the volume did a very good job: the book should not be missed by anybody who is interested in current party politics in general and in the relationship between populism and democracy in particular.
Konsolidacja reform ekonomicznych na Węgrzech
PROKLA. Zeitschrift für kritische Sozialwissenschaft
The articles explores how the way in which wars are being waged has changed since the 19th centur... more The articles explores how the way in which wars are being waged has changed since the 19th century. Its main focus is on ground warfare. Warfare, according to the thesis advocated in the article, has become industrialized within a few decades. One of the consequences was that since then only rarely battles have been lead face to face. Another result was a change in the way the military had to prepare for war. After presenting a short overview the articles proceeds to deal with objectification tendencies in regard to death, which also began to develop in pre-industrial periods.
Varieties if Capitalism and Capitalism « tout court »
Archives Europeennes De Sociologie, 2009
Economic Woes and Political Disaffection
Journal of Democracy, Nov 1, 2007
During the past decade of European economic integration vastly worse standards have emerged in wo... more During the past decade of European economic integration vastly worse standards have emerged in work conditions, industrial relations, and social welfare in Eastern Europe than in the West. Area scholars explain this divide by labor weakness caused by the ideological legacy of communism, and do not problematize the impact of transnational capital. In contrast, this essay argues that the reason why the European social model has not traveled to the East is that its socioeconomic foundations, the industrial building blocks of the historical compromise between capital and labor, have not traveled either. In the West, the compromise had been rooted in capital-intensive consumer durables industries, such as car-manufacturing, and their suppliers. These sectors brought together organized and vocal labor with businesses willing to accommodate workers' demands, because for them labor had been less a problem as a cost-factor and more important as factor of demand. However, the main driving force of the eastward expansion of European capital has been the relocation of labor-intensive activities where business relies on sweating masses of workers, whose importance as consumers is marginal, and who are weak in the workplace and the marketplace. With this general conceptualization of how the emerging new European division of labor constrains the social aspects of East European market societies as a background, the essay studies the cases of Hungarian electronics and Slovak car industries in order to better understand how particular features of various leading sectors mediate the general pattern. 1 In the following we compare data from ten West European countries,
Leading Industries and Leading Regions: Industrial Restructuring and Regional Inequality in Hungary Since 1990
The Economic Sources of Social Order Development in Post-Socialist Eastern Europe . By Richard Connolly . BASEES/Routledge Series on Russian and East European Studies, no. 85 . London : Routledge , 2013 . 272 pp. Notes. Bibliography. Index. Figures. Tables. Hard bound
Slavic Review, 2014
SSRN Electronic Journal
The Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies (RSCAS), created in 1992 and directed by Professor... more The Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies (RSCAS), created in 1992 and directed by Professor Brigid Laffan, aims to develop inter-disciplinary and comparative research and to promote work on the major issues facing the process of integration and European society. The Centre is home to a large post-doctoral programme and hosts major research programmes and projects, and a range of working groups and ad hoc initiatives. The research agenda is organised around a set of core themes and is continuously evolving, reflecting the changing agenda of European integration and the expanding membership of the European Union.
The Political Economy of Protest and Patience: East European and Latin American Transformations Compared
Slavic Review, 2000
... share almost a tradition of poor economic and political forecasts on Eastern European develop... more ... share almost a tradition of poor economic and political forecasts on Eastern European development ... responsible elite, an effective state apparatus, an organized civil society, a developedmiddle class, and ... is not enough to prove that democracy cannot take root in the East in any ...
Economic Miracle and National Debt on the Political Economy of East Central Europe
Capitalist Diversity on Europe’s Periphery. Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press
SSRN Electronic Journal, 2000
Les analyses concurrentes de la société de marché postcommuniste. Retour sur le passé d'une controverse
Revue française de science politique, 2000
... Une explication possible pourrait justifier la récente réincarnation des perspectives d'... more ... Une explication possible pourrait justifier la récente réincarnation des perspectives d'analyse concurrentes de la ... S'appuyant sur le concept de « vision » élaboré par Joseph Schumpeter, Robert Heilbroner ... de visions, qui ne sont d'abord que des réincarnations de perspectives ...
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Papers by Bela Greskovits