Communism, Federalism, and Ethnic Minorities: Explaining Party Competition Patterns in Eastern Europe

2014 ◽  
Vol 66 (4) ◽  
pp. 669-708 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jan Rovny
Keyword(s):  
Eastern Europe ◽  
Ethnic Minorities ◽  
Ethnic Politics ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Party Competition ◽  
The Political ◽  
European Politics ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
East European ◽  
Liberal Market Economy

Scholarship on East European politics expects that party competition in the region is determined by various communist legacies, juxtaposing state-centric authoritarianism to a liberal market economy. Recent empirical evidence, however, uncovers significant variance of party competition patterns across East European countries. To explain this variance, this article argues that an interaction between communist institutional framework and partisan responses to ethnic minorities determines party competition structure in the region. While experience with communist federalism determines partisan affinities with ethnic minorities, tolerance or support for ethnic minorities leads the political actors associated with those minorities to general socially liberal positions. Consequently—and contrary to received knowledge—ethnic politics influence the ideological content of party competition and structure party systems in Eastern Europe.

Politics of Intraexecutive Conflict in Semipresidential Regimes in Eastern Europe

2005 ◽  
Vol 19 (2) ◽  
pp. 135-160 ◽  
Author(s):  
Oleh Protsyk
Keyword(s):  
Eastern Europe ◽  
Party System ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
The Political ◽  
Prime Ministers ◽  
East European ◽  
Conflict And Cooperation ◽  
Political Status ◽  
System Characteristics

This article analyzes the patterns of intraexecutive conflict and cooperation in East European democracies that adopted semipresidential constitutional frameworks. It explores how the coexistence of popularly elected presidents and prime ministers is shaped by constitutional provisions, parliamentary fragmentation, and party system characteristics. The article emphasizes a critical role that party systems play in the evolution of intraexecutive relations across the region. It argues that variations in the political status of the cabinet, in the character of parliamentary composition, and in the constitutional powers of the president affect both the type and frequency of intraexecutive conflict experienced by semipresidential regimes.

Telling Lies, Making Truth

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Melissa Feinberg
Keyword(s):  
Economic Development ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Eastern Europe ◽  
The Political ◽  
Nuclear War ◽  
East European ◽  
Political Function ◽  
The World ◽  
The Cold War

This chapter analyzes the political function of show trials in Eastern Europe. It argues that while show trials told lies, their primary purpose was to reveal new truths about the Cold War world to their East European audiences. Show trials described a world where the peace-loving socialist East was continually menaced by the imperialist West, which sent spies and saboteurs to wreck its economic development and plotted to destroy it in a nuclear war. These political plays told East Europeans how they should see the world and clarified the consequences of non-compliance. This chapter also examines how people around the region were required to voice their condemnation of the traitors on trial and dedicate themselves to the search for hidden enemies.

The Political Origins of Coordinated Capitalism: Business Organizations, Party Systems, and State Structure in the Age of Innocence

2008 ◽  
Vol 102 (2) ◽  
pp. 181-198 ◽  
Author(s):  
CATHIE JO MARTIN ◽  
DUANE SWANK
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
The United States ◽  
Party Competition ◽  
The Political ◽  
Business Organizations ◽  
Political Factors ◽  
Political Determinants ◽  
Multiparty Systems

This paper investigates the political determinants of corporatist and pluralist employers' associations and reflects on the origins of the varieties of capitalism in the early decades of the 20th century. We hypothesize that proportional, multiparty systems tend to enable employers' associations to develop into social corporatist organizations, whereas nonproportional, two-party systems are conducive to the formation of pluralist associations. Moreover, we suggest that federalism tends to reinforce incentives for pluralist organization. We assess our hypotheses through quantitative analysis of data from 1900 to the 1930s from 16 nations and case studies of the origins of peak employers' associations in Denmark and the United States. Our statistical analysis suggests that proportional, multiparty systems foster, and federalism works against, social corporatist business organization; employers' organization is also greater where the mobilization of labor, traditions of coordination, and economic development are higher. These factors also largely explain pre-World War II patterns of national coordination of capitalism. Case histories of the origins of employers' associations in Denmark and the United States further confirm the causal importance of political factors. Although Danish and American employers had similar interests in creating cooperative national industrial policies, trajectories of associational development were constrained by the structure of party competition, as well as by preindustrial traditions for coordination.

Translating Social Cleavages into Party Systems: The Significance of New Democracies

2002 ◽  
Vol 54 (2) ◽  
pp. 184-211 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jakub Zielinski
Keyword(s):  
Eastern Europe ◽  
Party System ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Political Conflict ◽  
New Democracies ◽  
Theoretic Model ◽  
Social Cleavages ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
Game Theoretic ◽  
Social Cleavage

This article focuses on new democracies in Eastern Europe and addresses two questions about the translation of social cleavages into political oppositions. The first question concerns the translation of preexisting cleavages: does the evolution of new party systems influence the politicization of social conflicts? The second question concerns the translation of new social cleavages, that is, cleavages that emerge once a party system freezes: can a new social cleavage be politicized? To answer these questions, the article integrates a formalization of social cleavage theory with a game-theoretic model of a new party system. The first result is that translation of preexisting cleavages depends on which parties survive the early rounds of electoral competition. In fact, depending on which parties survive, the axis of political conflict can shift by 90 degrees. This implies that party systems in new democracies should be seen as important founding moments, during which political actors determine the long-term axes of political conflict. The second result is that once a party system freezes, the politicization of a new social cleavage is difficult. Indeed, it is possible that a new social cleavage will remain politically dormant. In the context of Eastern Europe, this result suggests that political salience of class conflict is likely to be low because competitive elections and political parties predate the entrenchment of propertyowning classes.

Nationalism in Eastern Europe in the Middle Ages

1972 ◽  
Vol 22 ◽  
pp. 1-16 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dimitri Obolensky
Keyword(s):  
Eastern Europe ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Eleventh Century ◽  
General Definition ◽  
The Political ◽  
European Politics ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Definition Of

The divergent views held by historians and sociologists as to what does and does not constitute nationalism will, I hope, provide me with some excuse for not attempting here a general definition of this phenomenon. Nor will I presume to adjudicate between the opinions of scholars like Hans Kohn who, confining their attention to Western Europe, will not hear of nationalism before the rise of modern states between the sixteenth and the eighteenth century, and of historians like G. G. Coulton who, after surveying the policy of the Papacy, the life of the Universities, the internal frictions in the monasteries and the history of medieval warfare, concluded that nationalism, which had been developing in Western Europe since the eleventh century, became a basic factor in European politics by the fourteenth. My paper is concerned with the medieval history of Eastern Europe: an area which I propose to define, by combining a geographical with a cultural criterion, as the group of countries which lay within the political or cultural orbit of Byzantium. The subject is vast and complex, and I can do no more than select a few topics for discussion. These I would like to present as arguments in support of three theses.

Language and the Sentiment of Nationality

1916 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 44-69 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carl Darling Buck
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Eastern Europe ◽  
The Other ◽  
The Political ◽  
European Politics ◽  
Active Force ◽  
Considerable Part ◽  
Political Consequences ◽  
Balkan States ◽  
Autonomous Development

The nineteenth century, it is a commonplace to remark, witnessed a notable revival of nationalistic sentiment, the germs of which go back to the eighteenth, and the political consequences of which are in considerable part still outstanding. The emancipation of the Balkan States, the union of Italy, and the consolidation of Germany, were substantial, though incomplete, realizations of nationalism. The Germanization of Austria-Hungary, which had seemed inevitable, was brought to a halt by the national revival of Slav and Magyar. And today, not to mention the Irish situation, Eastern Europe is fairly alive with smaller nationalities seeking to gain or to maintain autonomous development. Nationalism, in spite of, or rather because of its being so largely a matter of sentiment, is the most active force in European politics. The dynastic system, certainly, is only a superficial relic of a past reality; loyalty to a dynasty, except as it is identified with nationalism, has lost its former significance. And on the other hand, a socialistic brotherhood which shall rise superior to the bounds of nationality is a dream of the future.

scholarly journals Institutionalization of the Czech and Slovenian party system

2016 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
pp. 244-265
Author(s):  
Alena Klvaňová
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
Party System ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Party Competition ◽  
System Stability ◽  
The Political ◽  
Public Officials ◽  
The Republic ◽  
Political Scene

Abstract For the past two decades, the characteristic feature of the Czech Republic and the Republic of Slovenia’s party system has been relatively invariable and closed to fundamental change. In both cases, there has been a distortion of the change and its nature which occurred around 2010, when new political entities began to emerge on the political scene. These entities have received support from a large part of the electorate. The reason for the success of the new political parties is mainly related to the dissatisfaction of the Czech and Slovenian public with the political situation and the conviction of citizens about the widespread corruption among public officials. The success of the newly formed entities caused the decline of primarily established parties. The aim of this article is to determine the effect of these changes on the party systems, and simultaneously to answer the question, to what extent both party systems are institutionalized. The answer to this question can be obtained by measuring the extend of institutionalization of party systems based on three criteria, which are incorporation of political parties in the party system, party system stability and quality of party competition.

scholarly journals The venturous bid for the independence of Catalonia

2017 ◽  
Vol 45 (5) ◽  
pp. 950-967 ◽  
Author(s):  
Josep M. Colomer
Keyword(s):  
Political Party ◽  
Party Competition ◽  
The Political ◽  
European Politics ◽  
Recent Period ◽  
Competitive Strategies ◽  
Territorial Conflict ◽  
New Developments ◽  
Party Leaders ◽  
West European Politics

Following an ambiguous constitutional compromise for democratization, the territorial decentralization of the Spanish state developed by means of political party competition, exchanges, and bargaining. Hence, the so-calledstate of autonomieswas characterized as “non-institutional federalism” [Colomer, Josep M. 1998. “The Spanish ‘State of Autonomies': Non-institutional Federalism.”West European Politics21 (4): 40–52]. In the most recent period, competition and instability have intensified. New developments include, on one side, attempts at recentralizating the state and, on the other side, demands and mobilizations forCatexit, that is, the independence of Catalonia from Spain, which resulted in sustained inter-territorial conflict. This article addresses these recent changes with a focus on the relations between the Spanish and the Catalan governments. The political changes were analyzed as a result of opportunities and incentives offered by a loose institutional framework and the subsequent competitive strategies of extreme party leaders.

scholarly journals The Changing Cleavage Politics of Western Europe

2020 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 295-314 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Ford ◽  
Will Jennings
Keyword(s):  
Ethnic Diversity ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Structural Changes ◽  
Electoral Politics ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Party Competition ◽  
European Politics ◽  
New Parties ◽  
Mass Migration ◽  
Western European

How are the contours of Western European politics shifting? To what extent do these shifts reflect changes in the underlying social and economic structure of European polities? In this article, we reflect on insights from the classic literature on how cleavages structure party systems and consider how the emergence and persistence of new parties and new ideological conflicts are leading to both shifts of dividing lines of party competition and the fragmentation of party systems. While increasing attention has been given to the so-called second dimension of European electoral politics, we highlight the relatively limited focus on structural changes that are helping to drive this transformation. We identify some socio-demographic developments that are potentially generating new cleavages in Western European democracies: the expansion of higher education; mass migration and the growing ethnic diversity of electorates; the aging of societies and sharpening of generational divides; and increased geographical segregation of populations between prospering, globalized major cities and declining hinterlands.

Populist Rhetoric and Nativist Alarmism

2020 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
pp. 55-76
Author(s):  
Barbara Donovan
Keyword(s):  
Party Systems ◽  
Party Competition ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
The Political ◽  
German Politics ◽  
Close Affinity ◽  
Chapel Hill ◽  
Party Positions ◽  
European Parties ◽  
Radical Right Parties

Using the 2017 Chapel Hill Expert Survey of party positions, this study compares the AfD with other European parties outside the political mainstream across several ideological/attitudinal dimensions. The paper explores the changing character of European party systems and multiple axes of party competition. It regards populism and nativism as distinct political phenomena, but as ones that are symbiotic and coupled together provide a particular powerful narrative. The paper finds that the AfD shares a close affinity with radical right parties in Europe but also emerges as one of Europe’s most populist and nativist parties. This explains the AfD’s affiliation with the Identity and Freedom Group in the European Parliament; it also supports the argument it is the blend of populist anti-elitism and nativist alarmism that has made the AfD the potent force in German politics that it is today.

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