Eastern European Politics 2100-ERASMUS-EEPO

WEEK I
Introduction: Defining Eastern Europe and its place in the world
No readings

WEEK II
A short history of Eastern Europe since 1945. Communist legacy and European transition.
Obligatory Reading:
Juan Linz &Alfred Stepan, Chapter 15. Post-Communism’s Prehistories (pp.235-254) in Juan Linz &Alfred Stepan, Problems of Democratic Transition and Consolidation, The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore and London, 1996

Recommended Readings:
Sharon L. Wolchik and Jane L. Curry. Democracy, the Market, and the Return to Europe: From Communism to the European Union and NATO. (pp. 3-31), in Wolchik and Curry
Sharon Fisher. Re-Creating the Market. (pp. 53-83) in Wolchik and Curry

WEEK III
Communism’s end and the different models of transformation:
Obligatory Reading:
Juan Linz &Alfred Stepan, Chapter 17. Varieties of Post-Totalitarian Regimes: Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria pp.293-343 in Juan Linz &Alfred Stepan, Problems of Democratic Transition and Consolidation, The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore and London, 1996

WEEK IV
The transformation challenges: lustration, privatization, organized crime, selfgovernment, oligarchy
Obligatory Reading:
Valerie Bunce. The Political Transition. (pp. 31-53) in Wolchik and Curry

Recommended reading:
Misha Glenny, McMafia: A Journey Through the Global Criminal Underworld, Random House, 2008

WEEK V
Obligatory Readings:
The Geopolitics of Eastern Europe. Desintegration, fragmentation and integration
Spasimir Domaradzki, The Geopolitics of Eastern Europe, The Palgrave Handbook of Contemporary Geopolitics, (ed.) Zak Cope, Palgrave macmillan (2024) str.391-401
Ronald Linden. EU Accession and the Role of International Actors (pp. 125-143) in Wolchik and Curry

WEEK VI
The Balkans, Prejudices and Reality
Obligatory reading,
Maria Todorova, Balkanism and Orientalism: Are They Different Categories? In: Maria Todorova, Imaging the Balkans, Oxford University Press, 1997, pp.3-20

Recommended reading:
Robert Kaplan, Balkan Ghosts, A journey through history, Picador St.Martin’s Press, New York 2005

WEEK VII
Case Study: The Western Balkans, from integration to disintegration and back
Obligatory Reading:
Mark Baskin and Paula Pickering. Former Yugoslavia and Its Successors. (pp. 277-313) in Wolchik and Curry

Recommended Readings:
Bieber, F. (2018) ‘Patterns of competitive authoritarianism in the Western Balkans’, East European Politics, 34(3): 337–354

WEEK VIII
The Eastern Balkans – the permanent satellites?
Obligatory Readings:
Janusz Bugajski. Bulgaria: Progress and Development (pp. 251-277) and John Gledhill and Charles King. Romania since 1989: Living beyond the Past. (pp. 313-335) in Wolchik and Curry
Spasimir Domaradzki and Robert Rajczyk. Thirty Years after Communism: Bulgaria and Romania’s Experience, (pp.165-181) in ed. Kushnir O. and Pankieiev O., Meandering in Transition, Thirty Years of Reforms and Identity in Post-Communist Europe, Lexington Books, 2021

Recommended Readings:
Michael Boll. Bulgaria: Geography, History. (pp. 78-90) in Frucht
Paul E. Michelson. Romania: Geography, History. (pp. 575-593) in Frucht

WEEK IX
Case Study: The emergence of Central Europe, Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Hungary
Obligatory Readings:
Jane L. Curry. Poland: The Politics of “God’s Playground.” (pp. 161-187) in Wolchik and Curry
Sharon L. Wolchik. The Czech and Slovak Republics: Two Paths to the Same Destination. (pp. 187-213) in Wolchik and Curry
Federigo Argentieri. Hungary: Appraising the Past and Adjusting to the Present. (pp. 213-231) in Wolchik and Curry

Recommended Readings:
Chapter 16. Authoritatian Communism, Ethical Civil Society and Ambivalent Political Society: Poland pp.293-343 in uan Linz &Alfred Stepan, Problems of Democratic Transition and Consolidation, The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore and London, 1996

WEEK X
From leaders of transformation to democratic backsliding. The nature of politics in Eastern Europe
Obligatory Reading:
Nancy Bermeo, On Democratic Backsliding, Journal of Democracy, Volume 27, Number 1, January 2016, pp. 5-19

WEEK XI
European integration, political elites and the future of EU enlargement
Obligatory Reading:
Tanja A. Börzel and Thomas Risse, When Europe Hits Home: Europeanization and Domestic Change, European Integration online Papers (EIoP) Vol. 4 (2000) N°15; http://eiop.or.at/eiop/texte/2000-015a.htm
Frank Schimmelfennig, and Ulrich Sedelmeier (2004) 'Governance by Conditionality: EU Rule Transfer to the Candidate Countries of Central and Eastern Europe', Journal of European Public Policy 11(4): 661-79
or alternatevly:
Schimmelfennig, F. and Sedelmeier, U. (2005) Conclusions: The Impact of the EU on the Accession Countries. in F. Schimmelfennig and U. Sedelmeier (ed) The Europeanization of Central and Eastern Europe. Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press: 210-229.
Anastasakis, O. (2008) ‘The EU’s political conditionality in the Western Balkans: towards a more pragmatic approach’, Southeast European and Black Sea Studies, 8(4): 365–377

WEEK XII The reinvention of geopolitics and the new Eastern Europe
Case Study: Ukraine and Belarus
Obligatory Reading:
Taras Kuzio. Ukraine: Muddling Along. (pp. 335-369) in Wolchik and Curry

WEEK XIII
Case Study: Baltic States
Obligatory Readings:
Daina Stukuls Eglitis. The Baltic States: Changes and Challenges in the New Europe. (pp. 231-251) in Wolchik and Curry

WEEK XIV
General overview and conclusion. Future of Eastern Europe
Obligatory Readings:
Sharon L. Wolchik and Jane L. Curry. What Now? (pp. 397-405) in Wolchik and Curry
Mykola Riabchuk, Shifting the Wall Further East: What Has Left of the „Eastern Europe” Thirty Years Later? pp.9-24 in ed. Kushnir O. and Pankieiev O., Meandering in Transition, Thirty Years of Reforms and Identity in Post-Communist Europe, Lexington Books, 2021