Political Parties in Post Communist Politics
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Review Essay Political Parties in Post Communist Politics Political Parties in New Democracies: Party Organization in Southern and East Central Europe Ingrid van Biezen Palgrave, Houndmills/Basingstoke, 2003 ISBN: 1 4039 0307 7. Redeeming the Communist Past: The Regeneration of the Communist Parties in East-Central Europe Anna M. Grzymala-Busse Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2002 ISBN: 0 521 00146 3. Political Parties in the Russian Regions Derek S. Hutcheson, Routledge/Curzon, London, 2003 ISBN: 0 415 30218 8. Political Parties after Communism Toma´sˇ Kostelecky´ Woodrow Wilson Center Press/Johns Hopkins University Press, Washington, DC/Baltimore, MD, 2002 ISBN: 0 801 86851 3. Comparative European Politics (2005) 3, 118–127. doi:10.1057/palgrave.cep.6110038
Nearly 15 years have passed since the political upheavals that swept away the communist political systems in Eastern Europe. It was from the ashes of these fallen systems that there emerged a variety of groupings vying to fill the political vacuum created by the collapse of communism. In the early 1990s, the consensus among most reputable scholars was that the emergence of ‘real’ political parties in postcommunist politics was at best only a remote possibility — at worst it was an impossibility. Indeed, the consensus in the first years after the great transition was that parties were not going to develop any time soon in postcommunist politics. As several scholars noted, most parties were transient organizations with little organizational continuity from one election to another, lacking coherent ideological programs and reliable social constituencies (White et al., 1995; Moser, 1998). These ‘pseudo parties’ were seen as largely shifting coalitions
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of individuals unanchored in postcommunist society, incapable of performing even the most basic functions of political parties (Fish, 1995, 1997; Golosov, 1995, 1997, 1998; McAlister and White, 1995; McFaul and Markov, 1993; Sakwa, 1993, 1998). Many have argued that decades of totalitarian rule (more extreme and of longer duration in the Soviet Union than in Eastern Europe or the Baltic States) pulverized what little there was of civil society, a legacy that continues to retard the development of political parties. As Jack Bielasiak noted the ‘numerous weaknesses of political society impede the formation and consolidation of a structured party system capable of providing informed choices to the electorate’ (Bielesiak, 1998, 24). Others pointed to the incentives generated by political structures, particularly the existence of strong presidentialism, which retarded the development of political parties (Colton, 1995; Fish, 2000). Further, others argued that there was little hope that real political parties would develop given the well developed antipathy to the concept of party after 70 years of totalitarian rule (White et al., 1995). How much has changed since 1989? It appears that formidable parties and relatively robust (if shifting) party systems have emerged in former communist states like
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