Social and Political Landscape, Central Europe, Fall 1990
Social and Political Landscape, Central Europe, Fall 1990

Author(s): Iván Szelényi
Subject(s): Transformation Period (1990 - 2010), Post-Communist Transformation
Published by: CEEOL Digital Reproductions / Collections
Summary/Abstract: By the fall of 1990 the countries of Central Europe were progressing with great determination toward a “free economy” or toward liberal capitalism. Two or three years earlier, social scientists who tried to comment on current developments and forecast the future of the region had sensed that a window of opportunity was opening up for Central Europe. 1 The economic and political structure of state socialism was beginning to disintegrate. For decades it had appeared that the degree of freedom in these societies was about zero. Their rigid internal structure and the tight Soviet control over them almost completely determined their developmental trajectory. During the 1980s, cracks began to appear in the edifice of state socialism. The Polish socioeconomic order collapsed. Hungary and Yugoslavia were sliding into deepening economic recession and aggravated crises of legitimation. Even the Czechoslovak and East German elites began to lose their grip on power. On top of this the dissolution of the Soviet empire began. Under these circumstances, it appeared by 1986-87 that a wide range of alternative futures were be coming possible for the region.

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