A Concise Field Guide to Post-Communist Regimes : : Actors, Institutions, and Dynamics / / Bálint Madlovics, Bálint Magyar.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter Central European University Press eBook-Package 2022
• VerfasserIn: Magyar, Bálint,; Madlovics, Bálint,
• MitwirkendeR: Fisun, Oleksandr,
• Place / Publishing House: Budapest ;, New York : : Central European University Press, , [2022]; ©2022
• Year of Publication: 2022
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (264 p.)

While the literature of hybrid regimes has given up the presumption that post-communist countries must democratize, its language and concepts still mostly relate to Western democracies. Magyar and Madlovics strongly argue for a vocabulary and grammar tailored to the specifics of the region. In 120 theses they unfold a conceptual framework with (1) a typology of post-communist regimes and (2) a detailed presentation of ideal-type actors and the political, economic, and social phenomena in these regimes. The book is a more digestible companion to the 800-page The Anatomy of Post-Communist Regimes (CEU Press, 2020), which was a detailed theoretical study with plenty of empirical illustrations. Each of the 120 theses contains a statement and its concise discussion supported by illustrative tables, figures, and QR-codes that connect the interested reader to the more detailed analysis in the Anatomy. In a condensed variety, this book has kept the holistic approach of the Anatomy and treats the spheres of political, market, and communal action as parts of a single, coherent whole. The endeavor to synthesize a vast range of ideas does not, however, result in a too complicated text. On the contrary, freed from the implicit presumptions of democracy theory, the new terminology yields a readily usable toolkit of unambiguous means of expression to speak about post-communism.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Table of Contents -- FOREWORD A new paradigm for understanding post-communist regimes -- User’s guide to the book -- I. The Conceptual Framework: 120 Propositions -- Trapped in the Language of Liberal Democracy -- Dissolving Axiom #1: Stubborn Structures and the Region’s Development -- Dissolving Axiom #2: Formality and Informality -- Dissolving Axiom #3: From Constitutional State to the Mafia State -- A Sui Generis Phenomenon: the Adopted Political Family -- The Formal Institutional Setting: Changing Patterns of Legitimacy -- Legislation and the Legal System: From the Rule of Law to the Law of Rule -- Defensive Mechanisms: Stability and Erosion of Democracies and Autocracies -- Relational Economics: Corruption, Predation, and the Redistribution of Markets -- Market-Exploiting Dictatorship: Coexistence of the Three Economic Mechanisms in China -- Clientage Society and the Social Stability of Patronal Autocracy -- Populism: an Ideological Instrument for the Political Program of Morally Unconstrained Collective Egoism -- Beyond Regime Specificities: Country-, Policy-, and Era-Specific Features -- Post-Communist Regime Trajectories: A Triangular Framework -- II. Trajectories of Twelve Post-Communist Regimes -- Estonia: Regime Change to Liberal Democracy -- Romania: Regime Change to Patronal Democracy -- Kazakhstan: Regime Change to Patronal Autocracy -- China: Model Change to Market- Exploiting Dictatorship -- Czech Republic: Backsliding Toward Patronal Democracy -- Poland: Backsliding Toward Conservative Autocracy -- Hungary: Backsliding to Patronal Autocracy from Liberal Democracy -- Russia: Backsliding to Patronal Autocracy from Oligarchic Anarchy -- Ukraine: Regime Cycles with Color Revolutions -- North Macedonia: Regime Cycle with Intra-Elite Conflict -- Moldova: Regime Cycles with Foreign Interference -- Georgia: An Attempt to Break the Regime Cycle -- Notes -- About the Authors