1. Explaining Eastern Europe: Imitation and Its Discontents
- Author:
- Ivan Krastev and Stephen Holmes
- Publication Date:
- 07-2018
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- Journal of Democracy
- Institution:
- National Endowment for Democracy
- Abstract:
- For countries emerging from communism, the post-1989 imperative to “be like the West” has generated discontent and even a “return of the repressed,” as the region feels old nationalist stirrings and new demographic pressures. The origins of the region’s current illiberalism are emotional and preideological, rooted in rebellion at the humiliations that accompany a project requiring acknowledgment of a foreign culture as superior to one’s own. Further contributing to illiberalism in the region is a largely unspoken preoccupation with demographic collapse—resulting from aging populations, low birth rates, and massive outmigration—which manifests as a fear that the arrival of unassimilable foreigners will dilute national identities and weaken national cohesion.
- Topic:
- Nationalism, Post Cold War, and Illiberal Democracy
- Political Geography:
- Global Focus