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"Focusing on Slovakia and East Central Europe, this book examines the cultural economy of protest and considers how the origins of political movements - progressive and reactionary - derive from resilient agrarian features. It draws attention to how the legacy of rural socialist modernization influences contemporary politics and to the 'village' version of fascism developing in the region. The chapters look at the interplay of post-peasant economic and political habits and representations as a result of state-socialism and with regard to the European project, as viewed through an ethnographic lens. Juraj Buzalka describes the bulk of Slovak citizens as post-socialist Europeans with a connection to the countryside who feel that this is where real power in society should be defined and based. He also observes the skillful politicians who are mobilizing post-peasants while exploiting the political-economic context of the European Union. This volume will be relevant to scholars with an interest in European society and politics, particularly protest and populism, from disciplines such as anthropology, sociology, political science and history"--

Eseje Juraja Buzalku reflektujú slovenskú politiku, národnú ideológiu, politické myslenie na pozadí približne posledného storočia v zrkadle sociálnej antropológie, v našom spoločenskovednom svete nielen pre svoju globálnosť ešte vždy nie celkom zvyčajnej. Čitateľovi ponúkajú interpretáciu nacionalizmu, národnej identity z hľadiska nákladných sociálnych procesov, ktoré posúvali Slovensko od agrárnej k industrálnej, modernej spoločnosti, či, s autorom hovoriac, k europeizácii postsedliackeho slovenského prostredia. Procesov, pri ktorých sa na tejto transformácii podieľali aj fašizmus a socializmus, neskôr však aj neoliberalizmus či revitalizovaný nacionalizmus. Ale aj mnohé národné mýty, ktoré autor tak nástojčivo búra. A neustále pritom zdôrazňuje akceptovanie multietnickosti Slovenska ako opaku adorovania konceptu národného štátu etnickej väčšiny. Práve na slovenskom príklade Juraj Buzalka vo viacerých zrkadlách odráža všetku rozpornosť tejto transformácie, ktorú dnes charakterizujeme ako krízu identity. Identity individuálnej i kolektívnej, sociálnej, ekonomickej, náboženskej, národnej, stredoeurópskej i európskej. O kríze kultúrnej, mravnej nehovoriac. Scientistické uvažovanie, britký kriticizmus a polemický autorov štýl, hodný najlepších tradícií slovenskej esejistiky, sú pridanou hodnotou tejto knihy.--From Back Cover

This article is part of the special cluster titled Social practices of remembering and forgetting of the communist past in Central and Eastern Europe, guest edited by Malgorzata Glowacka-GrajperIn this article, I argue against the primary perception of communist nostalgia as either longing for social security or the "dark ages" of anti-communist narratives. I suggest we look deeper into people's everyday economic practices and ideas under communism, and their transmission and/or re-invention by contemporary populism, to understand the present-day role of nostalgia. Using material gathered mostly in Slovakia, I argue for a fuller understanding of the ambivalent role that communist modernization played in developing the specific model of livelihood strategies, ideas, and practices I call post-peasant. This people's economy is widely remembered as an unintended consequence of communist modernization, not as an integral product of it. This economic model is further mobilized by skilled populist politicians. It is not the memory of socialism, but an understanding of a "people's economy" and politics developed under socialism and transmitted across regimes, one I characterize as "post-peasant," that people are actually nostalgic about.