Suchergebnisse

This paper brings theoretical and empirical contributions to the scholarship on dimensions of politics in Europe. On the theoretical side it emphasizes the differences between Western and Eastern countries; we argue that while in Western Europe the main dimension of political conflict is the economic left-right, in Eastern Europe the main dimension is more likely to encompass cultural issues associated primarily with what in the Western literature is known as the secondary, social left-right. We trace the origin of the difference to the 1990s when parties in Eastern Europe chose to emphasize cultural issues to appeal to an electorate unfamiliar with capitalist economics and dissatisfied with the economic left associated with Communism and the economic right associated with painful reforms. To test this assertion we apply the Optimal Classification vote scaling method to an original dataset of over 24,000 votes from 22 European parliaments; the statistical tests support the hypothesis.

Belarus has a historically divided identity & presently finds itself "in between" the European Union member states & Russia. An analysis of official statements, focus groups & survey results suggests that foreign & security policy is made overwhelmingly by the country's powerful presidency, & that it is often more pragmatic than at first sight appears. Official statements avoid an unambiguous commitment to "east" or "west". This duality is also apparent within the foreign policy community, & at the popular level. Western governments have for the most part condemned the Lukashenko regime as "Europe's last dictatorship" & reduced official contacts to a minimum; a policy of "constructive engagement" might be less likely to push it towards a "Slavic choice" including a greater degree of integration with the Russian Federation & the CIS. Tables, Appendixes. Adapted from the source document.