Democracy and authoritarianism in the post-communist world
This volume brings together scholars working on Eastern Europe and Central Europe and the former Soviet Union to examine three waves of democratic change that took place in eleven different former Communist nations. Its essays draw important conclusions about rise, development, and breakdown of both democracy and dictatorship in each country and together provide a rich comparative perspective on the post-Communist world. The first democratic wave to sweep this region encompasses rapid rise of democratic regimes from 1989 to 1992 from ashes of Communism and Communist states. The second wave arose with accession to the European Union (beginning in the late 1990s and culminating in 2004 to 2007) and the third, with the electoral defeat of dictators (1996 to 2005) in Croatia, Serbia, Georgia, and Ukraine. Although these three waves took place in different countries and involved different strategies, they shared several commonalities. International factors played a role in all three waves, as did citizens demanding political change. Each wave revealed victorious democrats but also highly resourceful authoritarians
Print Book, English, 2010
Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2010