Newsletter - Social Science in Eastern Europe 2001- 3
Western Europe
Pal Tamas, Ulrike Becker. The Countries of Central and Eastern Europe and the
EU: Attitudes and Perceptions (Selected Papers).
Newsletter Social Sciences in Eastern Europe. Special Edition 2001. Berlin:
IZ Sozialwissenschaften, 158pp. DM 20,00
The publication is the result of the Workshop "The EU and the Countries
of Central and Eastern Europe: Attitudes and Perceptions" held on December
13, 1999 and organised by the Social Science Information Centre, Department
Information Transfer Eastern Europe. 30 participants, among them 12
representatives from a range of East European countries were brought together to
review attitudes to, opinions about and perceptions of Europe. Some of the
participants submitted papers, which have been published now as a special
edition of the Newsletter.
The Workshop was aimed to give an inside-view of the perceptions of Europe in
the post-socialist countries: social researchers from Central and Eastern Europe
presented a differentiated picture containing many impulses and incentives for
an intergovernmental European policy.
The main subjects of country contributions were the self-definitions the
East-Central European countries developed with respect to historical and current
integration processes, then the dominating concept of national identity, and,
finally, the constellations of political issues and actors.
There are numerous research works, dealing with the opening of the EU to the
East European states and focusing on economic, political and legal issues. The
sociological aspects of accession have been somehow neglected. For this reason
socio-psychological studies with reference to perceptions on and attitudes to
Europe in the potential member countries are of particular interest for social
scientists in Western Europe. Available at:
Department Information Transfer Eastern Europe at the GESIS Branch Office
Schiffbauerdamm 19
10117 Berlin
e-mail: langer@berlin.iz-soz.de
Fax: +49 30 28 23 692
Algis Krupavicius (Ed.) 2001. Lithuania's Seimas Election 1996: The Third
Turnover Analyses. Documents and Data. Series: Founding Elections in Eastern
Europe Klingemann, H.-D. and Taylor, C. (General Editors) Berlin: Ed. Sigma,
365pp. DM 48,00 ISBN 3-89404-215-X
The emergence of party systems in Eastern Europe in the 1990s represents one
of the most important and challenging fields for political research. After ten
years most Central and Eastern European countries have developed into
representative democracies and political parties have become the major actors in
free and fare general elections. The series "Founding Elections in Eastern
Europe" (edited by Hans-Dieter Klingemann and Charles L. Taylor) is
dedicated to the analysis of these emerging and formation processes. Each
country-related volume deals with the first and/or subsequent elections for the
national parliament in terms of the political parties' history, the electoral
system, the electoral behavior of the population, and the formation of
government. All volumes include appendices documenting parties and election laws
as well as survey data available for secondary analysis. The latest issue is
focused on the Lithuania's Seimas Election in 1996. The analyses presented in
this volume focus on different stages of electoral politics in the 20th century.
In Lithuania, the consolidation of democracy got underway as the political
parties became organized and as they began to find their natural sources of
support among appropriate categories of voters. It continues as power is
transferred from party to party in regular elections. This volume examines these
and other changes that are taking place in Lithuania. It devotes particular
attention to the electoral campaign of 1996, changes of public opinion between
the elections of 1992 and 1996, political regionalism, the evolution of the
party system, problems of voter turnout, the results of the election of 1996,
and the formation of the new government. Although its focus is the 1996
election, the analysis is placed within the larger context of Lithuania's
political history. The volume includes a history of the evolution of
parliamentary democracy in the early 1920s and in the period since the late
1980s and an analysis of the voting systems employed in the new democracy. A
comprehensive appendix provides the readers with factual information about the
results of the Seimas Elections as well as of election surveys from 1996.
The authors: Algis Krupavicius, Alvidas Lukosaitis, Juozas Matakas, Algis
Junevicius, Vladys Gaidys, Darius Zeruolis, Rasa Labulyte and Jürate
Novagrockiene. Further volumes (published by edition sigma Rainer Bohn Verlag
Berlin):
Volume 7
Gel'man, Vladimir; Golosov, Grigorii V. (eds.) 1999: Elections in Russia,
1993-1996: Analyses, Documents and Data. Berlin: ISBN 3-89404-198-6, 473pp.
DM 56,00.Volume 6
Gabor Toka, Zsolt Enyedi (eds.) 1999: Elections to the Hungarian National
Assembly 1994. Berlin: ISBN 3-89404-184-6, 318pp. DM 44,00.Volume 5:
Vladimir Goati (ed.) 1998: Elections to the Federal and Republican
Parliaments of Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro) 1990-1996. Berlin: ISBN
3-89404-181-1, 397 pp. DM 48,00.
Volume 4:Ivan Siber (ed.) 1997: The 1990 and 1992/93 Sabor
Elections in Croatia. Berlin: ISBN 3-89404-177-3, 215 pp. DM 33,00.
Volume 3:Georgi Karasimeonov (ed.) 1997: The 1990 Election to the
Bulgarian Grand National Assembly and the 1991 Election to the Bulgarian
National Assembly. Berlin: ISBN 3-89404-156-X, 156 pp. DM 33,00.
Volume 2:
Ivan Gabal (ed.) 1996: The 1990 Election to the Czechoslovakian Federal
Assembly. Berlin: ISBN 3-89404-158-7, 198 pp. DM 33,00.
Volume 1
The 1990 Election to the Hungarian National Assembly. Berlin: 1996.
ISBN 3-89404-150-1, 198 pp. DM 33,00.
Hans-Dieter Klingemann, Ekkehard Mochmann, Kenneth Newton (eds.) 2000: Elections
in Central and Eastern Europe. First Wave. Berlin: ISBN 3-89404-195-1, 354
pp. DM 44,00.
The Presence of the Past Transformation and Dealing with the Past in Eastern
and Central Europe - Conference May 23-25 2002 Berlin
The Institute for History and Biography at the Open University in Hagen as
the German representative of the "International Oral History
Association", supported by the "Stiftung Aufarbeitung der SED
Diktatur" in Berlin, will hold a conference on Central and Eastern Europe.
Conference will be held on the following subjects: individual and collective
remembrances of the time before, during and after the transformation process,
subjective dealing with the "new time", the investigation, archival
and judicial treatment of the past. The aim of the conference is also to compare
several Central and East European countries. The main topic of the conference is
thus the "Ungleichzeitigkeit" (non-simultaneity) of political
structures and mental orientations at times of system transformation. Two
scholars of each country are invited to present papers. One of them should give
an overview of the historical, political and judicial development in his or her
country. The other paper should focus on a concrete example of the experience of
this process and on dealing with the past within different social groups:
elites, parties, public service, churches, intellectuals etc. The accepted
participants will be paid travel and accommodation expenses by the organizers.
Guidelines for submitting proposals:
Send a single page proposal including an outline of your paper, also
mentioning the empirical or theoretical basis and the following details: name,
affiliation, postal address, e-mail address, phone and fax numbers.
Proposals must be received by September 30, 2001 and can be sent per post,
fax or e-mail to:
Contact: Dr. Alexander von Plato
Institute für Geschichte und Biographie der Fernuniversität Hagen
E-mail: alexander.vonplato@fernuni-hagen.de
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