Post-Communism: Constructing New Democracies in Central Europe

This article analyses the emerging politics of Poland, Hungary and Czechoslovakia since 1989 and assesses their progress towards stable democracy. It argues that the most damaging legacy of the communist period was to destroy the social base for democracy in these countries. These societies will not tolerate economic inequalities and are hostile to the emergence of a new middle class, and there is little common ground between intellectual party elites and public opinion. If democracy is really to take root here, these societies will have to mend themselves, and that will take time. George Schopflin argues that economic integration is the key to overcoming political and social hurdles.