local communities and post-communist transformation (basees curzon series on russian & east...

dpsl dpsl

Local Communities and Post-Communist Transformation

Post-communist transformation in the former Soviet bloc has had aprofound effect not just in the political and economic sphere but on allaspects of life Although a great deal has been written about transformationmuch of it has been about transformation viewed from the top and littlehas been written about how things have changed for ordinary people at thelocal level

This book based on extensive original research examines the changesresulting from transformation at the local level in the formerCzechoslovakia It considers especially local democracy social movementsand work collectives and paints a picture of people gradually growing inself-confidence and taking more control of their communities having livedfor decades in a framework where so much was directed from the top

Simon Smith is a research lecturer in the Centre for ContemporaryEuropean Studies at the University of Paisley His current researchinterests cover civil society collective action local culture and local andregional government in Central and Eastern Europe

BASEESRoutledgeCurzon Series on Russian and East European Studies

Series editorRichard SakwaDepartment of Politics and International Relations University of Kent

Editorial committeeGeorge BlazycaCentre for Contemporary European Studies University of PaisleyTerry CoxDepartment of Government University of StrathclydeRosalind MarshDepartment of European Studies and Modern Languages University of BathDavid MoonDepartment of History University of StrathclydeHilary PilkingtonCenre for Russian ad East European Studies University of BirminghamStephen WhiteDepartment of Politics University of Glasgow

This series is published on behalf of BASEES (the British Association forSlavonic and East European Studies) The series comprises original high-quality research-level work by both new and established scholars on allaspects of Russian Soviet post-Soviet and East European Studies inhumanities and social science subjects

1 Ukrainersquos Foreign and Security Policy 1991ndash2000Roman Wolczuk

2 Political Parties in the Russian RegionsDerek S Hutcheson

3 Local Communities and Post-Communist TransformationEdited by Simon Smith

4 Repression and Resistance in Communist EuropeJ C Sharman

5 Political Elites and the New RussiaAnton Steen

Local Communities and Post-CommunistTransformationCzechoslovakia the Czech Republic and Slovakia

Edited by Simon Smith

First published 2003by RoutledgeCurzon11 New Fetter Lane London EC4P 4EE

Simultaneously published in the USA and Canadaby RoutledgeCurzon29 West 35th Street New York NY 10001

RoutledgeCurzon is an imprint of the Taylor amp Francis Group

Editorial matter copy 2003 Simon Smith Individual chapters copy the contributors

All rights reserved No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic mechanical or other means now known or hereafter invented including photocopying and recording or in any information storage or retrieval system without permission in writing from the publishers

British Library Cataloguing in Publication DataA catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication DataLocal communities and post-communist transformation Czechoslovakia

the Czech Republic and Slovakia edited by Simon Smithp cm ndash (BASEESRoutledgeCurzon series on Russian and East

European studies 3)Simultaneously published in the USA and CanadaIncludes bibliographical references and index1 Civil societyndashCzech Republic 2 Civil societyndashSlovakia 3 CivilsocietyndashCzechoslovakia 4 Post-communismndashCzech Republic5 Post-communismndashSlovakia 6 Post-communismndashCzechoslovakiaI Smith Simon 1970ndash II Series

HN4203A8 L63 20033062acute094371ndashdc21 2002036958

ISBN 0-415-29718-4

This edition published in the Taylor amp Francis e-Library 2004

ISBN 0-203-63395-4 Master e-book ISBN

ISBN 0-203-63703-8 (Adobe eReader Format)(Print Edition)

Contents

List of tables viiNotes on contributors ixPreface xiAcknowledgements xv

1 Transformation as modernisation sociological readings of post-communist lifeworlds 1SIMON SMITH

2 Civil society and political parties in the Czech Republic 19MARTIN MYANT

3 Civic Forum and Public Against Violence agents for community self-determination Experiences of local actors 41SIMON SMITH

4 The development of the environmental non-governmental movement in Slovakia the Slovak Union of Nature and Landscape Conservationists 92MIKULAacuteŠ HUBA

5 Dual identity andor lsquobread and butterrsquo electronics industry workers in Slovakia 1995ndash2000 105MONIKA ČAMBAacuteLIKOVAacute

6 The democratisation of industrial relations in the Czech Republic ndash work organisation and employee representationcase studies from the electronics industry 126ALEŠ KROUPA AND ZDENKA MANSFELDOVAacute

7 Local community transformation the Czech Republic 1990ndash2000 143ZDENKA VAJDOVAacute

8 Civic potential as a differentiating factor in the development of local communities 161MARTIN SLOSIARIK

9 Group strategies of local communities in Slovakia facing social threats 184IMRICH VAŠEČKA

10 Conclusion the narrativisation of social transformation 206SIMON SMITH

Index 221

vi Contents

Tables

21 Results of elections to Czech parliament showing votes as percentage and seats as total 30

31 1990 local election results in main towns in Humenneacute district 5932 1994 local election results in main towns in Humenneacute district 5933 Mayors by party in Humenneacute district in 1990 6034 Mayors by party in Humenneacute district 1994 6035 1990 local election results in five Czech municipalities 7536 1994 local election results in five Czech municipalities 7551 Foreign direct investment inflows in CEFTA countries 11252 Distribution of four types of workersrsquo identity 11653 Satisfaction with working life 11854 Satisfaction with different aspects of work 11855 How true are the following statements about your work 11956 How far do the decisions of your local union reflect your

opinions 11957 How far do the decisions of management reflect your

opinions 11958 Membership agreement with local union policies and

participation in local union activities 11959 Representational deficit on labour issues 121

510 Perceptions of trade union representation 12161 Changes in work content in manual professions 13062 Self-evaluation of work undertaken in manual professions 13163 Manual workersrsquo evaluations of relationships to superiors

and co-workers 13264 Satisfaction with individual aspects of conditions at work 13465 Collective actors which best represent employee interests

in specific areas 13866 Priorities for union activity in the firm 14071 1994 and 1998 local election results Votes and seats won

by party 15072 Changing feelings of powerlessness 155

viii Tables

81 Occurrence of different types of lsquodemocratrsquo according to responses to action models 178

82 Percentage of respondents who expressed a willingnessto participate actively in solving local problems 179

83 Indices of civic potential dimensions in Kvačany and Liptovskeacute Klrsquoačany 181

91 Evaluations of community problems and prospects at the end of 1996 198

92 Informedness about community problems and about the work of its representatives 198

93 Levels of participation in tackling community problems 19994 Trust towards actors in the community authoritative

institutions and fellow citizens 20095 Preferred responses to financial or material difficulties of

community and individuals 201

Contributors

Simon Smith is a research lecturer in the Centre for ContemporaryEuropean Studies at the University of Paisley His current researchinterests cover civil society collective action local culture and local andregional government

Martin Myant is a professor at Paisley Business School and the Centre forContemporary European Studies at the University of Paisley He iscurrently completing The Rise and Fall of Czech Capitalism a study ofthe transformation of the Czech economy to be published by EdwardElgar

Mikulaacuteš Huba works at the Institute of Geography of the Slovak Academyof Sciences and has been chairman of the Society for Sustainable Livingin the Slovak Republic since 1993 Previously he was chairman ofSZOPK local organisation no 6 in Bratislava (1980ndash88) and president ofSZOPK (1989ndash93)

Monika Čambaacutelikovaacute is a senior researcher at the Institute of Sociology ofthe Slovak Academy of Sciences and a member of the editorial board ofthe journal Socioloacutegia Her main research interests are civil society thelabour market social dialogue social partnership and industrialrelations

Aleš Kroupa is the assistant director of the Research Institute for Labourand Social Affairs in Prague As a sociologist he is interested in socialdialogue work conditions the organisation of work and labourmigration

Zdenka Mansfeldovaacute is a senior research fellow at the Institute ofSociology of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic Herprimary interests are political parties interest groups and the institu-tionalisation of interest representation

Zdenka Vajdovaacute is a senior researcher at the Institute of Sociology of theAcademy of Sciences of the Czech Republic in Prague and also lecturesat the University of Jan Evangelista Purkyně in Uacutestiacute nad Labem Herresearch covers the sociology of local communities local governmentand social networks

Martin Slosiarik graduated in sociology from Comenius UniversityBratislava Since 1999 he has worked for the market and public opinionresearch agency FOCUS where he is currently the research director Heis also studying externally for a doctorate at Comenius University

Imrich Vašečka is director of the Central European Institute in Bratislavaand an external consultant to the Union of Cities of Slovakia His workis focused on minority issues local social policy and social problemsolving

x Contributors

Preface

This collection of studies grew out of a workshop held in Měchenice nearPrague in April 2001 where early versions of the chapters were presentedas papers in an informal and relaxed setting which allowed us to devoteconsiderable time to free discussion of a number of related themes Theworkshop was hosted by my friend Jiřiacute Holub lecturer in political scienceat Charles University in Prague who has a summer house in Měcheniceand is a member of the local sports club where we held the event The verysetting called for our engagement with the issue of local communityresponses to social transformation Měchenice is a village faced with thechallenge of maintaining or adapting an identity tied up with patterns ofwork and leisure and action spaces which had evolved and stabilisedduring the communist era (though some aspects can be traced further backin time) Its position within the living space of a different type of society isuncertain In a sense it is undergoing a necessary crisis invoked by thelifestyle changes brought on by marketisation and democratisation whatdoes the future hold for a recreational lsquocolonyrsquo near Prague Can it retainand revive an autonomous civic and cultural life Can it generate visionsand projects which will enable it to prosper in the new conditions Whatkind of organisational traditions will enable or hinder its adaptation Howhave social relations and public discourses altered Into what widernetworks are local actors becoming integrated (or excluded from)Měchenice as it were crystallised many of the questions which interestedus as sociologists concerned with the diffusion of structural changes withina society made up of real human actors

Following the workshop I invited each of the participants to re-worktheir contributions to address two general questions seen as central to localcommunity development and organisational transformation at this stage inthe emergence of a post-communist social order

bull How have pre-existing sources of social and cultural capital beendeployed by actors involved in or affected by social transformation

bull Have adaptive responses by social actors to the pressures of socialtransformation at the micro-level contributed to or blocked the expan-sion of civic and political participation in the wider social context

Chapter Title xi

The studies presented in this volume are the results of our reflections Eachtherefore represents a fresh take on contemporary problems and each islinked to the others by a common conceptual thread even though in mostcases they present findings from research carried out at various datesduring the past decade which has already been reported elsewhere

The opening chapter (Simon Smith) reviews some influential trendswithin Czech and Slovak sociology which often differ from dominanttreatments of post-communist transformation normatively and methodo-logically It focuses especially on critical accounts of the developmentallogic and potential of communist and post-communist societies putforward by Czech and Slovak sociologists in the period immediately beforeand after 1989 These mostly understood the problem in terms of modern-isation processes blocked or interrupted by the former regime The chaptergoes on to open a number of thematic and conceptual discourses relevantto micro-level social transformation concentrating on a critique of theconcepts of human potential and civil society

The second chapter (Martin Myant) deals with the macro-political frame-work for post-communist transformation focusing on the Czech RepublicThe transformation of local community life is both structurally constrainedand narratively conditioned by macro-political programmes reforms anddiscourses This relationship has been unusually reflexive in the Czech caseinsofar as a recurring theme of public debate and policy formation hasbeen the problematic of civil society Myant assesses the politicisation ofthis theme and its implications for the reintegration of public space

The main part of the book consists of seven empirically based localorganisation and community studies covering three distinct types

Social movements beginning with the historic social movements whichcoordinated the anti-communist mobilisation and the first steps towardscentral and local democratisation Civic Forum (Czech Republic) andPublic Against Violence (Slovakia) Their emergence and subsequentdecline are the reference points for a chapter by Simon Smith whichfocuses on the roles they played in local community life leading up to thefirst municipal elections in November 1990 using examples from specifictowns and villages in each country The chapter also attempts to identifythe legacy of their organisational traditions and repertoires of collectiveaction in present-day local communities A second study by Mikulaacuteš Hubaexamines the Slovak environmental movement exploring its pluralisationand fragmentation after 1989 when the single all-encompassing structurewhich had become an unofficial umbrella organisation for opposition tocommunist rule ndash the Slovak Union of Nature and Landscape Conserva-tionists ndash was gradually transformed into a series of more issue-specificgroups Huba describes how an established social organisation was re-institutionalised by its members and supporters in response to new prob-lems new resources (such as international linkages) and a new structure of

xii Preface

opportunities and constraints given by the initial democratisation andsubsequent closure of public space and political decision-making

Work collectives Matching case studies by first Monika Čambaacutelikovaacute andthen Aleš Kroupa and Zdenka Mansfeldovaacute investigate how four groups ofworkers in the electronics industry (two each in Slovakia and the CzechRepublic) have perceived processes of enterprise restructuring in the mid-to late 1990s Surveying attitudes of workers towards management andtrade unions and towards the work process itself they show how theculture of the workplace has responded to such factors as changes inownership redundancies restrictions on the welfare function of enterprisesand changing workloads and work practices Referring to an internationalcomparative framework the main emphasis in each study is on the ways inwhich the identity of labour has been discursively articulated andinstitutionally represented within these firms

Local communities and democracy One study from the Czech Republic byZdenka Vajdovaacute and two from Slovakia by Martin Slosiarik and ImrichVašečka deal with the reconstruction of citizenship and civil society withinlocal territorial structures in particular through local self-governmentVajdovaacute examines the reconstruction of political and civic cultures in arange of rural and urban settings in a study sensitive to differing organ-isational traditions and social milieux Slosiarikrsquos chapter contrasts thediffering success of two neighbouring villages in tapping internal andexternal developmental resources which is interpreted in terms of thedistribution and organisation of civic potential within the communitiesVašečkarsquos study is concerned with small rural communities and thecapacity of local authorities to mobilise community resources in responseto severe threats such as economic decline depopulation ethnic tensionsor the planned construction of a dam

A concluding chapter (Simon Smith) revisits the epistemological problemthrown up by the case studies namely how best to conceptualise collectiveactions and community reactions which respond to macro-level policies(narratives) and institutionalising processes actions which vary fromappropriation to resistance and from constructive improvisation to inertiaand withdrawal It is proposed that an understanding of transformationwithin the wider context of social cultural and economic modernisationprovides a better handle on the complexities and uncertainties of post-communist lifeworlds than more linear concepts of transition withoutabandoning an underlying normative discourse emphasising movementtowards self-regulation subjectivity and participation It is also suggestedthat lsquonarrativistrsquo and lsquoactivistrsquo sociologies prepared to engage with thediscursive practices of particular communities and organisations canincrease understanding of post-communist transformation where more

Preface xiii

orthodox approaches fail to appreciate how the clash of reforms withprevailing cultural practices must be carefully mediated The capacity ofindividual and collective actors at the grassroots of society to cope withsocial change by incorporating it into existing worldviews and lifeworlds isdependent upon the existence of channels for a dialogue between thediscourses of cultural practice and the modernising discourses of thepolitical actors pursuing social and economic reforms This represents achallenge for sociologists among others

Simon SmithJuly 2002

xiv Preface

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank the British Academy which supported (via the EastEurope Exchange programme) my research visit to the Czech Republic inApril and May 2001 when part of the research for Chapter 3 was carriedout Thanks also go to the Institute of Sociology at the Czech Academy ofSciences which hosted my visit In Slovakia my research for the samechapter in September 2001 was facilitated by the Department of PoliticalScience at Comenius University Bratislava and especially by LrsquoudmilaMaliacutekovaacute Thanks are also due to the Centre for Contemporary EuropeanStudies at the University of Paisley for supporting the April 2001workshop with which this project began and for providing me with theconditions to continue work on the book Finally special thanks go to JiřiacuteHolub and Irena Hergottovaacute for their participation in the workshop

Preface xv

xvi Preface

1 Transformation as modernisationSociological readings of post-communistlifeworlds

Simon Smith

Sub-cultures of sociological activism

Shortly before the collapse of the communist regime in Czechoslovakiarecognition grew among social scientists that socio-cultural networks at themicro-level were an important site for the generation of social capital andcivic potential lsquoMakeshiftrsquo institutions a lsquosecondrsquo economy and lsquosecondrsquosociety together with a lsquoprivatersquo public discourse were elements of statesocialist society with part-functional part-disfunctional consequencesdepending on the timescale of observation Such lsquoislands of positivedeviationrsquo met social needs which the system failed and compensated insome measure for the lsquohollowing outrsquo of the meso-sphere of civil societyWhereas practices sustained andor promoted within the lsquoofficial spherersquohad problematic implications for the process of democratisation it seemedplausible on the cusp of the post-communist era that some of thestructures and modes of behaviour developed within the lsquosecond societyrsquocould become a reservoir of energy for the recolonisation of civil society orthe emergence of new social actors substantially interested in democratis-ation and marketisation (Machonin and Tuček 1996 15)

By naming and locating these positive and negative potentials Czechand Slovak sociologists in the 1980s had formulated a critique of theprevailing system without explicitly committing themselves to a competingmacro-social or macro-economic regulatory principle (such as capitalism)Roacutebert Roškorsquos reflection on the second congress of the Slovak Socio-logical Society in September 1989 ndash lsquoa retrospective reading of the congressmaterials gives me a good feeling that we didnrsquot overlook any of the urgenttransformational and modernising tasks which ailed Slovakia on the eve ofthe November [regime] changersquo (Roško and Machaacuteček 2000 6ndash7) ndash islargely valid1 In particular some Czech and especially Slovak sociologistshad begun to define themselves as activists for a process of socialtransformation

An lsquoactivistrsquo sociology is starting to take shape closely connected witha sociology of everyday life with creativity with advisory activities and

R E C T O RU N N I N G H E A D

with the orientation of local and collective social movements inauthentic structures New social movements are emerging on the basisof various institutions developmental phenomena and needs ndash workinitiatives interest-based cultural and recreational activities Thesuccess of such movements and innovatory social changes demandsthe ability for self-organisation [and thus] creates a wide space forsociologistsrsquo creative involvement

(Bunčaacutek 1987 345)

Following its rehabilitation as a discipline after the 1950s (when it waslabelled a lsquobourgeois pseudo-sciencersquo and temporarily banished fromresearch and teaching institutes) sociology was formally recognised as ascience which could contribute towards maximising the functionality of thesocial system Thus from the early 1970s sociologists were dispatched tomedium and large enterprises to devise means of influencing the socialdevelopment of work collectives deal with labour relations absenteeismrecruitment and personnel policy2 Ironically it was precisely the develop-ment of enterprise sociology and other lsquobranchrsquo sociologies such asagricultural health and urban sociology (Stena 1988 361) which byproviding academics with experience of practical problems in the realworld informed the formulation of a self-critique of sociologyrsquos servicerole under communism ndash of its complicity in the central planning approachwhere respectability was bought by the production of policy-relevantideologically suitable output In practice this had meant serving andbolstering the interests of the state as the assumed personification of anall-societal interest while neglecting partial social interests

More and more practitioners held that sociology should instead ack-nowledge the variability and contradictory nature of social interestsshould broaden its orientation towards end-users other than the state andofficial directive organs working instead with various social groups andmovements (ibid 360) or in the case of enterprise sociologists joining inthe life of work collectives (Musil 1989 110) that it should seek to involvelocal actors as participants in social change because the social and culturalcapital of specific communities would in any case affect the success orfailure of social programmes (Krivyacute 1988 422) and should engage in adialogue with the public and citizens in order to tap lsquoa broader andcultivated reservoir for the generation of adequate approaches anddecisionsrsquo (ibid 420) This conception was in contradistinction tolsquosociotechnikarsquo promoted as the social scientific equivalent of appliednatural science (Pichňa 1988) Responding to Pichňarsquos paper at a 1987workshop on the subject Helena Wolekovaacute argued

Despite the close similarity of sociotechnika and engineering as a typeof professional human activity they are qualitatively different processesof putting science into practice [The difference] has to do with the self-

2 Simon Smith

regulating abilities of the working [of social systems] The process ofsociotechnical invention (unlike engineering) must therefore imply theactive involvement of the object ndash people or social groups ndash throughparticipation and social control

(Wolekovaacute 1988 358)

Thus the elaboration of lsquosociological activismrsquo represented a reorientationaway from concern with regulation (of society social organisations socialprogress) to concern with self-regulation (of social organisms)

The most sophisticated explication of a specific methodologicalapproach was undertaken by a team led by Fedor Gaacutel later to become theleader of Public Against Violence (see Gaacutel 1989) Papers by Gaacutel and hiscollaborators refer to Alain Tourainersquos concept of sociological interventionthe influence of which is obvious They define the role of the sociologist asthe initiation of social movements through facilitating a lsquomoderateddialoguersquo among the interested parties of a given social problem

The task of problem-oriented sociological investigations [is] toarticulate interests cultivate and mobilise the activity of all interestedparties ndash including the lay public ndash for the purpose of [finding] aqualified solution to the social problems which concern them orshould concern them People should themselves become thelsquosociologistsrsquo of their own lives The task of the professional sociologistis then to enable them to do so

(Frič et al 1988 75)

These were not just noble intentions sociologists did actually attempt tofacilitate something like Gaacutelrsquos dialogue or lsquomultiloguersquo in a variety ofconcrete situations for example by initiating and supporting self-helpgroups among out-patients The immediate aim in this instance was to meetthe needs of a more educated citizenry dissatisfied with bureaucratic healthprovision who wanted instead to take responsibity for their own health(Melucci has written of similar trends in advanced capitalist societies asone source of energy for new social movements (Melucci 1989)) Thebroader aim however was the creation of a space where roles practicesand modes of communication could be learned which were potentiallytransferrable to other spheres of an emerging civil society

Group-based self-help can prepare people for the missing social role ofindividuals helping others [can] overcome feelings of powerlessnessand uncover hidden reserves of human potential In the frameworkof self-help groups some individuals find the meaning and sense oftheir own life Itrsquos a matter of releasing the latent creative energy ofindividuals and groups

(Buacutetora 1988 345ndash6)

Transformation as modernisation 3

Separate but related developments occurred in various sociological lsquosub-culturesrsquo usually those that dealt with social milieux overlooked by thedominant branches of the communist social scientific establishment Forexample in the early 1980s a working team at the Prague Sportpropaginstitute undertook a series of experimental studies of sporting organis-ations clubs and informal groups which sought to explore the socialecology of a lsquogroup universersquo in its temporality and spatiality and tointervene in the reproduction and mobilisation of each grouprsquos internalresources as a participant observer and facilitator often using interactivecommunicative games as a research technique (Kabele et al 1982a 1982bKabele 1983a 1983b Kabele and Vovsovaacute 1983) Social ecology viewed asa lsquobourgeois sciencersquo had briefly found an institutional home in theInstitute for Landscape Ecology (1971ndash5) until its abolition Pseudonymssuch as anthropoecology or lsquothe psychology and sociology of time andspacersquo were later invented under cover of which Bohuslav Blažek andcolleagues were able to develop research projects based on diagnostictechniques such as games (Blažek 1982) working more or less freelancesometimes hired as consultants by teams of architects and town-plannersand simultaneously carrying out private research on the social ecology ofchildren families and the disabled (Blažek 1998 25ndash30)

Although some social ecologists such as Miroslav Gottlieb were notable to pursue their academic interests between 1975 and 1990 thedirections in which they then struck out flow from a diagnosis previouslyformulated lsquothe sociology of the totalitarian era suffered from a severeilliteracy It was unable to read an intricate text written by small marginalgroups It ostentatiously dismissed their attitudes living values andphilosophiesrsquo (Lapka and Gottlieb 2000 18) Hence the motivation for alongitudinal research project begun in 1991 on small-scale family farmingwhich made use of dialogical techniques based on in-depth informalcommunicative exchange with the subjects studied (understood as partnersand end-users of the knowledge produced) and conceived explicitly aslsquopractical participation practical assistancersquo to a social group lsquoabout whichvirtually nothing had been known for fifty yearsrsquo (ibid 19 13) as it soughtto re-establish the conditions for its existence The authors do not disguisetheir normative belief that the revival of private family farming could playa key role in the renewal of life in the Czech countryside because of anlsquoecological consciousnessrsquo they attribute to the peasantry (resting partly inreligiosity) and because of its historical role as a rural middle class with astrong commitment to democratic values (ibid 16ndash17)

In all these cases the active exploration of densely narrativised socialworlds (whether recreational affective communities traditional village life-worlds or intimate family circles) was part of a search for alternativenarratives of development and closely paralleled developments in lsquodis-sidentrsquo Czech philosophy where Jan Patočka and after him Vaacuteclav Havelidentified the potential for spiritual renewal in a return to the ecological

4 Simon Smith

consciousness of the countryside or in Havelrsquos case in the lsquostoriesrsquo he readas an implicit challenge to lsquototalitarianismrsquo in the autobiographies of hisfellow prisoners (Havel 1988a) According to Illner (1992) examples canalso be found in urban and land-use sociologies from the 1960s to the 1980sof approaches which focused on the intrinsic functioning of localcommunities looking at issues such as territorial self-identification anddevelopmental preferences which he argues are very useful for investig-ating the local democratic potential of communities in the post-communistera

These sociological sub-cultures have three things in common First theyall occupied lsquoislands of positive deviationrsquo both in their isolation from themainstream of Marxist social science which afforded them a measure ofimmunity from ideological pressures and in their instinctive recognitionthat marginal social phenomena could be interesting as the carriers ofalternative normative systems Urban sociologists for example were notincorporated into architectural design teams for housing developments butit was precisely this formal exclusion that enabled informal cooperationwith certain architects to develop in such a way that sociological lsquooutputsrsquoneed not be formulated in the sociotechnical forms demanded by planners(lsquoBesedarsquo 1984 339) enterprise sociologists because they represented acompletely new profession within manufacturing firms in the early 1970sfound themselves with substantial freedom to determine their own jobdescription as well as freedom from the structuring of their outputs byroutinised planning processes Second their understanding of the role ofthe sociologist broke the mould of the disinterested observer and com-mitted them to an active engagement with social reality (as a processunfolding in time and space) and to a cooperative exchange with adiversity of local end-users such as social organisations trade unionslocal authorities architects economic organisations and self-help groupsAlthough practical applications were limited sociologists had begun toreflect critically on the identity of end-users of sociological knowledge andthe forms of partnership this could involve This was most urgent in thesphere of enterprise sociology where the climate of suspicion whichgreeted the first sociologists to be appointed to manufacturing firms in theearly 1970s impelled them to seek allies among the various actors within anenterprise by offering genuinely useful cooperation often they becameactivists for expanding forms of worker participation or even aides to theformation of a worker interest (Suňog and Demčaacutek 1982 Wolekovaacute 1981)establishing relatively open fora for the expression of workersrsquo demandsand opinions which were more acceptable than official lsquoproduction confer-encesrsquo (Uram 1982 108) Third redefining the sociologist as someone whointervenes in social reality necessitated a radical methodological innova-tion involving a turn away from both number-crunching empirical surveysand structural analysis towards the social-psychological and moral dimen-sions of society implicated in the cognitive transactions of real social


actors The result (or at least the proposal) was an increase in reflexivitywhich welcomed feedback from society and thereby allowed sociologicaldiscourses to be affected by the lsquonaturalrsquo modes of narrativisation ofcommunities families and other (relatively) autonomous collective actorswhich had sustained considerable self-regulative capacities in opposition tolsquototalitarianrsquo pressures towards uniformity and regularity The logicaloutcome of these trends in many ways was Sociological Forum aninitiative of sociologists affiliating to Civic Forum in 1989ndash90 as a platformfor their own engagement in post-communist transformation (seeSociologickyacute časopis no 4 1990)

Sociology and modernisation

Since sociology as a science has its origins in a theory of modernisation orlsquosocial progressrsquo it is not surprising that Czech and Slovak sociologists alsotook great interest in modernisation theory both before and afterNovember 1989 What arguably made the concept particularly appealingwas the challenge which the reality of state socialism presented to commonassumptions in Europe and America that modernisation is a lsquoone-waystreetrsquo (Možnyacute 1999a 85) In theoretical treatises modernisation is attrib-uted an extensive conceptual range as a process which implies themobilisation of lsquohuman potentialrsquo the self-organisation of society thearticulation and diversification of the interests and identities of socialgroups the establishment of human actors as autonomous historicalsubjects and the mobilisation of social movements At the heart of theconcept is a dynamism ndash a process of becoming rather than merely being(Bunčaacutek 1990 245) Moreover since assessments of the lsquomodernityrsquo ofprevailing value systems and social norms in Czechoslovakia and itssuccessor states before and since 1989 have tended to produce conclusionsthat have been ambivalent tending towards pessimistic (see Roško 1987Boguszak et al 1990 Machonin 1997 Rabušic 2000) modernisation in thiscontext possesses a strong normative thrust

Its genesis is to be found in the 1980s critique of the conservative-technocratic lsquomodernisationrsquo associated with the extensive mode of eco-nomic development pursued by the communist regime in CzechoslovakiaInformed by normative assumptions of a civilisational movement towardsa post-industrial informational mode of development that regime wasunderstood as de-modernising The real socialist mode of developmentfailed to mobilise societyrsquos social and cultural capital and in many casesdeliberately dismantled it it suppressed the self-regulative faculties of civilsociety by destroying horizontal patterns of social integrationdelegitimising feedback from society to the state (Stena 1990 289ndash90Krivyacute 1989 344) it also suppressed individual initiative and reinforcedpaternalistic or communitarian forms of socialisation (Krivyacute andSzomolaacutenyiovaacute in Bunčaacutek 1990 247ndash8 Turčan 1992 51) it cultivated an

6 Simon Smith

lsquoinstitutional mode of thinkingrsquo symptomatic of the failure of officialorganisations to represent real social interests (Zich and Čukan in Stena1990 295ndash6) it resuscitated lsquoarchaicrsquo patterns of social relations andsymbolic interaction based on status rather than contract ritualised ratherthan negotiated legitimacy and clan-like social networks (Možnyacute 1999a84)

Even in Slovakia the impact of central planning could be classed as anti-modernising notwithstanding its superficially positive quantitativeinfluence on economic development industrialisation and urbanisationOne of the strongest critiques of socialist central planning was developedby Slovak urban sociologists alarmed by the deleterious impact of urban-isation programmes on the social and natural environment According toIvan Kusyacute the very origins of an urban sociology in Slovakia (from themid-1960s) are linked to diagnostic reflection on the visible problems ofthe expansion of Slovak towns (lsquoBesedarsquo 1984 331) However in the mid-1970s this critique was tentative extending only to recommendations thatplanning should be reoriented towards the identification and functionalintegration of urban(ised) territorial units rather than simply supportingcontinued concentration of social and economic activities into the largestcities a change in conception which was presented in terms of amodernisation of urbanisation itself (Kusyacute 1976) One of the leadingprotagonists of the critique which later developed could nevertheless stillchampion urbanisation as a means of intensifying economic and social lifeand liberating the individual from the place-boundedness of localcommunities (Pašiak 1976 116ndash17) claiming that lsquoSlovakia still has thechance to avoid all the known negative consequences associated with theconcentration of populations in citiesrsquo (ibid 120) A decade on the tonehad changed and he specified these consequences as the destruction ofrural community life on the one hand and on the other the creation ofmonofunctional residential estates in the expanding cities lacking ade-quate social amenities and cultural resources and characterised by anabsence of neighbourhood and spontaneous social control (Pašiak 1985165ndash6 1990 309) Earlier critiques (Francu 1976 Kuhn 1976) wereformulated as contributions to the improvement of planning procedureslater these very procedures were attacked for the exclusion of localdemocracy self-government and civic participation from land-use planningwhich therefore failed to recognise the lsquosocial potentialrsquo embedded interritorial communities with their lsquogenius locirsquo (Pašiak 1985 172ndash3) As inhealth provision positive trends were identified outside formal institutionsfor example among lsquomore active residential communities [whose] self-helpsolutions in organising clubs playing fields and collective social events indicate certain possibilities for the improvement of the lived environmentin terms of the development of neighbourhood relationsrsquo (ibid 166) or inthe lsquoactivisation of informal associations in defence of their housing andliving conditions in defence of the ecological qualities of the lived and


natural environment in defence of unique architecture and monumentsetcrsquo (Faltrsquoan in Pašiak 1990 313) Even unashamedly Marxist accountswhich defended the achievements of the first phase of the lsquobuilding ofsocialismrsquo began to criticise the continued reliance of territorial andeconomic planners on extensive developmental models and administrativedecision-making which reduced the lsquoadaptabilityrsquo of rural communities bysuppressing traditional and spontaneous aspects of village life (such assmall-scale cultivation on private plots) imposing urban living standards orfailing to take into account the way territorial systems are integrated into alsquospace of flowsrsquo a discourse which enabled them to argue for the lsquoeco-logisationrsquo and lsquoruralisationrsquo of towns as a process complementary to theurbanisation of the countryside (Slepička 1984) The normative use ofconcepts such as lsquospace of flowsrsquo lsquocity regionsrsquo lsquoagglomerationsrsquo and otherterms associated with the current deconcentrated or post-industrial phaseof urbanisation amounted to a critique of the blockages and deformationsto social and economic modernisation which were attributed to centralplanning Essentially this is the same interpretive framework adoptedtoday by Czech sociologist Karel Muller who referring to the ideas ofBeck and Giddens attempts to explain the ongoing social transformationas a shift from lsquosimplersquo to lsquoreflexiversquo modernisation delayed by twenty orthirty years in comparison with advanced western societies (Muller 199872ndash3)3

The post-communist transformation can thus be conceived as a returnto an interrupted or deformed process of social and cultural modernisationBoth Machonin (1997 114) and Szomolaacutenyi (1999 13ndash15) adopt thisinterpretation and direct attention to the effects on societyrsquos stock of socialand cultural capital and the potential to mobilise these resources In thisparadigm transformation policies are to be judged by criteria ofmobilisation rather than short-term economic or social lsquoeffectivenessrsquo(Havelka and Muller 1996) Mobilisation is required to overcome barriersdeeply embedded in micro-level structures (Muller and Štědronskyacute 200010 14) and the onus is on actors with high human potential to initiate aprocess of disembedding social actors from traditional (anti-modern pre-modern) institutional arrangements (ibid 106ndash7)4

These principles can also be seen in a number of policy-relevant socio-logical initiatives throughout the first decade after November 1989According to these the state itself could and should take up the role ofmobiliser or enabler managing the risks associated with a modern societybut not dampening or eliminating the interest and activity of other agentsof social policy and respecting the principle of subsidiarity in its formul-ation and implementation Thus in early 1990 seven Czech and two Slovaksociologists wrote to President Havel

The social sphere is where the use of the potential hidden in ournations is being decided and without its activisation even the best

8 Simon Smith

intentions of economists and politicians will remain unfulfilled It is theground on which individualsrsquo and familiesrsquo everyday life is played outon to which big historical changes and society-wide processes areprojected

(lsquoProhlaacutešeniacute sociologůrsquo in Potůček 1999 238)

The same basic modernising aims of activising human potential in both theformulation of public policy (by initiating wide-ranging public debate onissues like education or health reform) and its implementation (by devolv-ing rights and responsibilities as far as possible to actors in civil society anddifferent forms of self-government) have been present in civic initiatives inwhich sociologists have played a key role during the 1990s in the CzechRepublic such as OMEGA and Impuls 99 as well as in the proposal for anational lsquosocial doctrinersquo published more recently (lsquoNaacutevrh sociaacutelniacute doktriacutenyČeskeacute Republikyrsquo 2000 3ndash4)

Human potential has become a keyword for a number of Czech andSlovak sociologists interested in problems of transformation especiallyfor those who locate modernisation at the heart of that process It isunderstood as both a precondition and a result of human actions and inter-actions within civil society linking the institutional realm (where it co-determines the opportunity structures within which actors operate) and theself-creative realm (where it defines how actors embedded in particularcultural milieux articulate their identities and coordinate mutual relations)Martin Potůček both in his original 1989 paper on the idea and in a 1999book where he reintroduced the concept uses human potential essentiallyto theorise societyrsquos and individualsrsquo capacity to manage radical change Itis thus a concept genetically linked to transformation which it renders aninherently lsquopath-dependentrsquo process In both his pre- and post-1989elaborations of the concept Potůček is interested in how an exogenousimpulse towards change is conditioned by the choices actors make deploy-ing the resources given them Likewise the policy recommendations5

offered on how to increase human potential (in both eras) are gearedtowards enhancing societyrsquos and individualsrsquo competence and initiative inmanaging change

One of the most innovative attempts to utilise the concept of humanpotential in a study of social transformation was the project led by RoacutebertRoško at the Sociological Institute of the Slovak Academy of Sciencescalled lsquoFormation of civil society in Slovakiarsquo which was commissionedshortly before November 1989 and completed in 1994 (Roško 1995)Roško focuses on that aspect of human potential seen as most stronglysuppressed by the communist system and which would be key to successfulcompletion of the modernisation of Slovak society ndash what he calls lsquocivicpotentialrsquo Following Potůček Roško disaggregates civic potential intoseveral sub-components pertaining to different citizenship roles namelydemocratic potential lsquoconsciousnessrsquo potential (how informed a citizen is


about the workings of political systems) action potential associativepotential and delegative potential Thus disaggregated the concept formedthe basis for an empirical research project to lsquomeasurersquo the civic potentialof Slovak society and differentiate between different social groups Theconcept is adapted by Slosiarik in this volume and applied to the com-parative study of two small rural communities

Other authors formulated prognoses about post-communist develop-ments based on a similar philosophy Stena for example pinpointed acritical moment of the transformation in the emergence or non-emergenceof lsquosocial self-regulationrsquo when people react to the changing situation lsquobymeans of civil society using the feedback mechanisms given by socialinnovationrsquo (1991 14) Arguing that neither the free market nor politicaldemocracy can compensate for the missing modern meso-structure ofsocial life he predicted (accurately) anti-reform mobilisations as well asescapist responses and accordingly pointed to the lsquonorm-creating processrsquoas a key arena in which the success of social transformation will be decided(ibid 17) Hopes were invested in renewed self-government as a forum forthe realisation of latent civic potential (Sopoacuteci 1991a and 1991b) and thecontinuation of a relatively centralised public administration following thepassage of laws on municipal administration and municipal property in1990ndash1 was interpreted as an institutional barrier to the proper develop-ment of a local citizenship in Slovakia (Sopoacuteci 1992b 43) But there werealso warnings that power decentralisation in conditions of low civicpotential and social demobilisation could facilitate the emergence of lsquolocaltotalitiesrsquo merely providing scope for locally influential and organisedactors to secure their particular interests6 (Sopoacuteci 1992a 452 Slosiarik inthis volume) Hopes were also placed in trade unions and the emergence ofan organised employer interest if they could re-establish themselves assubjective actors rather than systemic agents and thereby help overcomethe major source of the former systemrsquos inefficiency ndash its inability to learndue to the deliberate blocking of feedback channels between state and civilsociety (Čambaacutelikovaacute 1992 64)

One assumption shared by each of these authors is that individual andcollective actor-formation and in particular the cultivation of a moderndemocratic citizenship ndash rather than institution-formation in a narrowersense ndash will be determining in the democratisation of social and culturallife and that this process will take place predominantly within the affectivecommunities where day-to-day lives are lived drawing on the discursiveresources reproduced by small-scale socio-cultural practices and com-municative networks Macro-level institutional reforms can be facilitatingor inhibiting but not the decisive factors On the other hand democratic orlsquocitizenocraticrsquo actor-formation will scarcely be possible without publiceducation and thus a key role is envisaged for opinion-forming elites andintellectual activists lsquodeepening the connection between theory and the[actual] patterns of civil societyrsquo (Fibich 1999 92)

10 Simon Smith

Civil society operationalising a concept

Although civil society is a major theme of the literature on post-communisttransformation inside and outside the countries affected the conceptremains enigmatic If many commentators were initially concerned that thedominance of social movements such as Polish Solidarity Czech CivicForum and Slovak Public Against Violence could block the development ofsocietal and political pluralism (Lewis 1994 18) or hinder interestarticulation and party formation (Pakulski 1995 421) more recentlyconcern has shifted to the possibility that political society has been sofirmly established as the dominant arena that civil society is demobilisedand references to a lsquosecond phasersquo of democratic consolidation urge the re-establishment of civil society as a relevant issue (Aacutegh 1998 17) Theaccount offered by Hungarian political scientist Attila Aacutegh strikes a chordwith the Czech and Slovak approaches outlined above in that he connectsa (desired) substitution of actors on the lsquostagersquo of democratisation (civilsociety organisations replace political parties ndash which had initially lsquorunamokrsquo ndash as the key actors of democratic consolidation) with a rehabilit-ation of the concept of modernisation as lsquoa middle-level abstractionindicating slow and evolutionary changes continuous adaptation andinnovation within the given polity practice-oriented [and] ldquoearth-boundrdquorsquo (ibid 212) Yet Aacuteghrsquos account can be seen as expedient in itsacceptance of the necessity of the initial dominance of institutional-political reform followed only afterwards by actor-formation as theculmination of the transformation process a modern interest-basedparticipative politics presupposes the prior emergence and continual re-confirmation and adjustment of actors based upon reflexive identity-formation in a relatively autonomous civic sphere lsquoOverparticisationrsquo andlsquooverparliamentaristionrsquo ndash the pathological traits of the political transitionin East Central Europe according to Aacutegh (1998 50) ndash are unlikely torecede until processes of actor-formation within civil society becomenormalised in social practice at all levels which is hardly likely to beencouraged by political actors which still regard organised interests asrivals7

This debate about the sequencing and complementarity of differentlevels of the transformation process relates to a key dispute surrounding theconcept of civil society Commentators have been divided between thosewho view civil society as a spontaneously developing sector and those wholink its development to macro-level institutional reforms The concept ofcivil society therefore needs to be more thoroughly problematised if it is tobe a useful analytical tool It assumed greatest analytical power whenapplied to authoritarian contexts (see Keane 1988 and 1998) it has evenbeen suggested that revival of interest in civil society is due substantially toits having been embraced by activists in Eastern Europe and Latin Americato conceptualise a struggle for democracy either explicitly as in Poland


(Cohen and Arato 1992 31ndash6) or intuitively as in Czechoslovakia throughrelated concepts such as lsquoanti-(non-)political politicsrsquo and lsquoparallel polisrsquo(Havel 1988b Benda 1990) In both cases the concept was understoodreflexively as a shorthand for self-creative initiatives existing outside and inopposition to the state sphere In Czechoslovakia they existed mostly inprivate rather than public spaces which hints at problems in mobilising suchsocial capital for the formation of the type of civil society associated with alate modern capitalist democracy Social self-defence mechanisms againstthe intrusive power of communist state institutions led to the revival offamilial and other traditional highly localised identities and solidaritieswhich in turn ended up colonising the state This social capital can play asimilarly ambiguous role in democratisation and marketisation ndash resistingthe socially atomising logic of market forces whilst also hampering theconstruction of lsquospontaneous sociabilitiesrsquo at a level between the state andthe family (Možnyacute 1999b 30ndash1 Ryšavyacute 1999 32ndash3) Machonin whoconceives the second society in terms of interests (poorly represented bythe communist state) rather than identities also detects its legacy in lsquohybridrsquosocial institutions which cannot categorically be labelled pre- or post- pro-or anti-transformation (1997 106)8

In late modern democracies civil society can be defined normatively as apublic space fulfilling a range of mediatory functions through institution-alised channels connected to the political system while still allowingindependent self-creative activity to thrive (Castoriadis 1997 Melucci 1989227ndash30 Melucci 1996 10) This presents problems of coordination whichcan be illustrated by glancing at the condition in which Italian societyfound itself in the 1970s and 1980s lsquopropel[led] beyond industrial societywithout an institutional modernization of the society at large having takenplacersquo (Melucci 1996 276) Such a situation was characterised by thelsquounder-representationrsquo or conversely the lsquohyper-politicisationrsquo of identitiesand interests in civil society at precisely the moment when deepercivilisational changes were provoking an unprecedented diversification ofidentities and interests and their primary expression as various forms ofcollective action The predictable result was the degeneration of socialmovements into residuality marginality or lsquointegralismrsquo (clinging dog-matically to a fundamental identity) manifest as withdrawal into sects orexpressive violence What Italy lacked was a sufficiently modernisedpolitical system to mobilise (representatively or delegatively by creatingand securing spaces for self-determination) the potential for social innov-ation embodied by the diversity of forms of collective action constantlyemerging in complex societies ndash potential which has a short shelf-life andwill be rapidly consumed (or at least reduced to purely cultural innovation)if it is unable to be channelled and institutionalised so as to producetangible policy outcomes (ibid 259ndash83) Thus despite the lsquointernal richnessextant in civil societyrsquo lsquothe Italian political system was unable to absorbprotest and harness its modernizing thrustrsquo (ibid 279 274)

12 Simon Smith

Some analagous problems ndash in terms of a failure to cope with modernis-ation in its full complexity in which the main shortcomings relate toblocked political modernisation ndash undoubtedly exist in contemporaryCzech and Slovak society As Myant points out in the following chapterthe Czech debate on civil society typically still clings to a simplisticdualistic understanding of the term (according to him both the Klausistand Havelian versions are open to criticisms of reductionism) which haslimited relevance to societies characterised by lsquodiverse centres of powerrsquoWith this in mind one way of reformulating the post-communist lsquoproblemrsquois to focus normatively on a shift between different types of civil societyfrom the almost privatised expressions associated with the lsquosecond societyrsquothrough the mobilised forms which opposed communist regimes in 1989towards socially integrative semi-institutionalised forms associated withdemocratic regimes yet without succumbing to post-revolutionarytendencies towards an extreme demobilisation (Linz and Stepan 19967ndash9) The goal is a civil society capable of sustaining and balancing twocomplementary processes ndash the articulation or reproduction of collectiveidentities and their political representation or as Castoriadis puts it theoperations of the lsquoinstitutedrsquo society and the work of the lsquoinstitutingimaginaryrsquo through which actors constantly make and remake the formerat the same time as it makes them (1997 271) The issue is how existingsources of social capital and human potential can be recombined via formsof political representation sophisticated enough to mobilise and channelrather than thwart and marginalise their innovatory impulses in order togenerate movements towards that goal

Notes

1 Czech sociologist Miloslav Petrusek expressed a similar sentiment in hisopening speech at the 1998 conference Českaacute společnost na konci tisiacuteciletiacutestating that lsquothe most complete and systematic analyses of totalitarian regimesand their social and psychological consequences were provided by sociologistsrsquo(Potůček 1999b vol 113)

2 In 1980 there were around forty-five enterprises in Slovakia employingsociologists For a summary of the post-war development of sociology inSlovakia see Szomolaacutenyiovaacute 1990 367ndash82 and 1995 158ndash62 On enterprisesociology see Wolekovaacute 1981 and Suňog and Demčaacutek 1982

3 The independent cultural activities which existed beneath the surface ofnormalisation-era Czechoslovakia could also be construed as a direct reactionto the anti-modernising effects of the lsquonomenclaturersquo system imposed on art andculture Snopko saw the essence of the cultural policy of the state in an attemptto return culture to the role and status of a lsquocourt painterrsquo (Snopko 1996 201)Thus the task of artists rejecting such a service role was in effect to rediscovermodernity in this case its individualising moment

4 According to Aacutegh the modernisation approach was also a significant criticaldiscourse among Polish and Hungarian social scientists in the 1980s but its


popularity had faded by the end of the decade lsquoits role and place taken by amore ideologically oriented democratization approach with its exclusivepractice in basic macro-political changesrsquo By the mid-1990s following thecompletion of the most important institution-building processes the modernis-ation approach made a return as social scientists found they lacked a theory todeal with lsquomore complex socio-technical changesrsquo (1998 212ndash13) This period-icity is not so clear in Czech and Slovak sociology where the modernisationapproach has remained strongly represented from at least the mid-1980s andthroughout the 1990s

5 In one paper Potůček refers unashamedly to the lsquodoctrine drawing on thetheoretical concept of the cultivation and application of human potentialrsquo as analternative transformation strategy to the lsquoneoliberal political doctrinersquo (199444 emphasis added)

6 Ironically this was one of the arguments used by the Slovak government tojustify the decision to return only a narrow range of property to municipalauthorities and thus perpetuate local councilsrsquo financial dependence on fiscaltransfers from central government (Sopoacuteci 1992b 40)

7 In his chapter Myant notes the superficially puzzling adoption by former CzechPrime Minister Vaacuteclav Klaus of an anti-communist rhetoric in contradiction tothe pragmatism which flowed from his belief in the free market Oneexplanation is that for him it represented a necessary myth which sustained adependency relationship between society and a centralised state manned by anarrow political elite The moment when the mode of narrativisation was toshift from the domination of such meta-narratives to more participativediscursive processes accessible to actors at lower levels would represent athreat to the types of post-communist elite epitomised by Klausrsquos CivicDemocratic Party with its disdain for civil society

8 These authors thus concur with Stark and Szelenyi among lsquowesternrsquo analysts inunderstanding social transformation in terms of lsquorecombinationsrsquo rather thanthe classical concepts of revolution and evolution and they likewise divergefrom classical sociology lsquothe thrust [of which] was to argue that moderncapitalism was so all encompassing that it erased its originsrsquo (Burawoy 2000 412) However the sociological paradigm which I am suggesting can be discernedhere also has common points with the revisionist lsquopostsocialistrsquo account of statesocialist societiesrsquo potentialities ndash particularly the potentialities embodied inlocalised subaltern life-worlds revealed by lsquoethnographies of everyday lifersquo ndashwhich Burawoy calls for (2000 24 30)

Bibliography

Aacutegh A (1998) The Politics of Central Europe London SageBenda V (1990) lsquoParalelniacute polisrsquo in Prečan V (ed) Charta 77 1977ndash1989 Od

moraacutelniacute k demokratickeacute revoluci Bratislava ARCHA 43ndash50lsquoBeseda za okruacutehlym stolom redakcie Socioloacutegia a urbanizmusrsquo (1984) Socioloacutegia

vol 16 no 3 331ndash46Blažek B (1982) Manuaacutel komunikačniacutech a prognostickyacutech her Prague SportpropagBlažek B (1998) Venkov města meacutedia Prague SLONBoguszak M Gabal I and Matějů P (1990) lsquoKe koncepciacutem sociaacutelniacute struktury v

ČSSR (1)rsquo Sociologickyacute časopis vol 26 168ndash86

14 Simon Smith

Brokl L and kol (1997) Reprezentace zaacutejmů v politickeacutem systeacutemu Českeacute republikyPrague SLON

Bunčaacutek J (1987) lsquoSkupina ad hoc 4 Rola socioloacutega v našej spoločnostirsquo (report ofdiscussion group at the First Congress of the Slovak Sociological Society 1986)Socioloacutegia vol 19 no 3 343ndash8

Bunčaacutek J (1990) lsquoProbleacutemovyacute okruh I Teoretickeacute a metodologickeacute probleacutemyrsquo(report of working group at Second Congress of the Slovak Sociological Societyin September 1989 in Martin) Socioloacutegia vol 22 no 3 242ndash59

Burawoy M (2000) Neoclassical sociology from the end of communism to the endof classes Berkeley University of California Online Available HTTP lthttpsociologyberkeleyedufacultyburawoygt (accessed January 2002)

Buacutetora M (1988) lsquoSocioloacutegia v prestavbe ndash sociotechnickaacute straacutenka spoločen-skovedneacuteho poznaniarsquo (contributions to Slovak Sociological Society seminarheld on 3 December 1987 at Uacutestrednyacute filmovyacute klub Bratislava) Socioloacutegia vol20 no 3 331ndash62

Čambaacutelikovaacute M (1992) lsquoOdbory kolektiacutevne vyjednaacutevanie a legislatiacuteva vo sfeacuterespoločenskej praacutecersquo in Sopoacuteci (ed) 1992 64ndash72

Castoriadis C (1997) lsquoPower Politics Autonomyrsquo in Honneth A McCarthy TOffe C and Wellmer A (eds) Cultural-Political Interventions in the UnfinishedProject of Enlightenment (second printing) London MIT Press 269ndash97

Cohen J and Arato A (1992) Civil Society and Political Theory London andCambridge MA MIT Press

Fibich J (1999) lsquoMentaacutelniacute krize transformace a vyacutechova člověka budoucnosti jakoobčanarsquo in Potůček (ed) 1999 vol 1 83ndash94

Francu D (1976) lsquoUrbanizaacutecia a medzilrsquoudskeacute vztrsquoahyrsquo Socioloacutegia vol 8 no 2159ndash75

Frič P Gaacutel F and Dianiška I (1988) lsquoProfesiovaacute orientaacutecia socioloacutega vo svetlespoločenskyacutech očakaacutevaniacutersquo Socioloacutegia vol 20 no 1 71ndash80

Gaacutel F (1989) lsquoProbleacutemovo orientovanyacute participatiacutevny priacutestuprsquo Sociologickyacute časopisvol 25 no 3 302ndash10

Havel V (1988a) lsquoStories and Totalitarianismrsquo Index On Censorship vol 17 no 3Havel V (1988b) lsquoAnti-political politicsrsquo in Keane (ed) 1988Havelka M and Muller K (1996) lsquoProcesy transformace a teorie modernizacersquo

Sociologickyacute časopis vol 32 no 2 143ndash57Illner M (1992) lsquoK sociologickyacutem otaacutezkaacutem miacutestniacute samospraacutevyrsquo Sociologickyacute

časopis vol 28 no 4 480ndash92Kabele J (1983a) Přiacutepad městskeacuteho plaacutecku Prague SportpropagKabele J (1983b) Přiacutepad skupiny džezgymnastek Prague SportpropagKabele J (1999) lsquoSociaacutelniacute naacuteklady transformace ČR viděneacute časovou perspektivoursquo

in Potůček (ed) vol 2 11ndash30Kabele J and Vovsovaacute A (1983) Přiacutepad žaacutekovskeacuteho družstva kopaneacute Prague

SportpropagKabele J Potůček M and Větrovskyacute S (1982a) Přiacutepad skupiny turistů Prague

SportpropagKabele J Potůček M and Větrovskyacute S (1982b) Přiacutepad skupiny veslařů Prague

SportpropagKeane J (ed) (1988) Civil Society and the State London VersoKeane J (1998) Civil Society Old Images New Visions Stanford Stanford

University Press


Krivyacute V (1988) lsquoSociotechnika možnosti a hranicersquo Socioloacutegia vol 20 no 4 417ndash25Krivyacute V (1989) lsquoEfekty žaby a kravy v zauzleniach spoločenskej dynamikyrsquo

Socioloacutegia vol 21 no 3 343ndash8Kuhn V (1976) lsquoBratislava ndash pokus o sociaacutelnoekologickuacute interpretaacuteciursquo Socioloacutegia

vol 8 no 2 195ndash201Kusyacute I (1976) lsquoProblematika aglomeraciiacute v suacutečasnom procesersquo Socioloacutegia vol 8

no 2 185ndash90Lapka M and Gottlieb M (2000) Rolniacutek a krajina Kapitoly ze života soukromyacutech

rolniacuteků Prague SLONLewis P (1994) lsquoCivil Society and the Development of Political Parties in East-

Central Europersquo in Waller M and Myant M (eds) Parties Trade Unions andSociety in East-Central Europe Ilford Frank Cass 5ndash20

Linz J and Stepan A (1996) Problems of Democratic Transition and ConsolidationSouthern Europe South America and Post-Communist Europe Baltimore andLondon Johns Hopkins University Press

Machonin P and Tuček M (1996) lsquoGeneze noveacute sociaacutelniacute struktury v Českeacuterepublice a jejiacute sociaacutelniacute akteacuteřirsquo in Šafařiacutekovaacute a kol 1996 9ndash49

Machonin P (1997) Social transformation and modernization Sociaacutelniacute transformacea modernizace Prague SLON

Melucci A (1989) Nomads of the Present London Hutchinson RadiusMelucci A (1996) Challenging codes Collective action in the information age

Cambridge Cambridge University PressMožnyacute I (1999a) Proč tak snadno Prague SLON (second edition)Možnyacute I (1999b) lsquoČeskaacute rodina v době pozdniacute modernityrsquo in Potůček (ed) 1999

vol 1 27ndash35Muller K (1998) Modernizačniacute kontext transformace strukturniacute a institucionaacutelniacute

aspekty Prague Sociologickyacute uacutestav AV ČR Working Paper 986Muller K and Štedronskyacute V (2000) Transformace a modernizace společnosti na

přiacutekladech vybranyacutech instituciacute Prague Sociologickyacute uacutestav AV ČR WorkingPaper 002

Musil L (1989) lsquoSympozium o teoreticko-metodologickyacutech otaacutezkaacutech a řiacutezeniacutepracovniacutech kolektivůrsquo Sociologickyacute časopis vol 25 no 1 109ndash11

lsquoNaacutevrh sociaacutelniacute doktriacuteny Českeacute republikyrsquo (2000) Sociaacutelniacute politika vol 26 no 122ndash5

Pakulski J (1995) lsquoMass Movements and Plebiscitary Democracy Political Changein Central Eastern Europersquo International Sociology vol 10 no 4 409ndash26

Pašiak J (1976) lsquoSocialistikaacute urbanizaacutecia Slovenskarsquo Socioloacutegia vol 8 no 2111ndash24

Pašiak J (1985) lsquoK problematike uacutezemnyacutech spoločenstiev lrsquoudiacutersquo Socioloacutegia vol 17no 2 157ndash75

Pašiak J (1990) lsquoSociaacutelno-uacutezemneacute suacutevislosti dynamizaacutecie a modernizaacutecie spoločnostirsquo(report of working group at Second Congress of the Slovak Sociological Societyin September 1989 in Martin) Socioloacutegia vol 22 no 3 309ndash25

Pichňa J (1988) lsquoTeoreticko-metodologickeacute vyacutechodiskaacute uplatňovania sociologickyacutechpoznatkov v spoločenskej praxirsquo Socioloacutegia vol 20 no 3 255ndash73

Potůček M et al (1989) lsquoLidskyacute potenciaacutel československeacute společnostirsquo Socioloacutegiavol 21 no 3 325ndash40

Potůček M (1994) lsquoTrh a spraacuteva v teorii a praxi sociaacutelniacute transformacersquoSociologickyacute časopis vol 30 no 1 43ndash50

16 Simon Smith

Potůček M (1999a) Křižovatky českeacute sociaacutelniacute reformy Prague SLONPotůček M (ed) (1999b) Českaacute společnost na konci tisiacuteciletiacute (2 volumes) Prague

KarolinumRabušic L (2000) lsquoJe českaacute společnost ldquopostmaterialistickaacuterdquorsquo Sociologickyacute časopis

vol 36 no 1 3ndash22Roško R a kolektiacutev (1987) lsquoDiferenciačneacute procesy a probleacutemy rozvoja našej

spoločnostirsquo Socioloacutegia vol 19 no 1 73ndash91Roško R (1995) Smer moderneacute občianstvo Bratislava IRISSociologickyacute uacutestav

SAVRoško R and Machaacuteček L (2000) lsquoRozhovor s R Roškom na prelome mileacutenia o

našej socioloacutegii a socioloacutegochrsquo Socioloacutegia vol 32 no 1 5ndash30Ryšavyacute D (1999) lsquoDůvěra a ekonomickeacute jednaacuteniacutersquo in Potůček (ed) 1999 vol 2 31ndash4Šafařiacutekovaacute V a kol (1996) Transformace českeacute společnosti 1989ndash1995 Brno

DoplněkSlepička A (1984) lsquoAktuaacutelniacute probleacutemy sbližovaacuteniacute mesta a venkova v ČSSRrsquo

Socioloacutegia vol 16 no 2 194ndash206Snopko L (1996) lsquoSituacionizmus na Slovensku ndash kapitola z dejiacuten apelatiacutevneho

umeniarsquo in Bartošovaacute Z (ed) Očima X Desatrsquo autorov o suacutečasnom slovenskomvyacutetvarnom umeniacute Bratislava ORMAN 201ndash20

Sopoacuteci J (1991a) lsquoVyacutechodiskaacute sociologickeacuteho skuacutemania roly občana v podmien-kach miestnej samospraacutevyrsquo Socioloacutegia vol 23 no 1ndash2 118ndash25

Sopoacuteci J (1991b) lsquoOd rekonštrukcie NV k obecnyacutem zastupite13stvaacutemrsquo Socioloacutegiavol 23 no 5ndash6 482ndash6

Sopoacuteci J (1992a) lsquoMiestna demokracia v utvaacuteraniacute samospraacutevnosti siacutedielrsquo Socioloacutegiavol 24 no 5 445ndash53

Sopoacuteci J (1992b) lsquoRevitalizaacutecia roly občana v podmienkach miestnej a uacutezemnejsamospraacutevyrsquo in Sopoacuteci (ed) 1992 31ndash45

Sopoacuteci J (ed) (1992) Občianska spoločnos na prahu znovuzrodenia BratislavaSAV internal publication

Stena J (1988) lsquoSocioloacutegia v prestavbe ndash sociotechnickaacute straacutenka spoločens-kovedneacuteho poznaniarsquo (contributions to Slovak Sociological Society seminar heldon 3 December 1987 at Uacutestrednyacute filmovyacute klub Bratislava) Socioloacutegia vol 20 no3 331ndash62

Stena J (1990) lsquoSociaacutelno-politickeacute suacutevislosti dynamizaacutecie a modernizaacutecie spoloč-nostirsquo (report of working group at Second Congress of the Slovak SociologicalSociety in September 1989 in Martin) Socioloacutegia vol 22 no 3 285ndash305

Stena J (1991) lsquoUtvaacuteranie občianskej spoločnosti ako rozvojovyacute probleacutemsuacutečasneacuteho Slovenskarsquo Socioloacutegia vol 23 nos 1ndash2 7ndash21

Suňog P and Demčaacutek M (1982) lsquoO postaveniacute a činnosti socioloacutega v podnikursquoSocioloacutegia vol 14 no 1 118ndash22

Szomolaacutenyi(ovaacute) S (1990) lsquoHistoacuteria zrodu a formovania sociologickeacuteho pracoviskaSAVrsquo Socioloacutegia vol 22 no 3 367ndash82

Szomolaacutenyi(ovaacute) S (1995) lsquoMetareflexia histoacuterie SUacute SAVrsquo Socioloacutegia vol 27 no 3158ndash62

Szomolaacutenyi S (1999) Klrsquoukataacute cesta Slovenska k demokracii Bratislava STIMULTurčan Lrsquo (1992) lsquoObčianska spoločnos a aspekt jednotlivcarsquo in Sopoacuteci (ed) 1992

46ndash54Wolekovaacute H (1981) lsquoSocioloacutegovia bratislavskyacutech podnikovrsquo Socioloacutegia vol 13 no

1 115ndash20


Wolekovaacute H (1988) lsquoSocioloacutegia v prestavbe ndash sociotechnickaacute straacutenka spoločen-skovedneacuteho poznaniarsquo (contributions to Slovak Sociological Society seminarheld on 3 December 1987 at Uacutestrednyacute filmovyacute klub Bratislava) Socioloacutegia vol20 no 3 331ndash62

Uram J (1982) lsquoSociaacutelna kliacutema v pracovnyacutech kolektiacutevochrsquo Socioloacutegia vol 14 no 1103ndash9

18 Simon Smith

2 Civil society and political parties in the Czech Republic

Martin Myant

I am for the decentralisation of power I am for the progressive creationof the space for a diversified civil society in which the central governmentwill perform only those functions which nobody else can perform or whichnobody else can perform better The creation of a genuine civil society ofthe western type will take a very long time but that does not mean that weshould not be creating favourable conditions for its emergence It is not aquestion only of regional autonomy or of the creation of a non-profitmaking sector or of the system of tax allowances It is a question of muchmore of the method of thinking which enables citizens to trust

(Vaacuteclav Havel Praacutevo 18 November 1995)

Our country is following a thorny path from communism to a free societyand market economy so far without any real wavering On that path wehave already passed several crossroads The first was the clash overeconomic reform over whether we want genuine capitalism or whether wewould try for a third way socialism with a human face perestroika Thesecond was the clash over the character of the political system itself overwhether we want the standard parliamentary pluralism based on the keyrole of political parties or whether an all-embracing non-politics shoulddominate The third was the clash over maintaining the homogeneouscommon Czechoslovakia or over its division if that proved impossible Thefourth concerns the very conception of the content of our society whetherwe want a standard system of relations between the citizen (and community)and state supplemented with voluntary organisations or whether we willcreate a new form of collectivism called civil society or communitarianismwhere a network of lsquohumanisingrsquo lsquoaltruisingrsquo morals-enhancing more or lesscompulsory (and therefore by no means exclusively voluntary) institutionscalled regional self-government professional self-government publicinstitutions non-profit making organisations councils committees andcommissions are inserted between the citizen and the state

(Vaacuteclav Klaus Lidoveacute noviny 11 July 1994)

Introduction

These quotations illustrate the sharp conflict over the meaning and impor-tance of lsquocivil societyrsquo in the Czech Republic in the mid-1990s They also

Chapter Title 19

helpfully illustrate the modes of thought and argument of lsquothe two VaacuteclavsrsquoHavel the former dissident who became President of Czechoslovakia in1989 and then of the Czech Republic saw himself maintaining a positionderived ultimately from fundamental moral principles Klaus the discipleof the monetarist economist Milton Friedman was federal Minister ofFinance from 1989 to 1992 and then Czech Prime Minister until November1997 He saw himself opposing and defeating successive attempts todeviate from what he believed to be clear messages from lsquostandardrsquowestern theory and practice

This chapter aims to set that conflict over civil society in the context ofan emerging political system It is built around two questions The firstconcerns why there should have been such sharp disputes over a vagueambiguous and rather abstract term To some extent the terminology andthe form taken by the debate could have reflected the very differentpredilections and past interests of the key protagonists Behind ithowever lay deep disagreements albeit ones that were not always verydirectly formulated over the kind of political system they wanted to seeand over the relationship between the political system and society ingeneral

The second question concerns how far the debate influenced the develop-ment of the political system and forms of interest representation Itcoincided with and was in part a reaction to attempts by Klausrsquos CivicDemocratic Party to minimise the influence of other political or socialforces Havel became a part of a diffuse opposing trend that resisted theexclusive domination of politics by parties and pointed towards a morecomplex institutional framework for the control and possibly alsodecentralisation of power

What is civil society

The term lsquocivil societyrsquo has been used over a very long period of time withroots back at least to Aristotle It is therefore hardly surprising that itsmeaning has shifted over time leading even to the despairing suggestionthat lsquothere is no discovering what the term meansrsquo (Nielsen 1995 41)Ambiguities in its meaning did colour the debate but both main positionsactually have clear theoretical and historical antecedents

The important break in the development of the term was the notion of aseparation or even counter-position between state and civil society JohnKeane (1988b 35ndash71) sees the beginnings with the Scottish eighteenth-century philosopher Adam Ferguson who argued that the danger oflsquodespotical governmentrsquo was opposed by the lsquosense of personal rightsrsquo(Ferguson 1966 273) strengthened by forms of involvement in publicactivity However Fergusonrsquos use of the term lsquocivil societyrsquo did not implythe advocacy of associations fully independent of the state that distinctionwas to come later

20 Martin Myant

Hegel although he used the term civil society gave it a meaning that haslittle relevance to the Czech debate He did see a private sphere but it wasa chaotic arena full of conflict which needed to be given order by apolitical authority the state More relevant was almost the exact oppositeview derivable from Adam Smithrsquos lsquoinvisible handrsquo of market relations (cfCox 1999 454) Civil society is then the sphere of private individualactivity free from state control but it is largely able to organise itself aslong as a state maintains set rules It could even be equated with privateproperty Klaus seemed happy with such a notion viewing lsquoliberal civilsocietyrsquo as part of the heritage of his favoured lsquoconservative rightrsquo (Klaus1992 42)

The notion of a distinct civil society as a barrier against lsquostate despotismrsquowas developed by Alexis de Tocqueville in his study of Americandemocracy in 1831 To him the contrast was clear with a France where hesaw negative consequences of uncontrolled power in different periodsfrom an established and then from a revolutionary order In America hesaw power controlled by a popular willingness to become actively involvedwith public discussion of even lsquothe most trifling habits of lifersquo (Tocqueville1980 79) This led in turn to a plethora of free associations independent ofthe state They could have common economic concerns but were alsolsquoreligious moral serious futile extensive or restricted enormous ordiminutiversquo (ibid 111) The level of involvement led him to suggest thatdebates at the top level were lsquoa sort of continuation of that universalmovement which originates in the lowest classes of the peoplersquo (ibid 79)

Havel was close to this starting point but it appears limited in a moremodern world of mass parties organised interest representation anddiverse centres of power Control of state despotism can no longer be thesole area of concern Thus trade unions emerged largely to counter thepower of private property but are also involved in conflicts with the stateand play a variety of roles in political life Business too can organisecoordinating its position against organised labour and ensuring indepen-dence from the state but also influencing the latterrsquos behaviour Thecounter-position of state to civil society is too simple a starting point foranalysing such processes

Nevertheless the term civil society underwent something of a revival inthe late twentieth century with a new meaning as an informal andspontaneous sphere The problem of defining the relationship between civilsociety parties and interest representation is resolved by defining civilsociety as everything apart from the state economic power marketrelations parties and clearly formal forms of political activity (Cohen andArato 1992) This definition acquired life with the growth of lsquonewrsquo socialmovements outside previously established political structures (cf Keane1988b) Parties trade unions and the like had become established To somethey were another element restricting the representation of the fulldiversity of opinions and interests A definition based on lsquoinformalityrsquo

Czech civil society and political parties 21

implies a dividing line between political and civil society that is vaguemoving as a regime changes or as a movement gains lsquoestablishedrsquo statusNevertheless this was a notion that could find a strong resonance in east-central Europe in the 1970s and 1980s It even still had some influence inthe specific situation in Czech politics after 1998

However even the vision of democracy derived from de Tocqueville isnot shared by all intellectual traditions Klaus familiar largely with what hesaw as lsquostandardrsquo economic theory was a confident advocate of the radic-ally different perspective articulated by the economist Joseph Schumpeter(1943) The starting point was rejection of direct popular decision makingThe best realistic alternative Schumpeter saw was a system allowing choicebetween individuals There was a conscious analogy to the competitionbetween firms in economic theory The crucial point however was thatdemocracy not only centred on but also meant no more than a system ofperiodic choice between professional politicians The voters must notindulge in lsquopolitical back-seat drivingrsquo They lsquomust understand that oncethey have elected an individual political action is his business and nottheirsrsquo (Schumpeter 1943 295) There was thus no place for associations orinterest representation This was a licence for an elected dictatorship

Both neo-classical and neo-liberal economics take this further seeinginterest representation as positively harmful as distorting the otherwiseideal market outcomes Trade unions behave as economic monopoliesraising remuneration for some only by lsquodepriving other workers ofopportunitiesrsquo (Hayek 1984 52) State provision breeds a lsquobureaucracyrsquothat is self-serving and inefficient (Niskanen 1971 and 1994) quite unlikethat portrayed in Weberrsquos lsquonaive sociological scribblingsrsquo (C Rowley inNiskanen 1994 vii) Even elected government may be dangerous enablinga majority to impose policies to its advantage on society as a whole(Tullock 1976) The solution is the free market wherever possible

Hayek (1944) and in a more popularised version Friedman (1962)portray the free market and private property as a necessary and it seemsalso sufficient condition for political democracy Private wealth is thebarrier against political dictatorship and any interference in the market isitself an infringement of freedom It even carries the ultimate threat that itmight culminate in an elected government whereby lsquoa majority imposestaxes for its own benefit on an unwilling minorityrsquo (Friedman 1962 194) Inthis view any form of lsquosocialismrsquo even if from an elected governmentthreatens both personal freedom and economic prosperity

Equating political freedom to property ownership is difficult to reconcilewith the historical evidence on the crucial role of workersrsquo movements in thedevelopment of political democracy (Rueschemeyer et al 1992) Indeed inCzech history too the political forces representing rural and urban businesswere either suspicious of universal suffrage or opposed to it and on groundsvery similar to those behind Friedmanrsquos reservations about democracy TheSocial Democrats were left to lead demonstrations culminating in a generalstrike in 1905 to force concessions out of the Habsburg empire

22 Martin Myant

Friedmanrsquos followers need not reject de Tocquevillersquos notion of civilsociety built around voluntary association but in Friedmanrsquos world theyrely on support from lsquoa few wealthy individualsrsquo (Friedman 1962 17) Theytherefore depend on the prior existence of capitalism and inequalities inwealth Friedman also advocates lsquoprivate charity directed at helping theless fortunatersquo (ibid 195) as the best solution to problems of poverty anddeprivation In this case voluntary associations could play a role filling inthose few cases where markets for reasons not made clear may produceresults not judged ideal There is however no legitimate place for thecollective representation of interests that might temper the power associ-ated with wealth or alter the outcome of free market processes

While these ideas of Friedman and Hayek were gaining influenceamong a small circle of professional economists in the 1980s active dis-sidents were more attracted to the notion of civil society as a counter toformal political authority This had a special resonance in Czechoslovakiawhere it echoed a nineteenth-century tradition Masaryk (1927 47) claimedto have set the aim to lsquode-Austrianise our people thoroughly while they arestill in Austriarsquo A lsquonon-political politicsrsquo would enable the Czech nation todevelop within the substantial space allowed for cultural and economicadvancement while not challenging the key areas of lsquobigrsquo politics such asforeign and military policy (Havelka 1998 460ndash1)

The lsquonon-political politicsrsquo of the 1970s and 1980s fitted the specificsituation of a repressive regime confronting a weakly organised andseemingly powerless opposition that was isolated from any sources ofsocial discontent The dilemma of lsquowhat to do when we canrsquot do anythingrsquo(Otaacutehal 1998 467) was resolved by involvement in small-scale activitiessuch as seminars and samizdat publications Challenging the powerstructure directly was not a serious option

Havel gave this a theoretical justification around his notion of lsquoanti-political politicsrsquo He was not interested in power but rather in anindividual moral revival amounting to lsquoliving in truthrsquo There was nopolitical strategy far less so than in the case of much of the Polishopposition or even Masaryk in the 1890s and no clear vision for a politicalor economic system in the future The agenda was left at a very generallevel at the lsquopre-politicalrsquo stage (Havelka 1998 Otaacutehal 1998 Havel 1988)This did not prevent Havel from emerging to play a leading role in themass movement that established Civic Forum ndash he chose the civic part ofthe name ndash and ended communist power It did however mean that he hadonly the vaguest of theoretical armouries relevant to the new situationafter November 1989

Civil society and the 1989 revolution

Despite the breadth and spontaneity of the initiatives leading to the emer-gence of Civic Forum (OF) its rise cannot be interpreted as a victory forcivil society over a repressive regime Throughout the early months of 1990


OF was primarily the vehicle of political revolution forcing changes inpersonnel in the administrative machine in economic life and in localgovernment It was moving into the arena of power The spontaneousaspect continued in the absence of formal organisational structures as itbrought together opposition groups spanning the political spectrum Theeffect was to leave the body of activists at local levels divorced fromcentral decision making Indeed major policy issues were increasinglytaken within government structures without wider consultation Civilsociety as normally understood therefore had to develop as somethingdistinct from Civic Forum

The overthrow of dictatorships in Latin America and southern Europewas frequently followed by an lsquoexplosionrsquo of civil society with a lsquomultitudeof popular formsrsquo (OrsquoDonnell and Schmitter 1986 53) In purely numericalterms the same could be said to apply in the Czech Republic where civilsociety has been conveniently defined as registered non-state non-profitmaking organisations (eg Zpraacuteva 1999 19) these numbered 2500 by theend of 1990 and 79000 by December 1999 This however gives only apartial picture particularly where the political influence of the variousorganisations is concerned The change that took place was as much atransformation of existing structures as a creation of new ones fromscratch

Repression in Czechoslovakia had not prevented society from organis-ing The point was rather that organisations were controlled and incor-porated Many completely new organisations did emerge to representinterests opinions and activities but they were generally small in relationto the transformed versions of ones that already existed Some haveconsciously aimed to influence policy but they typically do this by personallinks to MPs ministers or officials in the new power structure Theygenerally steer well clear of more public forms of protest (cf Frič 2000)

The only organisations with the will and potential to influence politicalevents by mass protests have been the trade unions and the representativesof cooperative farmers Their links to the new power structure wereinitially weak and they encountered initial suspicion over their past ties tothe old regime The guiding spirit in trade unions therefore becamedecentralisation and depoliticisation with a rapid devolution of power intolocal organisations rather than a desire to play a central role in a newpolitical structure (Myant and Smith 1999) As they redefined their role insociety they sought a formal tripartite structure that would recognise theirright to a voice on a clearly defined range of issues relating to employmentand social policies

Civic Forum itself it can be added started with a modest view of its ownrole The initial assumption had been that it would quickly disappeargiving way to newly emerging political parties that would contest electionsSuch a process had been eased in eastern Germany by importing a partysystem from the West Effective new parties did not emerge so quickly in

24 Martin Myant

Czechoslovakia and it was soon accepted that OF would itself contest thefirst parliamentary elections scheduled for June 1990

In this early period Civic Forumrsquos development was dominated by twopotentially conflicting trends One emphasised the creation of a newpolitical system with all the checks and balances associated with a maturedemocracy while the other emphasised a firmer line against the remnantsof the old regime merging in extreme cases into a crude anti-communismThe clearest advocate of putting primacy on lsquocreatingrsquo was Czech PrimeMinister Petr Pithart He was already worrying at a OF assembly on 21January 1990 that the people could come to fear the new authorities asmuch as they had feared the communists in the past His call was to finishlsquoas soon as possible with the dismantling of the oldrsquo and lsquoto build a state anindependent civil society a prosperous economy in short a civilisedEuropean societyrsquo (inFoacuterum 23 January 1990)

This thinking was a powerful influence on policy making It evencontributed to the development of formal structures for interest represent-ation with Pithart playing an important role in the creation of a tripartitestructure that assured trade unions and employersrsquo organisations access tothe government on issues that concerned them directly (Myant et al 2000)However the general principle of the need to open up political life and tocontrol those in power could not lead to any inspiring political slogansModern democracies as is often argued themselves developed gradually asthe result of pressures from and compromises between conflicting forcesIt could not be an easy task to win enthusiasm for the need to control onersquosown power when leading revolutionary changes Indeed Pithart was fre-quently accused of scoring lsquoown goalsrsquo that reduced his political standingby appearing to be lsquosoftrsquo on communists

The alternative lsquoanti-communistrsquo trend had an automatically easierappeal seeming to follow more naturally from the revolutionary changes Itwas fuelled by reports that the Communist Party (CP) or CP members wereresisting changes In reality although its members grumbled and clung topositions where they could the party itself could mount no serious organisedopposition to the loss of its positions of power However it continued toexist kept the word lsquocommunistrsquo in its title sought to cling on to as much aspossible of its substantial wealth ndash equivalent to 16 per cent of GDP and 283times the property held by OF (Svobodneacute slovo 25 October 1990) ndash andoccasional early reports showed that many of its members still occupiedleading positions These rather than social interests or the creation ofdemocratic structures were issues that could mobilise public demonstrationsthroughout early 1990 A significant and very vocal part of public opinionfavoured banning the CP in total ndash 37 per cent of the population supportedthis in an early opinion poll (Rudeacute praacutevo 17 May 1990) ndash and there weremore widespread calls for a thorough purge of positions of authority

The 1990 election gave OF approximately half the Czech vote Ithad a comfortable majority in the Czech and together with its Slovak


counterpart Public Against Violence federal parliaments Its detailedprogramme naturally emphasised the lsquoconstructiversquo trend but its appealwas based around general themes rather than specific policies It presenteditself as the key force in ending communist power and as the bestguarantee against a return to the past It promised to continue with thecreation of a democratic system a market economy and with ensuring asuccessful lsquoreturn to Europersquo Its own status and role within these processeswere left vague Indeed a key appeal had been its slogan of lsquoparties are forparty members Civic Forum is for everyonersquo a wording that fitted with thespirit of the time but not with plans that might include acceptance of itsfuture transformation into a political party

Ultimately contesting elections imposes a certain logic on an organisa-tionrsquos development requiring a degree of discipline an organisationalstructure a means of funding and a body of activists It also logically meanshampering rather than encouraging the development of other partiesMoreover having won the parliamentary elections OF again took respons-ibility for government Splitting into the diverse trends that had comeunder its umbrella could threaten the stability of that government Haveland others began to reason that OF would have to continue at least tocontest the next parliamentary elections in 1992

This realisation of permanence coincided with pressure from a numberof Civic Forum assemblies for a thorough purge of public and economiclife Society in Havelrsquos words was lsquonervous and impatientrsquo as reflected inlsquohundreds of letters dailyrsquo demanding more dramatic changes (inFoacuterum 18September 1990) This found acceptance around the aim of destroying thelsquonomenclature brotherhoodrsquo that was alleged albeit with little definiteevidence to be lsquostrengthening its positionsrsquo (I Fišera inFoacuterum 21 August1990)

A reasoned if uninspiring alternative to this mood came again fromPithart Existing laws did not allow for a sweeping purge with arbitrarydismissals although some changes to the law were to create more scope forremoving job security from high officials His objective of creating a modernpolitical system meant that OF lsquomust be tolerant and far-sighted enough toaid the emergence of parties alongside usrsquo (inFoacuterum 18 September 1990)

Enter Vaacuteclav Klaus

A new way forward came from a somewhat different direction Once it wasdecided that Civic Forum needed a stronger profile around a new chairVaacuteclav Klaus at the time federal Finance Minister emerged with enthusi-astic support as lsquothe author of the economic reformrsquo (inFoacuterum 17 October1990) He was elected chair by 115 votes to 52 for Havelrsquos favourite MartinPalouš at the OF assembly on 13 October

The background had been his role in developing ideas on reform withinhis ministry from early 1990 onwards He had focused on essentially the

26 Martin Myant

standard IMF stabilisation package plus voucher privatisation whilemaking some concessions to advocates of a more interventionist approachDespite criticism from specialist opinion in the following months parlia-ment approved the programme in September and Klaus was keen topresent himself as its main author and defender (Myant 1993) Klausrsquosthinking dominated the formulation of the OF programme at assemblies inDecember 1990 and January 1991 His position can be characterised aroundthree elements The first was an insistence that Civic Forum should becomea party not lsquoan all-embracing political movementrsquo with a clear programmebased around economic reform and the proven models of democracy fromthe Czechoslovak past western Europe and North America This it wasargued required support from a disciplined movement Subsequent eventssuggested no need for a disciplined mass membership but Klaus wasworried that the effects of economic reform would provoke social dis-content Discipline among ministers and MPs could then prove important

The second element was a clear commitment to a right-wing perspectivethat required firm rejection of socialism social democracy and anyone whowanted lsquoto speak of a market economy with various kinds of adjectivesrsquo(inFoacuterum 17 January 1991) Klaus had already won implicit acceptance forhis rejection of the lsquosocial market economyrsquo the successful slogan ofGermanyrsquos Christian Democrats Elements of the reform scenario agreedby parliament (lsquoSceacutenaacuteř ekonomickeacute reformyrsquo Hospodaacuteřskeacute noviny 4September 1990) with references to industrial energy and transportpolicies and a substantial programme of state initiatives to create a com-prehensive environmental policy had quietly disappeared Instead camethe Friedmanite insistence that private ownership was the key to solving alleconomic social environmental and political problems

Thus political reform meaning the construction of an institutionalframework for democracy and civil society was subordinated to economicreform References did remain to the need to find mechanisms to controlthe state apparatus and to develop strong local government but privateproperty was creeping forward as the only precondition worth mentioningfor defending individual rights (inFoacuterum 17 January 1991)

The third element was his approach to anti-communist rhetoric Klauswas from the start against any further lsquopurgesrsquo He later claimed to havebeen guided by a clear position of favouring lsquoa systemic solution over-coming communism as a system and not an individual personal confronta-tion with the individuals responsible for the evil and injustice of thecommunist regimersquo (Rudeacute praacutevo 13 August 1994) He even suggested onoccasion that the best way to deal with former communists was to helpthem become capitalists His opposition to the lsquoindividualrsquo approachbrought him into potential conflict with a strong and persistent body ofopinion and one the support of which he needed to ensure dominancewithin OF He was not enthusiastic about the lsquolustrationrsquo law passed inOctober 1991 which barred for five years various former communist


officials and secret police informers from holding state office but he madelittle public show of his doubts It was easy enough to keep any of his alliesdirectly affected in post by transferring activities into the private sectorwhere no bars applied In general he made what concessions were neces-sary to ensure an implicit alliance with lsquoanti-communist fundamentalistsrsquoThey in turn were impressed enough by his brand of rhetoric As various ofhis views recorded in this contribution indicate he subjected those withideas to the left of his own to scathing criticism effectively accusing themof threatening a return to the communist past Anti-communism to himwas not a matter of individualsrsquo pasts an issue that caused him very littleconcern but a weapon against political opponents of the present Itsounded quite good enough to give him the status of the dominantpersonality on the political right

The direction Klaus was giving Civic Forum in the latter part of 1990 ledto the departure of some MPs into an emerging Social Democrat groupand ultimately to a division of the organisation into two streams Thealternative position favoured a looser internal structure perhaps hankeringto maintain something of the heritage from the period since November1989 with a greater concern for social issues albeit alongside commitmentto a market economy For the sake of government continuity the twogroups held together in a loose federation until the 1992 elections On 21April 1991 Klaus was elected chair of the new Civic Democratic Party(ODS) while a majority of former dissidents and government ministerswent into the looser Civic Movement

Klausrsquos conception had no place for political or social organisationbeyond his own clearly right-wing party which was to promote privateproperty as the foundation and guarantor of individual liberty Neverthe-less there was some scope for pressing social interests Organisationsassociated with the past continued to be cautious but some new and oftenvery small groups could make an impact when they had the right personalconnections and when issues were repackaged in terms of reconciliationwith the communist past Individual MPs themselves not tied to anythingapproaching party discipline would willingly take up such demands andfrequently embarrassed the government Thus the voice of emerging smallbusinesses became audible around demands for return of property confis-cated in the past Klaus saw this as a diversion from rapid and comprehen-sive privatisation but he conceded quickly enough for his position toreceive little publicity

The voice of farmers a group that was hit hard and very early byeconomic changes was at first most audible when it came from newlyemerging organisations that wanted scope for returning land taken bycooperatives into private individual use (Foacuterum no 15 1990 11) The CivicForum draft programme presented on 8 December 1990 started itsagricultural policy section with a call to lsquoredress the crimes perpetrated bythe totalitarian regimersquo (inFoacuterum 13 December 1990 supplement) a

28 Martin Myant

position that dominated policy making towards agriculture throughout1991 The biggest organisations representing the agricultural communitywere more concerned with addressing the difficulties created by economicreform and defending existing cooperatives against what they saw as abigoted and politically motivated attack led by people ignorant of farmingTheir voices were eventually heard in government after powerful publicdemonstrations (Myant 2000) a tactic that newer groups neither needednor wanted to use

Czech parties and the ODS

The weakness of organised interest representation across east-centralEurope was a common feature in the early 1990s The Hungarian politicalscientist Attila Aacutegh has referred to a lsquopartyistrsquo democracy with visiblepolitics dominated by clashes between party oligarchies (Aacutegh 1998 12)Czech parties however were themselves weak in measurable indicatorssuch as membership and committed support (cf Jičiacutenskyacute 1995) Theyappeared to be lsquocadre parties in the truest sense of the termrsquo (Šamaliacutek1995 257) brought together around the vaguest of programmes andpossibly charismatic leaders and lacking internal cohesion or disciplineIndeed more than seventy out of the 200 Czech MPs had changed partybefore the 1996 elections albeit with changes overwhelmingly amongopposition parties (A Veacutebr Rudeacute praacutevo 13 May 1995 and Brokl et al1998 25)

Nevertheless generalisations need to be tempered by a recognition ofdiversity in party types across the Czech political spectrum Table 21 showsthe parliamentary election results that secured the ODS a dominantposition in coalitions in 1992 and 1996 Its coalition partners were thePeoplersquos PartyndashChristian and Democratic Union (KDUndashČSL) and theCivic Democratic Alliance (ODA) The former inherited property and aparty machine from an existence as a loyal satellite party before 1989 andsoon claimed to have doubled its membership to a very satisfactory 40000It sought to profit from association with powerful Christian Democratparties in western Europe adopting the slogan of a lsquosocial market economyrsquoThe ODA remained a select group with about 2000 members created in1989 by long-standing dissidents and neo-liberal economists

The opposition included the far-right Republicans and various centregroupings that often seemed to be searching for issues to take up One forexample latched onto a campaign for restoration of the death penaltyThere seemed to be little lsquomiddle groundrsquo when the key issues werereconciliation with the communist past and economic reform

The left was dominated by two parties The CP was completely out oftouch with the spirit of the time but retained an ageing core of membersfalling from 17 million in 1989 to 355000 in 1992 and 121000 in 2001(Fiala et al 1999 180ndash2 and lthttpwwwkscmczgt) It retained a substantial


apparatus but made few new recruits (under 5000 in the period up to2001) and 65 per cent of all members by 2000 were over 60 They wereclinging to the past with little serious ambition to take part in power againand had little in common with the notion of cadre party The SocialDemocrats (ČSSD) benefited both financially and politically from linkswith friendly western European parties but suffered from a slow startbefore leading figures drifted across from OF Membership was never highreaching about 13000 in 1996 and there were no formal links to organisedinterest representation Trade unions preferred to keep a distance from allparties The ČSSDrsquos popularity increased as the leadership moved tocondemn the corruption and rising inequality that they associated withprivatisation It probably benefited from a growing awareness of socialissues and from a move towards more active campaigning by trade unionsfrom 1994 onwards

The ODS too was small and fits to some extent with the characterisationas a lsquocadrersquo party It won support by appearing as the most committedadvocate and architect of the new political and economic order Howeverit was closely tied in with the new structures of political and economicpower leading to a characterisation as a lsquonomenclaturersquo party lsquoof a specialtypersquo with members in leading positions in the state administration andprivatised enterprises (Z Jičiacutenskyacute Rudeacute praacutevo 24 January 1994) Its naturecan be demonstrated around the three key areas of membership fundingand internal differences

30 Martin Myant

Table 21 Results of elections to Czech parliament showing votes as percentageand seats as total

1992 1996 1998

Votes Seats Votes Seats Votes Seats

ODS 297 76 296 68 277 63ČSSD 65 16 264 61 323 74KDUndashČSL 63 15 81 18 90 20KSČM ndash ndash 103 22 110 24LB 141 35 14 0 ndash ndashODA 59 14 64 13 ndash ndashUS ndash ndash ndash ndash 86 19HSDndashSMS 59 14 ndash ndash ndash ndashSPRndashRSČ 60 14 80 18 39 0LSU 65 16 ndash ndash ndash ndash

Note Votes do not add up to 100 because lsquoothersrsquo are not included All parties with seats inparliament are included A dash indicates that the party did not standKey to parties ODS Civic Democratic Party contesting in 1992 in coalition with the KDS asmall Christian Democrat Party ČSSD Social Democrats KDUndashČSL Christian andDemocratic UnionndashPeoplersquos Party KSČM Communist Party LB Left Block includingcommunists in 1992 ODA Civic Democratic Alliance US Union of Freedom formed inJanuary 1998 by former leading members of ODS HSDndashSMS Moravian autonomistmovement SPRndashRSČ Republican Party LSU Liberal Social Union

Klausrsquos original claim had been that 10 per cent of Civic Forum sup-porters would be willing to join the ODS leading to a mass lsquoconservativersquoparty This proved unrealistic but also unnecessary and for him possiblyeven undesirable The ODS to Klaus was a vehicle for supporting hisgovernmentrsquos position of power so that it could implement his conceptionof economic reform based on privatisation and the emergence of promin-ent Czech entrepreneurs heading powerful business empires He had nointerest in a political structure giving scope for interest representationdebate and freely competing views It was even suggested that he wouldhave been happy had the party dissolved itself after the 1992 elections tore-emerge only for the next elections in 1996 (B Pečinka Lidoveacute noviny 9September 1994) In practice ODS membership was steady at around23000

Parties typically need members to provide revenue to fill elected postsin local government and to mobilise around certain objectives Revenuecame by means indicated below The party was too small to contest morethan 26 per cent of Czech parishes in local elections in 1994 ndash only thecommunists could contest in more than half ndash and of the 20000 represent-ing the party only half were members (Hospodaacuteřskeacute noviny 6 October1994) Not surprisingly local organisations remained weak The party vice-chair in charge of organisation complained at the congress in December1996 that only a few activists were involved and then only in lsquoformalorganisational tasksrsquo (L Novaacutek lthttpwwwodsczgt) This however isonly part of the picture Although there was little sign of activity in thesense of an interest in political debate and certainly not in challenging theleadership a decentralised and loose organisational structure created theideal environment for a party that could serve as a mechanism forambitious individuals to achieve positions of personal power

Funding was linked to the partyrsquos ability to help with privatisationdecisions Heads of nationalised industries hoping for decisions favourableto themselves openly sponsored the party in 1994 This practice wasstopped following opposition from all other parties It appears to havebeen replaced by less public methods A forensic audit of the partyrsquosaccounts published by Deloitte and Touche in May 1998 revealed evidenceof systematic errors omissions and contraventions of the law One case thatprobably related to a major privatisation decision came to court aroundcharges of tax evasion (proving corruption behind a donation would havebeen a practical impossibility) against an ODS official The twenty-fivewitnesses called in June 2000 remembered or knew nothing of the detailsof how the party had been funded The partyrsquos accounts showed Kčs 435million from sponsorship in 1996 This is considerably less than the Kčs1615 million subsequently received from the government as fundinglinked to election results but the sponsorship figure need not be a reliableguide in view of the possibility of secret donations or of firms themselvespaying ODS election expenses directly As one insider suggested at the


time the 1996 campaign was financed partly lsquofrom black untaxed fundsrsquo(T Dvořaacutek Praacutevo 2 September 1996) These it should be emphasised werelittle more than business transactions that related specifically to privatis-ation and implied no further implications for ODS policy This was not acase of an organised interest influencing a partyrsquos policy Klaus was happyto dismiss collective representation from business and also had little timefor individual managers who were critical of government policies Hisgovernment was to remain impervious to outside pressures

Within the party too as already indicated there was very little politicaldiscussion Conflicts and differences did emerge but they were largely todo with personal ambitions and accusations of corruption against leadinglocal individuals Behind the scenes however three political positionsplayed a role in the partyrsquos development The first was Klausrsquos focus oneconomic reform The second was that of lsquofundamentalist anti-com-munistsrsquo The third was associated with Josef Zieleniec Czech Minister forForeign Affairs from 1993 to 1997 He was lsquoeven said to be the one manfrom whom Klaus is capable of taking even very sharp criticismrsquo (BPečinka Lidoveacute noviny 9 September 1994) and is sometimes credited withauthorship of the idea of creating a mass right-wing party (eg Husaacutek 199784) Klausrsquos great ability was to react quickly and improvise to keep abalance between the first two of these without it being too obvious whenhe had to make compromises and concessions

Naturally Klaus denied that he had propagated a personality cult andothers whose voices could be heard feigned offence at the suggestion thatit was a one-man party However only Miroslav Macek one of the partyrsquosdeputy chairs and a man whose self-confidence and thirst for publicityalmost rivalled that of Klaus publicly claimed to have lsquoconvincing writtenevidence that Vaacuteclav Klaus has accepted a number of my suggestionsrsquo(Praacutevo 20 November 1999)

The lsquofundamentalist anti-communistrsquo position was visible not in analternative personality but in a small number who did not vote for Klaus asparty chair amounting to 16 per cent of delegates at the November 1993congress There was occasional talk of a breakaway party but the mostserious lsquofundamentalistrsquo party rarely passed the 5 per cent barrier inopinion polls Klaus was willing to compromise for example accepting anextension of the validity of the lustration law to 2000 He was morereluctant to concede when anti-communism threatened the creation oflarge Czech-owned business empires but he had on occasion to yield whenpublicity was given probably thanks to colleagues within his own party tothe communist past of some of his favoured prospective captains of Czechindustry

The issues raised by Zieleniec were even more central to the nature ofthe ODS but he lacked the political charisma and support base to pressthem with any serious chance of success He began with cautious sugges-tions in 1994 that the party might benefit from greater programmatic

32 Martin Myant

clarity This could be seen as an alternative and even a threat to Klausrsquosmethod of holding together the diverse personal interests within the partyby a combination of charisma and improvisation (P Přiacutehoda Lidoveacutenoviny 15 September 1994 P Šafr Lidoveacute noviny 28 September 1994)Zieleniec tried again after the disappointing 1996 election resultssuggesting that the ODS would never reach his target of 40 per cent of thevotes if it continued to be a party that lsquoalways speaks with one voicersquo Hesuggested that policy should come not just from above but lsquofrom pluralityand political battles on all levelsrsquo and saw the key in welcoming fractionsand an internal life which encouraged debate (Mladaacute fronta Dnes 5 August1996) There were a few mutterings of support and some voices taking thepoint towards its logical conclusion asking lsquowhy have we left the termldquosocial market economyrdquo to [Peoplersquos Party leader] Luxrsquo (R DenglerPraacutevo 6 August 1996) Klaus returned early from his holiday describedZieleniecrsquos contribution as lsquoimportantrsquo and ensured that it was quicklyburied

Zieleniec tried yet again in 1997 advocating a shift in the lsquomethodrsquo offunding away from the efforts of top officials directed towards big sponsorsInstead the party would rely more on smaller donations As he pointedout that would imply a shift in policy orientation It would mean listeningto lsquosmallrsquo as well as lsquobigrsquo voices (Mladaacute fronta Dnes 30 October 1997) Hewas working towards a coherent alternative of a party that tries to forgelinks with and to take up the interests of diverse social groups that mightbe expected to gravitate towards the right It is an approach familiarin western Europe The trouble for Zieleniec was that the party haddeveloped in a very different way He could refer to the desirability ofdebates and fractions but there was no basis for any to emerge He wasproposing an abstract idea with no resonance in a membership that had noreason to challenge its leader

Zieleniec resigned from the government on 24 October 1997 andrevelations about the partyrsquos secret funding shortly afterwards forcedKlausrsquos resignation The ODS however weathered the storm of divisions inits top leadership and continued as the dominant force on the politicalright Recorded sponsorship was down to Kčs 235 million by 2000 againsttotal party income of Kčs 963 million The party was even more clearlydominated by Klaus with his picture and speeches hogging its web pagesHe had however lost an important stage in the battle described in the nextsection over the nature of the political system and the relationship betweenparties and society

The two Vaacuteclavs

The most visible public clash over the nature of the emerging power struc-ture was the debate between Havel and Klaus which took off after theformerrsquos New Year address for 1994 and was amplified in a series of


speeches over the following two years Havelrsquos concerns over the govern-mentrsquos activities were expressed in terms of the need to lay the foundationsof a civil society At first he built this around the need to respect his generalmoral principles of lsquotolerancersquo and lsquorespect for one anotherrsquo The conflicttook shape as he took up practical issues particularly noting delays overfulfilling constitutional requirements for the creation of a senate andregional authorities By 1995 Klaus was reported saying of one of hisspeeches that lsquoevery sentence is directed against the ODSrsquo (Rudeacute praacutevo 15March 1995)

To Havel the basic pillar of political life should be respect for humanrights including measures against racism anti-semitism and the abuse ofpower by state officials The state itself should be run by a trusted civilservice with a role protected and defined by law Lustration was to him anacceptable element of control over power only during the emergencyperiod before a new state machine could be stabilised He used his powerof veto in October 1995 against prolongation of its validity to 2000 a movethat was then duly overturned by parliament Political parties had a role inpolitics but not as lsquothe monopoly owners of all political activityrsquo and theyshould never place themselves lsquoabove the statersquo (Praacutevo 13 March 1996Hospodaacuteřskeacute noviny 15 March 1995) Instead he favoured decentralisationby strengthening regional government professional associations and non-profit making organisations He had less to say on social or economicissues but gradually added his concerns over economic corruption ulti-mately joining in accusations of lsquomafia-like capitalismrsquo (eg Praacutevo 2January 1996 and 29 March 2000)

Havelrsquos position was criticised from a number of different angles Manycommentators disliked his moralising tone but it was precisely when hemoved beyond this that real controversy erupted Some on the left felt itshould all have been said much sooner He could for example have taken astronger stand against lustration from the start joining others who believedthat it conflicted with internationally recognised standards of human rightswith its presumption of guilt and retrospective applicability Instead he hadcapitulated to the craving for lsquoa hysterical settling of scores with thecommunist pastrsquo (J Šabata Rudeacute praacutevo 19 September 1994) By 1995however there was little doubt where Havel was placing himself ODS MPssaw his stand as an attack on their party or even as an attempt to constructan alternative government programme It was by no means only Klaus whothought that once elected the ODS should be freed from any outsidecontrols In the lead-up to the 1996 election Minister of the Interior JanRuml generally closer to the lsquoanti-communistrsquo trend in the party describedthe idea of an ombudsman supported by Havel and taken up vigorously bythe Social Democrats as lsquoa refined attempt to revise the results of theelections and to dominate our political scenersquo He saw implementation ofthe constitutional requirements for a senate and regional authorities asaimed at lsquolimiting the influence of the ODSrsquo (Praacutevo 4 April 1996)

34 Martin Myant

Klaus however was the most persistent and articulate in attackingHavel as illustrated in the quotation at the start of this chapter He tried togive his criticisms academic weight claiming that the notion of civil societylsquostands outside current standard sociological or political disciplinesrsquo Itsbasic origins he claimed are in lsquorationalist philosophersrsquo meaning appar-ently that it amounts to another attempt at lsquosocial engineeringrsquo (Lidoveacutenoviny 7 March 1994) Thus as with everything else he opposed he tried totar it with the socialist or communist brush He felt confident enough tocounterpose lsquoa society of free individualsrsquo to lsquoso-called civil societyrsquo Oddlyhis academic source one that would have been unknown to practically allhis Czech readers referred to the notion of civil society as lsquocritical to thehistory of western political thoughtrsquo (Seligman 1992 5) Klaus could notconvince those with knowledge of the history of ideas (eg P PithartLidoveacute noviny 25 March 1994) but the key question was whether supportfor Havel could take an effective political form

Broad support for Havelrsquos conception can be followed around threethemes conflicts within the coalition conflicts over the decentralisation ofpower and the issue of organised interest representation The first of thesebecame important both in response to Havelrsquos interventions and as partiesbegan thinking of the forthcoming 1996 parliamentary elections

The ODA with its roots partially in the dissident movement included arole for lsquocitizensrsquo initiativesrsquo in environmental protection and culturaldevelopment in its 1996 programme It was more persistent in its supportfor strong regional government including the issue in its 1992 electionprogramme Support for civil society albeit in a weak form that paid littleattention to interest representation was presented as a distinguishingfeature from the ODS However it was unlikely to be enthusiastic about agenuine opening up of power to outside scrutiny as like the ODS it washeavily dependent on sponsorship from business ODA members headedthe Ministries of Trade and Industry and Privatisation It was even more ofa lsquocadrersquo party than the ODS and declared sponsorship income in 1996 ofKčs 8 million the highest figure in relation to membership of any party Itwas destroyed as an electoral force in early 1998 following revelations ofanonymous donations

The KDUndashČSL gave general support to Havel with party leader anddeputy Prime Minister Josef Lux calling for the speedy creation of asenate and regional authorities He saw a reluctance to complete theconstruction of the institutional structure set out in the constitutionlsquoprimarily in those elements that lead to a division of authority andpowerrsquo In place of the visible lsquoefforts at etatisationrsquo he advocatedlsquosharing out powers and building a many-layered civil societyrsquo (Rudeacutepraacutevo 18 July 1995) This was to prove of greater practical significancethan the ODArsquos position The Christian Democrats embracing the generalidea of a lsquosocial market economyrsquo were less dependent on businesssponsorship and more willing to listen to organised interests both from


agriculture for which Lux had ministerial responsibility and from tradeunions

On specific policy issues Klaus was guided by Friedmanrsquos theoreticalperspective dressed up with a portrayal of any deviation from the freemarket as threatening a return to the communist past The practicalimplication was that there was no need to listen to voices from outside orto decentralise power in any way It was a message he liked to pressvigorously perhaps not least in the hope of asserting discipline among hisown MPs For him there was no place for an environmental policy and noneed to listen to an environmental movement An environmental policyproposed by a minister from the KDS a small Christian Democrat groupallied to the ODS was voted down by ten to nine in a government meetingin August 1994 with Klaus giving assurances that the market and privateproperty are lsquofar more important than activities of the governmentrsquo(Hospodaacuteřskeacute noviny 23 August 1994) This view could be backed up bythe theoretical contribution of Nobel Prize winner Ronald Coase (1960)but that is tempered by important caveats To Klaus however anythingmore than the market lsquowould return us to the social system that we hadbeforersquo (Lidoveacute noviny 29 August 1994)

Self-regulation of professions was dismissed just as lightly The mainpractical issue was the medical profession which had a different conceptionfrom the government on the development of the health service Klausagreed that he might talk to them but never wavered from hisinterpretation that the professional body was just lsquoan ordinary pressuregrouprsquo the primary aim of which was to limit competition by controllingentry qualifications (Hospodaacuteřskeacute noviny 19 January 1995 and 12 February1999) Representatives of the profession were amazed at this suggestion (IPelikaacutenovaacute Hospodaacuteřskeacute noviny 25 January 1995) presumably unaware ofits central place in Friedmanrsquos argument against the medical professioncontrolling standards of those practising medicine (Friedman 1962Chapter 9)

Regional government was a bigger theme as it figured in OF program-matic documents and in the constitution The inherited structure of eightadministrative authorities had been dissolved in 1991 but no agreementfollowed on how it should be replaced with new self-governing authoritiesThe ODS preference was for a large number which would have littlechance of challenging a central authority Klaus anyway saw no urgencyarguing that genuine decentralisation should be directly to the citizenmeaning the greatest possible reliance on market relations and the mini-mum of bureaucracy In the words of his press spokesperson lsquodo we wantevery second citizen to be a state official or a representative so that therewill be an even stronger bureaucracyrsquo (J Petrovaacute Lidoveacute noviny 27 June1994) In fact the abolition of one layer of regional government wasfollowed by a growth in employment in the state administrative structuresby 77 per cent from 1991 to 1997 However as Klaus pointed out the

36 Martin Myant

precise merits of the case were not the issue Regional administration waslsquoa stale theme which lacks popular supportrsquo (Rudeacute praacutevo 24 June 1995)There were some who saw creating strong local government as the key to afunctioning lsquocivil societyrsquo but the wider public showed little interest

Organised interest representation was ultimately a more troublesomearea Klaus contemptuously dismissed trade unions and employersrsquoorganisations as lsquoa residue from socialismrsquo (Lidoveacute noviny 5 November1993) Unions should have no role outside the immediate workplace butthis had been lsquorather poorly understoodrsquo when tripartite structures wereestablished It was lsquono small task to turn this backrsquo (Lidoveacute noviny 18 April1994) Klaus nevertheless made a serious effort after unions staged protestactions against a proposed reform of the pension system in December1994 He was however held in check by his coalition partners with theKDUndashČSL taking the unionsrsquo position seriously The outcome was arestriction in the tripartitersquos competence such that it could not discuss thefull range of economic issues (Myant et al 2000)

The trend towards a centralised unlistening government was reversedby the electoral weakening of the ODS in 1996 the subsequent intensific-ation of economic difficulties the emergence of divisions in its own leader-ship and a clear threat of rising social discontent The first albeit cautiousstep towards institutionalising change was a restoration of the tripartite inits original form in July 1997 Klaus still had no interest in listening to whatwas said there but his time as Prime Minister was anyway practically at anend

The aftermath

Returning to the questions posed at the start the sharp conflict aroundcivil society reflected much more than two abstract views of the world Itconcerned one of the central questions of Czech political development inthe mid-1990s but it also missed the crucial areas associated with interestrepresentation and the political implications of privatisation The ODSrsquosposition was closely tied to privatisation in which wide authority was leftwithin ministries and a government freed from scrutiny by parliament orany outside body Havel coming from a position that ignored economicand social interests pinpointed general themes of control over powerwhich were not areas of central concern to the population

The fact that Havel progressively nailed his colours to the anti-Klausmast undoubtedly played some role in weakening the latterrsquos prestige butit was only one part of a process that began to reverse the concentration ofpower towards a dominant party Aacutegh has referred to the party dominationof east-central European politics as a phase that should give way to abroadening of inputs from outside the party system Czech experienceillustrates two points The first is that party domination depended on adetermined effort by a particular group to create the party that would aim


to dominate and then to exclude others from political influence Thesecond is that opening up the political structure and creating a widerpluralism was itself the result of political battles in which a very diverserange of forces and pressures were involved

The specific issues that concerned Havel have generally been addressedA senate started operating after elections in November 1996 with anelectoral system that leads to a different party composition from that ofthe main chamber The creation of fourteen new regional authorities wasapproved in April 2000 with the ODS still hostile The electoral system ledgenerally to ODS domination that might eventually presage changeswithin a party that had little previous experience of alternative centres ofpower The tripartite albeit not one of Havelrsquos themes has operated to giverepresentative bodies direct access to government and the right tocomment on relevant legislation before it is passed The potential power oftrade unions has thus opened the way for involvement of a wider range ofinterests Privatisation again not one of Havelrsquos themes has continued butwith more scope for open scrutiny of decisions

It would therefore appear that much of the institutional framework fora lsquomulti-layeredrsquo civil society has been created with channels for interestrepresentation more scope for the decentralisation of authority and moremeans of control over power However civil society in this sense is stillnot a theme that creates great public excitement There has instead beensomething of a revival of interest in a conception that emphasises theinformal sphere with activities distinct from or even opposing establishedparties and representative bodies This may have partly reflected specificcircumstances after the parliamentary elections of June 1998 The minoritySocial Democrat government clung to office in the following years thanksan agreement with the ODS In exchange for a promise to oppose anyvote of no confidence in the government the main opposition party washelped into a number of key parliamentary posts and the SocialDemocrats agreed among other concessions to support a change in theelectoral system to one closer to the first-past-the-post principle Thiswould have given a real chance for a single party to win an outrightparliamentary majority The method ultimately approved by parliamentwas deemed illegal by the Constitutional Court in 2001 as it wasincompatible with the constitutional stipulation of elections by propor-tional representation

This lsquoopposition pactrsquo between the two largest parliamentary parties waspresented as a pragmatic necessity and as the only feasible means tomaintain a stable government To many however it appeared to bekeeping afloat a government that clearly lacked majority support and toconfirm all that was distasteful with political parties What might elsewherehave been secret deals between a few individuals now seemed to bereached in the full glare of publicity Loyal party representatives were leftto toe lines that must have jarred with their instincts

38 Martin Myant

This period saw a revival of ideas for a political life outside or opposedto existing parties Initiatives emerged some with directly political aimsbut others ostensibly to create an independent discussion forum Amongthe most substantial was Děkujeme odejděte (lsquoThank you now leaversquo)initiated as a petition in November 1999 by former student leaders fromthe events of November 1989 Their call was for the then currentgeneration of political leaders to resign It soon claimed 150000 signaturesof support This and other initiatives were quickly confronted with asituation that differed substantially from that of 1990 Civil society in thesense of an informal sphere distinct from the existing structures of powercould claim a base in past traditions and could win immediate supportfrom part of the population Before long however figures leadingindependent initiatives were being asked about their links to existingparties about what constructive alternatives they could propose and aboutwhether they too might not soon be forming a party It remains to be seenwhether the partial revival of lsquonon-partyrsquo political activity after 1998 willprove to be a minor temporary episode or whether the strength of pasttraditions and a continuing level of distrust towards the lsquoformalrsquo spheremean that it will remain a more permanent feature of Czech political life

Bibliography

Aacutegh A (1998) The Politics of Central Europe London SageBrokl L Mansfeldovaacute Z and Kroupa A (1998) Poslanci prvniacuteho českeacuteho

parlamentu (1992ndash96) Prague Sociologickyacute uacutestav AV ČR working paperWP98 5

Coase R (1960) lsquoThe problem of social costrsquo Journal of Law and Economics 31ndash44

Cohen J L and Arato A (1992) Civil Society and Political Theory CambridgeMA MIT Press

Cox R (1999) lsquoCivil society at the turn of the milleniumrsquo Review of InternationalStudies 25 3ndash28

Ferguson A (1966) An Essay on the History of Civil Society 1767 EdinburghEdinburgh University Press

Fiala P Holzer J Mareš M and Pšeja P (1999) Komunismus v Českeacute republiceBrno Masarykova univerzita

Frič P (2000) Neziskoveacute organizace a ovlivňovaacuteniacute veřejneacute politiky (Rozhovory oneziskoveacutem sektoru II) Prague Agnes

Friedman M (1962) Capitalism and Freedom Chicago University of ChicagoPress

Havel V (1988) lsquoAnti-political politicsrsquo in Keane J (ed) Civil Society and the StateLondon Verso 391ndash8

Havelka M (1998) lsquoNepolitickaacute politika kontexty a tradicersquo Sociologickyacute časopis34 455ndash66

Hayek F (1944) The Road to Serfdom London Routledge and Kegan PaulHayek F (1984) 1980s Unemployment and Unions London Institute for Economic

Affairs


Husaacutek P (1997) Budovaacuteniacute kapitalismu v Čechaacutech Rozhovory s Tomaacutešem JežkemPrague Volvox Globator

Jičiacutenskyacute Z (1995) Uacutestavněpraacutevniacute a politickeacute probleacutemy Českeacute republiky PrahaVictoria Publishing House

Keane J (1988a) Democracy and Civil Society London VersoKeane J (1988b) lsquoDespotism and democracyrsquo in Keane J (ed) Civil Society and

the State London VersoKlaus V (1992) Proč jsem konzervativcem Prague TOP AgencyMasaryk T G (1927) The Making of a State Memories and Observations London

Allen amp UnwinMyant M (1993) Transforming Socialist Economies The Case of Poland and

Czechoslovakia Aldershot Edward ElgarMyant M (2000) lsquoEmployersrsquo interest representation in the Czech Republicrsquo

Journal of Communist Studies and Transition Politics 16 1ndash20Myant M and Smith S (1999) lsquoCzech trade unions in comparative perspectiversquo

European Journal of Industrial Relations 5 265ndash85Myant M Slocock B and Smith S (2000) lsquoTripartism in the Czech and Slovak

Republicsrsquo Europe-Asia Studies 52 723ndash39Nielsen K (1995) lsquoReconceptualizing civil society for now Some somewhat

Gramscian turningsrsquo in Walzer M (ed) Toward a Global Civil SocietyProvidence RI and Oxford Berghahn

Niskanen W (1971) Bureaucracy and Representative Government Chicago AldineAtherton

Niskanen W (1994) Bureaucracy and Public Economics Aldershot Edward ElgarOrsquoDonnell G and Schmitter P (1986) lsquoTentative conclusions about uncertain

democraciesrsquo in OrsquoDonnell G Schmitter P and Whitehead L (eds) Transitionsfrom Authoritarian Rule Prospects for Democracy Baltimore and LondonJohns Hopkins University Press

Otaacutehal M (1998) lsquoO nepolitickeacute politicersquo Sociologickyacute časopis 34 467ndash76Rueschemeyer D Stephens E and Stephens J (1992) Capitalist Development and

Democracy Chicago Chicago University PressŠamaliacutek F (1995) Občanskaacute společnost v moderniacutem staacutetě Brno DoplněkSchumpeter J (1943) Capitalism Socialism and Democracy London Allen amp

UnwinSeligman A (1992) The Idea of Civil Society New York Free PressTocqueville A de (1980) On Democracy Revolution and Society Selected Writings

edited and introduced by J Stone and S Mennell Chicago University ofChicago Press

Tullock G (1976) The Vote Motive An Essay in the Economics of Politics LondonInstitute of Economic Affairs

Zpraacuteva vlaacutedy o stavu českeacute společnosti (Report of the Government on the State ofCzech Society) January 1999

40 Martin Myant

3 Civic Forum and Public Against ViolenceAgents for community self-determination Experiences of local actors

Simon Smith

So are you saying we donrsquot have any honourable politiciansndash We do but they are the ones who lack support People somehow donrsquotappreciate them

Could it have turned out differentlyndash Probably not I thought this country was a lot better prepared for the fallof communism that its moral condition was a lot better But it isnrsquot

You live in a small village [near Trnava] where most people support HZDSHow do you get alongndash The locals believe sweet-sounding slogans and donrsquot realise what influencethey have on things They tolerate me they even listen but they treat me asan eccentric

(Interview with actor and folk singer Mariaacuten GeišbergDomino foacuterum no 4 2002)

At present legal and political methods are highly effective and we must notabandon them But nor should we neglect other strategieshellip Fundamentalaspects of our environment will change for the better only via a positiveroad by personal connection and personal example through understand-ing reciprocity trust openness cooperativeness interest in others strengthof personality

(Jan Piňos Czech environmentalist lsquoTrvale udržitelneacute hnutiacutersquoSedmaacute generace no 9 2000)

If it were not for us [mayors and local councils] instilling a certain calm andpeace in the municipal sphere against a background of terrifying problemsthis state would turn into Argentina

(Peter Modranskyacute mayor of Trenčianske Teplice in SlovakiaObecneacute noviny no 22 2002)

Chapter Title 41

Introduction

Civic Forum (OF) and Public Against Violence (VPN) warrant attentionfor their historical role in extricating their respective societies fromcommunism and formulating a lsquoroute maprsquo for democratic transformationIn addition they are remarkable as social phenomena characterised bymass involvement penetration down to the grassroots and the geo-graphical peripheries of society for the spontaneity with which peopleformed and joined local groups and not least for a certain experimentalquality of the politics they pursued They embodied a participative type ofpolitics based on a loose movement-type structure without formal member-ship on decentralised decision-making and a commitment to devolvingself-governing powers to a wide range of spatial and functional constituen-cies and on dialogue partnership and non-partisanship In Czech andSlovak the term lsquonon-political politicsrsquo derived from the pre-1989 dissidentdiscourse and associated above all with Vaacuteclav Havel has become ashorthand for such a political philosophy In his 1978 essay lsquoThe Power ofthe Powerlessrsquo Havel had dismissed lsquotraditional mass political partiesrsquo aslsquostructures whose authority is based on a long-since exhausted traditionrsquoand instead spoke up for lsquoorganisations emerging ad hoc imbued withfervour for a specific goal and disbanding upon its attainmentrsquo ndash a vision ofpolitical organisation echoing new social movement theory and as chal-lenging to conventional parliamentary systems as to what Havel called thelsquopost-totalitarianrsquo regime in communist Czechoslovakia Political structureshe went on lsquoought to emerge from below as the result of authentic socialself-organisationrsquo (Havel 1990 61ndash2) He was not alone in his dissidentreflections ndash the Hungarian Gyorgy Konradrsquos concept of lsquoanti-politicsrsquowas likewise an attempt to transcend established political and polito-logical traditions ndash but nowhere else in Central and Eastern Europe weresuch ideas translated into political practice to the same extent as inCzechoslovakia in the first year following the collapse of communism

It is worth recalling the degree of utopianism and exceptionalism associ-ated with this concept at the outset of the post-communist era In lateJanuary 1990 a key VPN document boasted

The euphoria of the first days after 17 November is slowly fading we arenow facing the need to transfer the political changes into everyday lifeBut even now we need not forget what it was that made us interestingfor the world Evidently it was because we carried out [our revolu-tion] spontaneously from below through the rediscovery of our ownhumanity and our identity as a state and that we showed a Europeexhausted by the thrust and counter-thrust of political parties whichincreasingly bypass people that civility can still be part of elementaryhuman behaviour as long as human beings act with intentionality

(lsquoPredstava o krajinersquo Verejnos no 9 1990)

42 Simon Smith

Given these characteristics and these claims it is particularly relevant toexamine an as yet little understood and poorly documented aspect of thesemovementsrsquo short existence namely their functioning in and impact uponlocal communities Not only would this give us a better indication of thelevel of their actual penetration participativeness decentralisation andspontaneity there are good reasons for supposing that a lsquonon-politicalpoliticsrsquo although it was displaced at the national level after the firstexperiences with parliamentary lsquorealpolitikrsquo had a more lasting relevanceto local democracy found a more receptive social milieu within small ruralmunicipalities in particular and had greater potential benefits in suchcommunities On the basis of a series of Czech empirical studies of localdemocracy Kroupa and Kosteleckyacute concluded lsquoIt is evident that a certainmistrust of classical political parties characteristic of national political lifein the period immediately following the change of regime persisted muchlonger at local levelrsquo (1996 114) In other words the notion of a lsquonon-political politicsrsquo although originating in urban intellectual circles chimedwith social attitudes prevalent in rural or small town communitiessuspicious of all political ideologies and convinced that local government isan essentially lsquonon-(party)politicalrsquo affair This belief which can partly beattributed to a post-communist reaction against the party is founded on theassumed non-conflictual character of local issues such that the task of localpolitical representatives is to represent andor mobilise a unified all-community interest rather than to manage the interaction of competinginterests The continued development of such a politics following thedemise of OF and VPN in 1991 has prompted some commentators tosuggest that local self-government represents the most successfullydemocratised lsquopower containerrsquo within post-communist Czech or Slovaksociety citing a continued or growing preference for non-party politics(more than a third of Slovak and three-quarters of Czech mayors areindependents)

the mayors of rural municipalities (including villages and towns)represent in their experiences and their approaches the great hope forthe emergence of a political force operating on a basis other than theparty principle The trend of recruiting local councils from politicalindependents is a particularly hopeful one Engaged mayors are begin-ning to sense that they can be the initiators of a political culture of acompletely new style

(Blažek lsquoObnova venkovarsquo)

Starting hypotheses positive and negative potential of OF and VPN

It is hypothesised that OF and VPN had a unique potential (in com-parision with other more conventional political actors of the time) to

Civic Forum and Public Against Violence 43

become vehicles for community-based civic renewal founded on aconvincing narrativisation of a communityrsquos collective experience tra-jectory or destiny If they could win support for and successfully manageinstitutional transformation at the local level this would also inducepositive feedbacks in terms of a re-stocking of social and cultural capitalThe outcome would be a self-confident self-regulating well-integratedsocial organism This would represent a vital contribution to the processof democratisation adopting the functional definition of the term used byFrič and Strečenskaacute (1992) lsquoas an increase in the influence of civil societyon the course of social lifersquo On the other hand this positive potentialmust be balanced by recognition of plausible negative scenarios accord-ing to which local OF- or VPN-inspired collective actions could beeffectively captured by partial interest groups could be rejected byconservative social milieux struggling to cope with the demands of rapidsocial change or could be unwittingly implicated in a disorganisation oflocal community life by failing to articulate with existing collective actorsand identities

The fulfilment of positive or negative scenarios hinged to a large extenton the functioning of local fora as social movement networks A study byBuštiacutekovaacute conceives the potential of local OF in terms of facilitating alsquolooseningrsquo or lsquoopening uprsquo of social networks thus enabling broaderparticipation in the public life of a community followed by a later lsquoreset-tingrsquo or reconfiguration as new patterns of community life discourse socialcontrol and governance became re-institutionalised (1999 23) OF andVPN would thus have been the vehicles for a participative adaptation to anew mode of regulation Conversely where the negative scenario wasfulfilled this may be because fora served not as bridges between localactors but as gatekeepers or filters enabling only a small clique to profitfrom the opportunities that the social transformation brought with it andblocking (or at least not stimulating) participative adaptation for themajority of members of a community

OF and VPN as social movements

In understanding the emergence and spread of OF and VPN as socialmovements resource mobilisation theory provides a useful perspectiveAccording to Lustiger-Thaler and Maheu

Resource mobilisation theory argues that constraints inequalitiesand levels of domination cannot in and of themselves explaincollective action and its impact on political systems Collective actionhas to do with access to resources The social and political impact ofgrassroots groups and their claims upon the larger polity are mediatedby their organisational aptitudes

(1995 162)

44 Simon Smith

Clearly OF and VPN were social movements which responded to a uniqueopening of the opportunity structure for collective action following thecollapse of the communist system and to this extent were phenomenadetermined by the availability of physical and ideological resourcesexternal to the lives of local communities To put it another way they werethe product of a change in the lsquohowrsquo rather than the lsquowhyrsquo of collectiveaction Access to external resources ndash above all the possibility of integra-tion into the organisational structure of a powerful social movementnetwork ndash provided the opportunity to articulate local claims empowerlocal self-help initiatives or facilitate the ambitions of local social elites Inunderstanding which option was taken however we have to inquire afterthe identity or the social conflict to which the collective action gaveexpression and the way in which this was articulated by the communityconcerned Mobilisation around a reflexively formulated project for socialchange or community development amounted to the appropriation ofexternal resources by local actors (the re-insertion of a lsquowhyrsquo of collectiveaction) On the other hand failure to reflect underlying social problems orto develop self-reflexive identities in interaction with a particular socialconstituency was likely to render social movements hostage to capture forthe partial interests of pre-existing social elites

Another perspective on social movements holds that they supplementthe functioning of political systems which are necessarily imperfect atrepresenting social interests needs and identities (Offe 1987) New socialmovement theories developed to explain the coexistence between relativelystable political systems and anti-systemic collective actions whose effect isin part to directly satisfy needs the system fails to meet and in part to pushback the boundaries of representative procedures in order to admitidentities and discourses previously not accorded legitimate status Thisusually produces a tension within movements themselves between self-institutionalising and anti-systemic moments such that they challenge thelegitimacy of a political system and simultaneously contribute to state-building (Lustiger-Thaler and Maheu 1995 163ndash9) As actors which wereanti-systemic in relation to a system which capitulated almost before theyhad emerged OF and VPN were genetically associated with the state-building project which superseded this Nonetheless they posed difficultquestions with regard to the reintegration of public space in particulararticulating claims to citizenship and participation which tested theinclusiveness of the new Czechoslovak state

Such a conception is implicit in the vision set out by VPNrsquos founder-leader Fedor Gaacutel at the beginning of 1990 In his view VPN and OF wouldndash once their lsquorevolutionaryrsquo role had been completed with free elections ndashcontribute to the further democratisation of Czechoslovak society in threedistinct ways as a loose political club purveying a non-political politicsbased on dialogue and stripped of the hierarchies and rituals of traditionalpolitical organisation as the seedbed for economically independent


institutions in areas such as research the media and publishing and (mostimportantly from the present perspective) by stimulating the emergence ofproblem-oriented movements which would both ensure the societalcontrol of power and facilitate various forms of civic self-help thusincreasing the independence of civil society and its rapid mobilisability inthe event that democracy were again threatened (lsquoViacutezia našej cestyrsquoVerejnos no 5 16 January 1990) Gaacutelrsquos vision not only presupposes that theemerging political system would under-represent the spectrum of moreor less localised social constituencies it also presupposes sufficientlydeveloped local civic cultures to experience and express this represent-ational deficit and be capable of exploring forms of self-representation andself-regulation beyond the boundaries of formal institutions OF and VPNthus promoted highly demanding patterns of local civic life which were noteverywhere accepted possibly because populations expected the politicalincarnation of the movement to meet their needs without remainder1

Inquiry into the longevity of a particular local OFVPN organisationand into its following either the lsquopositiversquo or lsquonegativersquo developmentaltrajectory sketched above therefore leads to questions about the humanpotential with which different communities faced up to post-communisttransformation meaning the level of development of local civic cultures interms of their structuration integration self-image and the competences ofindividual and group actors within them As these are variables partiallypredetermined by settlementsrsquo demographic socio-economic andgeographical attributes it was possible to test some of these relationshipsby an appropriate selection of case studies The Czech cases encompasssmall towns and villages of different sizes different degrees of proximity orperipherality in relation to Prague different types of social structure anddifferent functions within the settlement structure (including for instanceagricultural communities and dormitory towns) However most arebasically rural communities The single Slovak example Humenneacute as wellas providing a complementary urban example is a useful test case in otherrespects According to Faltrsquoan et al (1995) the Zempliacuten region suffers fromlsquohistorical marginalityrsquo given its geographical peripherality a tradition ofout-migration for work and its belated primitive industrialisation Incommon with large parts of Slovakia its development was more markedthan most Czech regions by directive urbanisation and industrialisationprojects after the Second World War that concentrated settlement andeconomic activity into growth poles ndash regional and district capitals or sitesfor greenfield industrial investments This was when Humenneacute hitherto aservice and processing centre in an agricultural region acquired a largeindustrial (textile engineering construction and especially chemical)capacity growth was concentrated in the period 1960ndash80 when populationmore than doubled to 26000 primarily in association with the establish-ment and expansion of the chemical plant Chemlon which at one periodhad 6000 employees During the later years of state socialism many Czech

46 Simon Smith

towns began to acquire a more diversified economic structure in particulara more developed tertiary sector (Musil 2001 288) but the growth ofSlovak towns such as Humenneacute continued to be a product of industrial-isation often leading to over-dependence on single enterprises whichsubstituted municipal social services (thus weakening the last vestiges ofself-government) but could not make up for a generally impoverished civicinfrastructure caused by the dominance of economic considerations insettlement planning These were not promising preconditions for a self-regulative adaptation to post-communist conditions However the studyseeks to investigate among other things whether a more variegateddistribution of human potential is visible at the sub-district level andwhether this was reflected in the impact of VPN on civic culture

Self-government and extensive local autonomy

Merely by virtue of their presence in many if not most local communitiesduring the critical first year or so after the lsquovelvet revolutionrsquo OF and VPNwere in a pivotal position to coordinate the process of reintegrating theintricate network of public spaces which would make up the lsquonewrsquo nation-state Early pronouncements acknowledged this role and stressed that theprocess must take place from the bottom up beginning with action on thelocal level within the context of each municipality (obec) For Civic Forum

Politics begins in communities [municipalities] whose members feelsufficient co-belonging that it is worth their while complying withdemocratic procedures Along with economic reform we must comeup with for example new territorial arrangements in which it will beabundantly clear where the sphere of citizensrsquo self-government endsand the competences of the authorities begin The state has to bebuilt organically gradually through the expansion of our homes andour communities [W]hat we lack most of all today is communityand without living self-governing communities politics and democracyare mere figments

(Foacuterum no 7 1990 supplement 3)

Public Against Violence championed an identical project in opposition tohitherto dominant centralising forces

The alternative is decentralisation self-government in every region the division of the res-publica into thousands of individual publicsmaking competent decisions about their own environments That iswhy VPN supports the emergence of the most varied fora Thesefora and particularly those at the local level can become the source ofa genuinely cultured local or regional milieu the activisers of local lifelocal administration local culture in the broadest sense of the term



The meta-narrative of transformation to which these documents subscribeis one of the liberation of human potential suppressed by the centralisticadministrative modes of governance which characterised the communistsystem optimistically envisaging the spontaneous reconstruction of societyfrom the bottom up predicated only on the removal of institutionalbarriers to community self-regulation High hopes were invested in formallocal self-government structures but the wider goal was to re-establishlocal communities as self-determining organisms in a more profound senseBučekrsquos distinction between lsquolocal self-government autonomyrsquo and lsquoexten-sive local autonomyrsquo is useful here

[Extensive local autonomy] lsquois not guaranteed constitutionally or legisla-tively [but] belongs to the non-political informal sphere It reflectsthe aggregated efforts of a locality of all local actors to attain thelocalityrsquos collective aims to control its social reproduction (throughcooperative action and participation) and to resist unwanted externalinterference

(Buček 2001 166ndash7)

One might equally cite Vašečkarsquos definition of local community in Chapter9 stressing the complexity of the network of actors relations and mutualobligations which needs to be managed usually coordinated by but neverreducible to the actions of local self-government

The introduction of new institutional solutions (such as the devolution ofcompetences on to freely elected local governments or the establishment ofpolitical party structures) was a necessary but insufficient condition for therevitalisation of human potential The wider need was for local facilitatorsto find ways of mobilising that potential set up spaces for a public dialoguewhere the lsquolocalityrsquos collective aimsrsquo could be worked out and recruitcommunity leaders lsquoSelf-governmentrsquo (the term samospraacuteva is used inCzech and Slovak for what would normally be called lsquolocal governmentrsquo orlsquolocal authorityrsquo in the UK) was viewed unequivocally as an institutionbelonging to civil society in OF and VPN programmes which envisaged acreative synergy between its organs and voluntary social organisationschurches and family circles as communitarian traditions were reinvigoratedThe ideal outcome would be to enhance a communityrsquos self-regulatingcapacities bolster social cohesion and natural mechanisms of social controland reduce dependence on external actors and institutions

Sources

The main sources for the following case studies comprise in-depth inter-views undertaken by the author in 2001 with several former mayorsfunctionaries and activists in each country Claims to representativenessare largely sacrificed in favour of reconstructing in some detail the

48 Simon Smith

lifeworlds of a small number of distinct communities In Slovakia a singlein-depth case study is presented to illustrate many of the challenges whichfaced a district VPN organisation in a medium-sized town where thecontestation between the two alternative trajectories described abovebecame personified in a power struggle between two social networkswithin the organisation This evidence is augmented by notes from inter-views with VPN activists from other parts of Slovakia and at the centrallevel The selection of Czech interviewees was based on a sample of writtenfirst-hand testimonies taken from the Norwegian-sponsored projectlsquoLearning Democracyrsquo2 and interviews were supplemented by documentssupplied by interviewees3 Five mainly rural municipalities are compared interms of the ability of local OF groups to initiate positive changes and theirvulnerability to lsquonegative scenariosrsquo

Public Against Violence (Humenneacute)

Foundation and early development of Humenneacute VPN

As in most larger Czech and Slovak towns the people of Humenneacute (popul-ation nearly 37000) responded relatively quickly to the events of 17November 1989 in Prague by staging demonstrations and meetings and bysetting up strike committees in their workplaces following the calling of asymbolic two-hour general strike for midday on 27 November High schoolstudents were especially active inspired by the leading role played bystudent representatives in Prague and elesewhere In the first days of therevolution as television radio and most newspapers were still propagatingthe Communist Party or government version of events any informationfrom or about emerging opposition groups was vital if support was to growoutside the main urban centres and in peripheral regions such as ZempliacutenAs was often the case in eastern Slovakia communications with Praguewere better than with Bratislava and activists in Humenneacute initiallyobtained more information about Civic Forum than about VPN thanks inpart to literature fetched by two guards working on the Prague train line(interview with Korba Ďugoš and Miško) Indeed until mid-December asmany OF as VPN groups were being formed and the townrsquos coordinatingcommittee bore both names Visits from OF activists (mostly students andactors) from Prague and Košice were received in Humenneacute beforeBratislava VPN representatives came to the town

Most of the members of the first coordinating committees representedworkplace groups or interest groups (such as religious communities) ratherthan territorial units such as neighbourhoods and municipalities The firstspecifically local demands concerned environmental and religious issueswhich were issues of existential importance in a district with a sizeablechemical industry and an ethnically and confessionally mixed population(with large Ruthenian and Ukrainian minorities which form the cores of


Greek Catholic and Orthodox congregations) An early conception of thestructure of the district VPN devolved to local groups the prerogative toadd their own demands to that of the Humenneacute coordinating committeewhose programme would automatically be modified if a petition with atleast twenty signatures was received (minutes of coordinating committeemeeting 12 January 1990) Demands addressed to the administrativeauthorities were thereby aggregated from the bottom up so that even veryspecific local problems would not be overlooked Later in 1990 other issuesemerged as natural foci for mobilisation ndash notably property restitution andthe transformation of agricultural cooperatives ndash partially eclipsingecological and religious issues but providing VPN with a continued strongraison drsquoetre

At the start Humenneacute OFVPN had sought access to the media toaddress the local community Communications were an obvious concern tocombat the real risk of isolation from local society and early meetingsrecord repeated urgings to get the message out lsquoamong the peoplersquo or lsquointothe factories and schoolsrsquo A newsletter was founded (the first issue cameout on 4 December) and a suggestions box was provided where peoplecould indicate their own priorities or pass on ideas The discourse adoptedby Humenneacute VPN ndash informed by a mix of optimism and cautious un-certainity about the limits of the revolution ndash was one of partnershipreciprocity and the need to reintegrate a community artificially divided byinterests generated by the redundant system From the outset there was aclear intent to apply the human potential of a loose civic opposition to thesolution of community problems thus the first lsquoaction committeersquo electedon 29 November delegated portfolios for legal matters health transportthe Catholic community and propagation a division which probablyreflected the expertise of volunteers rather than any overt priorities Bymid-January when a proper structure began to take shape in keeping withthe newly approved statutes of VPN as a nationwide organisation (withseparate district and town committees to match the hierarchy of theadministrative authorities) thirteen committees or expert groups had beenestablished covering all important areas of local community life

Early statements demanded the reclamation of the public space of thetown and attempted to redefine the dominant discourse within public lifeTop of a list of demands issued on 3 December was one for the removal ofall banners and slogans proclaiming the leading role of the CommunistParty By 19 December following wider public soundings a more detailedand ambitious list of demands had been formulated many of which pro-posed a reintegration of the urban community based around an informedcitizenry culturally literate and historically aware Streets should berenamed monuments restored and repositioned the museum collectionreconceived so as to reflect lsquotruthfully and objectivelyrsquo the history of thetown and district The recently closed summer cinema should be reopenedand other underused cultural facilities revived with a full programme of

50 Simon Smith

events and activities A commission consisting of experts and represent-atives of the local SZOPK4 branch should be set up to produce an accuratereport on the state of the environment and the health implications for localpeople (This followed the revelation publicised in the first OFVPNHumenneacute newsletter that the local environmental monitoring station didnot actually possess the instruments needed to carry out pollution measure-ments because of a lack of funding and had hitherto relied on informationsupplied by the polluting enterprises themselves) There was also thethorny question of the imposing Communist Party building the future useof which it was suggested should be determined on the basis of a broadpublic debate One interesting initiative was the idea (subsequentlybrought to fruition) for the establishment of an Andy Warhol museum inhis ancestral town of Medzilaborce mentioned on 19 December andsymbolic of a different kind of reintegration ndash the reintegration of theregion with modern world culture

The empowerment of citizens also comes through in demands relatedto the activities of the local administrative authorities Councillors werepressed to defend their record in front of their constituents and ifrequested to resign public lsquocontrol commissionsrsquo were seen as means bywhich (following the co-optation of opposition representatives) notori-ously corrupt practices such as the allocation of flats and garages and thegranting of building permits could be cleaned up and injusticesredressed There was a recognition that peoplersquos support for democratictransformation would hinge on their own experiences (whether theircomplaints were satisfactorily addressed whether they were able tosecure justice for past wrongs) The VPN coordinating committee as theself-proclaimed mouthpiece for the lsquobroad publicrsquo or lsquothe workers andstudentsrsquo of Humenneacute demanded access to all the meetings of city anddistrict national committees and later agitated for the replacement of aproportion of councillors and officials by its own delegates and those ofother social organisations and political parties Yet in late January 1990minutes of VPN meetings still record a debate about the proper terms ofinvolvement in local administration Korba referred to cautionary advicefrom Bratislava that delegating too many VPN candidates could result intheir acceptance of co-responsibility for problems they had not causedand were powerless or unqualified to redress The suggestion was made togive priority to experts even if they were not VPN supporters whenputting forward candidates for public office This advice was later heededwhen VPN nominated Matej Polaacutek an agricultural engineer from Košiceand an ex-communist as the new head of the district national committeein February 1990 a seemingly logical choice in an agricultural district buta decision later regretted ndash his short term of office was characterised bythe first suspicions of clientelistic privatisations in which certain VPNrepresentatives as well as managers of leading local enterprises wereimplicated5


Both the district and city national committees underwent quite whole-sale reconstruction leaving the Communist Party with just 25 per cent ofseats in the latter with VPN making the largest number of new co-opta-tions alongside representatives of the newly formed Christian DemocratsGreens and Democratic Party the reformed Social Democrats and thelsquooldrsquo Freedom Party The VPN representative Zuzana Dzivjaacutekovaacute becamethe new chair of the city national committee (commonly referred to as themayor or lsquoprimaacutetorrsquo) VPN nominated its best candidates to the citynational committee which was regarded as more important for tworeasons its competences included housing and property matters overwhich the greatest disputes arose in Humenneacute during 1990 and from thebeginning of the year the tone of political debate indicated a concertedmovement for decentralisation and strong self-government in whichmunicipalities would be the key actors whereas many voices questionedthe necessity of maintaining both district and regional administrative organs

Internal problems of the district organisation contestation of the movementrsquos identity

The first three months saw a considerable turnover in the local VPN leader-ship and the effective displacement of many of the founding members by arival group with its roots in the district committee of the Socialist YouthUnion (SZM) Of twenty-nine members of the first proper coordinatingcommittee elected on 12 January 1990 seven were expelled on 14 Februaryand a further eleven were no longer committee members (loss ofcommitment was common when people started businesses or made radicalcareer changes) ndash a turnover of more than 60 per cent in a month One ofthe grounds given for the expulsions was that those people lsquodid notrepresent anyonersquo (meaning an enterprise or organisation) The subse-quent struggle for the identity of the movement negatively affected VPNrsquospublic image in Humenneacute though such problems were typical in manylocalities (and also afflicted OF) Humenneacute is referred to in several VPNdocuments (along with a handful of other districts) as a lsquoproblem casersquoWith central mediation the dispute was resolved in favour of the originalfounders in October 1990 resulting in a second wholesale replacement ofthe district VPN leadership (of the eighteen members of the districtcoordinating committee who signed the motion to expel the lsquooriginalrsquofounders only two remained in the reformed district council on 14 March1991) However this came too late to save VPN from a rather disappointingperformance in the local elections

The internal struggle had soon begun to manifest itself in a breakdownof communication and trust between members of the district coordinatingcommittee and VPN representatives on the reformed national committeesThis may have reflected the disconnection between the two sets of institu-tions of the first twenty-one VPN delegates to the city national committee

52 Simon Smith

there were only three current and one former member of city or districtcoordinating committees In contrast to the situation which was common invillages where OF or VPN often lsquoinstitutionalisedrsquo themselves in the localself-government structures and the movement (as a separate structure)became less relevant a town the size of Humenneacute saw the development ofa duality within the movement which was intended to avoid the accumul-ation of functions by a narrow leadership but which in the worst casescenario could lead to mutual isolation and rivalry In Humenneacute theproblem was more serious than poor coordination VPN structures it isalleged actually hindered attempts by mayor Dzivjaacutekovaacute in particular topush through personnel changes in municipal institutions or investigate aKčs 826000 fraud at the cultural centre (Jozef Balica member of thecommission of the VPN district council pre-local election literatureNovember 1990) and generally impeded reforming initiatives on the partof VPN delegates in public office because they had begun to constitute avested interest with close links to the former communist local elite Areport produced by the central control commission of VPN later concludedthat as a result of the lack of support for its public representatives byHumenneacute VPN lsquoThe process of taking over the state administration isparalysed ndash if this was the intention it has worked perfectlyrsquo (lsquoZpraacuteva osituaacutecii VPN v okrese Humenneacutersquo UacuteKK KC VPN 151090)

VPN Humenneacute had achieved some initial success in pushing throughthe personnel changes it sought in the state administration ndash besides thenational committees VPN-approved figures took over at the head of theschool board and the tax office But lsquoold structuresrsquo showed much greaterresilience in economic enterprises and the lower tier of public services andthe lack of change in the management of factories farms or schools beganto have a disheartening effect on their employees Theoretically the matterlay in the hands of workforces themselves ndash they had the right eitherthrough VPN cells or independently to voice their disapproval of theincumbent management and force the holding of a new selection process(in effect a workforce election) for leading posts But in the absence of anyformal procedures to guide the process reliant only on the moral compul-sions of all sides and in a situation of power asymmetry managements werefrequently able to win the overt approval of the majority of employees orward off the holding of an election giving themselves sufficient breathingspace to lsquocapitalisersquo their position in the form of various types of more orless transparent privatisation scheme VPN itself had to combat residualpaternalistic expectations among employees which were strongest in thedistrictrsquos outlying villages among employees of agricultural cooperativesLetters poured into the district headquarters from workers pleading withwhat they saw as the new power centre to come and lsquorestore orderrsquo in theirvillage VPN Humenneacute continued to devote considerable time and energyto organising visits to the villages (each member of the coordinatingcommittee was given responsibility for five or six) which had the character


of public education exercises explaining to villagers their rights or suggest-ing procedures for influencing the management and personnel policy of theorganisations in which they lived and worked To begin with the main valueof these activities was simply in enabling people to express grievances andto obtain sympathy and encouragement because lsquopeople needed to telltheir storyrsquo (interview with Korba) later in 1990 advice on restitution andcooperative transformation had a more practical purpose since a highproportion of families in the Humenneacute district had claims to smallholdingsconfiscated during collectivisation Legal counselling proved to be one ofthe most empowering actions VPN could take and weekly legal adviceshops held all over the district were well attended

The call by the VPN national coordinating committee in April 1990 todisband enterprise VPNs and build the structure of the movement exclu-sively on a territorial hierarchy matching the administrative division ofSlovakia was met with disappointment in Humenneacute as the workplace wasa natural space for collective action in a city of large industrial enterprisesand public corporations It coincided with an increasing unwillingness ofpeople to engage in public affairs Dzivjaacutekovaacute draws a direct relationshipbetween these developments based on the communications received byVPN from the public

In the beginning people spoke out openly and were not afraid to pointdirectly at the particular official or boss whom their complaint con-cerned The decision to finish with VPN in enterprises was an unfortun-ate one at least in Humenneacute as we thereby opened the way for thereturn of the old structures

(Interview)

In August the VPN Humenneacute district committee issued an appeal for there-establishment of VPN cells in workplaces including cooperative farmsutilising the new law on trade unions accompanied by a prescient warningto workers to monitor the establishment of new share companies by themanagers of state enterprises and note any connections between newprivate firms and the economic nomenclature The appeal also pointed toalleged cases of discrimination and intimidation by lsquounreconstructedrsquomanagements against VPN activists disguised as organisational changesin accordance with the Labour Code (OKV VPN Humenneacute lsquoVyacutezvarsquo13 August 1990) It won support from a few other district organisations butwas ignored by Bratislava It expressed a feeling widespread in someperipheral regions where communist control had often been firmer(melded to an earlier system of informal social control based on the powerof extended family clans) that VPN had acted too hastily and toomagnanimously that rooting out deeply ingrained clientelist relationswould for some time yet require organised collective action backed bypolitical clout and that it was precisely within firms on the verge of

54 Simon Smith

privatisation that the most was at stake and there was the greatest need fororganised resistance to the regrouping of lsquoold structuresrsquo

Such was the situation at the District Industrial Enterprise (OPP) inHumenneacute in November 1990 according to the VPN coordinatingcommittee there (which had not been disbanded)

Rumour has it that [the director] and a narrow circle of his people areup to something but the work collective is not in the picture andeveryonersquos waiting to see what trick these rogues come up with to getsomething for themselves at the expense of the collective as a wholeIn any case our knowledge of their capabilities can only serve as awarning Therefore we cannot be inattentive and we feel a respons-ibility to point things out and act So we are trying to analyse thesituation in the firm and present suggestions for a way forward

(Letter dated 6 November 1990)

The quotation is from a letter addressed to both the Interior Minister andthe VPN coordinating committee in Bratislava

without [whose] assistance in these circumstances it will not be possibleto redress the situation These people have already developed firmstructures and are better organised than in the past They have thenecessary resources experience unity of purpose finance and influenceThe influence which they should no longer have ndash which we should have


Detailed examples are given of how repeated promises of personnelchanges had not been carried out how votes of confidence and re-selectionprocesses had been manipulated and how through a combination of bribescoercion and benevolence towards petty theft the top management hadbeen able to forestall or curtail initiatives by the various collective bodieswhich began to or had the potential to threaten its control of the firm ndash theunion organisation the works council the supervisory board and VPN

Recourse to a personal appeal to the Interior Minister is interpretableas a residual paternalism or protectionism on the part of the work collec-tive but it also constituted a legitimate reproach against the perceivedtoothlessness and belatedness of legislative measures designed to enablethe replacement of top personnel in enterprises the government did notissue guidelines on this until 12 March 1990 and this did not amount to aclear set of procedures only obliging managers to agree to workersrsquodemands to hold lsquoround tablersquo discussions without addressing the funda-mental power asymmetry between the parties manifest most critically as adisparity in the social capital mobilisable by managerial networks on theone hand and ordinary workers on the other6 In OPP a round table tookplace under the supervision of the chairman of the district national


committee Matej Polaacutek who it turned out had close ties with thecompany director having previously collaborated in establishing foreigntrade relations for the firm and stood to profit from the latterrsquos plans toprivatise the wood-processing facility in Snina Polaacutek was nevertheless aVPN appointee and the district coordinating committee (until itsreplacement in November 1990) stood by him and so came into conflictwith the OPP VPN branch which openly criticised Polaacutekrsquos part inpreventing management personnel changes VPN district representatives inturn questioned the representativeness of the enterprise VPN structureironically only shortly after they had issued their appeal to refound VPN inenterprises The nature of the internal conflict is indicated by an earlierletter to the VPN district council

You were indifferent to all of this and we believe that several of yourfunctionaries were acting on their own interests How else can weexplain the fact that on 13890 you issued an Appeal with ten demandsgeared towards the intensification of our activities in workplaces Butwhen we organised an enterprise-wide dialogue on 101090 yoursecretary Mr Hladiacutek visited us that morning and warned us not toorganise anything because you had just issued an appeal for the with-drawal of all activities from workplaces During this whole affairyou took no interest in our work until there were fears that thisworkersrsquo meeting could result in demands for radical correctivemeasures in the firm

(Letter dated 26 October 1990)

This episode illustrates the penetration of an interest-based politics into amovement initially disavowing this type of politics and the centrality ofpersonnel issues as a touchstone for competing transformation strategiesThe OPP VPN group was appealing to the principle of self-regulation ndashthat all collectives and organisations should have the right to choose thedirectors or managers they considered to be the best qualified and morallymost suitable

The recapture of the Humenneacute district and city organisations by thelsquofoundersrsquo represented the restoration of such a discourse and the firstopportunity to demonstrate this shift was in the run-up to the municipalelections of November 1990 when the goal of a strong self-sufficient localcouncil was defended meaning both decentralisaton of competences andfinance from central government and liberation from dependence on thepower of large enterprises which had previously subsidised much of thesocial and recreational provision in towns like Humenneacute and through elitenetworks effectively controlled local administrative decision-making Thecompilation of the election programme and indeed the list of VPNcandidates was turned into an exercise in participative lsquoprojectingrsquo andrecruitment policy suggestions were solicited and people were urged to

56 Simon Smith

lsquohelp us find wise enterprising [candidates] who enjoy general respectrsquo Theprogramme appealed to common effort and sacrifice and became anexercise in self-criticism acknowledging a struggle against a dependencyculture which afflicted everyone

Subconsciously we thought that from the centre will come instruc-tions on how to make changes in the villages towns districts andregions We did not reflect on the fact that the revolution also meantabolition of any kind of centralism Freedom and democracy havearrived and we will have to deal with problems ourselves

(J Balica pre-local election literature November 1990)

To the extent that the dispute between the two groups within VPNHumenneacute was over principles a distinction can be drawn between alter-native conceptions of legitimacy whereas the lsquooriginalrsquo founders sawthemselves as informal public representatives whose legitimacy dependedentirely on the work they carried out in the community and the supportthis engendered the lsquoSZM grouprsquo viewed legitimacy as something deleg-ated by specific organisations or firms The lsquooriginal foundersrsquo in Humenneacutealso adhered to an increasingly radical discourse which regarded anycompromise with lsquoold structuresrsquo as unacceptable and dangerous introduc-ing a new stricture into the statutes (against the recommendations ofBratislava) that no ex-communists could hold office within VPN Thecommunist elite was viewed as so wedded to a nomenclature politics ofpatronage as to be morally unsuitable for office-holding in any non-corruptregime at least until they (as individuals) had demonstrated their goodwillby participating in the democratisation process as ordinary citizens orrank-and-file VPN members

As noted the capture of VPN Humenneacute was only reversed when orderwas effectively restored from above in the movementrsquos hierarchy Althoughthis took place according to procedures contained in its statutes itsomewhat contradicts the decentralising ethos of VPN Fedor Gaacutel VPNchairman in 1990 says the national coordinating committee intervened inthe affairs of local branches very reluctantly and regarded each suchintervention as a failure of sorts (interview) In this respect developmentsin Humenneacute illustrate a wider problem within the life of the movementPeter Zajac another VPN founder describes the position of the co-ordinating committee as like being between Scylla and Charybdis VPNwas expected to resolve psychological and social problems lsquoinstall orderrsquo inan organisation or locality arbitrate trivial personality clashes and so onOn the other hand it found itself exposed to accusations in the press andsometimes from within its own structure of being the bearer of a newtotalitarianism of secretive lsquocabinet-stylersquo decision-making and of a lack ofinternal democracy (interview) According to Gaacutel local organisationslooked to Bratislava with a mixture of aversion and helplessness (interview)


Another member of the central leadership Daniel Brezina believes withhindsight that many of VPNrsquos public activities were poorly conceived notfully appreciating the priority of generating self-regulative capacitieswithin communities Thus legal advice shops for example were often toospecific and encouraged continued dependency by placing VPN in theposition of distributing justice or issuing instructions instead they shouldhave remained more on the level of general civic education about howdemocracy and the market work (interview)

In practice it was politically impossible to ignore the overwhelmingpublic cry for help to which both OF and VPN were exposed in the firstthree weeks or so of its existence VPN received more than 15000 lettersfrom the public at its Bratislava headquarters alone many of them requestsfor help or poignant accounts of wrongs perpetrated on people and theirfamilies during the communist regime Many rank-and-file communistsalso turned to VPN to help resolve the crisis of conscience or identity theywere undergoing (Verejnos no 3 22 December 1989 4ndash5) Given theutopian expectations which the velvet revolution aroused OF and VPN asits most prominent symbols were in a sense condemned to try to lsquoinstallorderrsquo and lsquodistribute justicersquo if they were to maintain popular belief in the(inevitably painful) transformation of society

Reintegration of public space VPNrsquos legacy in Humenneacute

The history of VPN Humenneacute illustrates the vulnerability of organisationsto capture in a weak civic culture The cooptation of many of the leadinglights in February and March 1990 on to the city and district councilstogether with the high turnover of volunteers within the coordinatingcommittee led to the weakening of natural control mechanisms both fromthe lsquointellectual elitersquo of the movement (preoccupied with municipal affairs)and from the rank-and-file (inexperienced in self-organisation) There wasno formal district assembly between February and October and yet a smallclique around the former SZM leadership was able to bypass democraticprocedures to take control of the district organisation excluding many ofthe founding members without eliciting any protests among a sizeablemembership However the feud led to a loss of legitimacy for VPN withinHumenneacute A coalition for the local elections between VPN and theChristian Democrats (KDH) which led to success in many parts ofSlovakia fell apart in Humenneacute and Dzivjaacutekovaacute was narrowly defeated bythe KDH candidate for mayor (nominally standing as an independent)with VPN finishing only third in terms of council seats behind KDH andthe communists (winning seven out of thirty-nine) In the district as awhole VPN was only able to field mayoral candidates in forty-three out of108 municipalities and twenty-three of these were coalition candidatesAlthough the result in Humenneacute was only marginally below the nationalaverage for VPN of 20 per cent of council seats this average is deflated by

58 Simon Smith

the non-existence of the movement in many small parishes7 Humenneacutestood out as a disappointing return among larger towns along with Martinand Senica where the local organisations had also failed to find a coalitionpartner and had similar lsquoproblems with themselvesrsquo (Telefax no 28 1990)Paradoxically one of VPNrsquos best results in the district was in Snina whereit won 32 per cent of seats in the 1990ndash4 council chamber despite theorganisation having a miniscule membership there (see Tables 31ndash34 for asummary of local election results)

Following the split in VPN in 1991 few members or branches in theHumenneacute district transferred their allegiance to Vladimiacuter Mečiarrsquos Move-ment for a Democratic Slovakia (HZDS) which continues to haverelatively little support in the town itself (where the vast majority of VPNorganisations were) holding just four out of thirty-nine seats on the lasttown council The district HZDS organisation was formed in Snina whereit remains electorally strong Among its founders were members of theousted Humenneacute district VPN leadership who evidently saw in HZDS anorganisation better able to advance their political or business careers

Minutes even of early VPN meetings suggest a problem finding suitablerepresentatives in both Snina and Medzilaborce the districtrsquos second and


Table 31 1990 local election results in main towns in Humenneacute district(percentage of councillors)

Party Humenneacute Medzilaborce Snina Slovakia

VPN 18 25 32 20KDH 36 0 36 27KSS 23 69 16 14DS 8 6 16 2SDSS 10 0 0 0ind 3 0 0 16

Notes Political affiliation of mayor A zero indicates a nil result



HZDSa 28 35 37 23DUacutea 8 0 3 5KDH 21b 0 33 20SDL 23 53bc 13 16DS 0 0 3 2SDSS 5 0 0 ndashind 10 0 3bc 9

Notes aVPN successor partiesbPolitical affiliation of mayorcSame mayor re-elected

third towns Whereas in Snina this enabled the capture of VPN by partialinterests who then declared for Mečiarrsquos HZDS Medzilaborce presents amore complicated picture The foundation of the VPN town coordinatingcommittee in early 1990 was allegedly conceived directly as a means todefend the position of communist functionaries on the national committeeThe VPN chairman a Mr Petruš was said to consult regularly with the oldcommunist elite which thereby continued to exercise power from theshadows of public life according to a statement by the participants in ameeting to refound VPN Medzilaborce addressed to the district coordin-ating committee (6 February 1991) who stressed their own credentials asthe lsquooriginalrsquo (later sidelined) founders of VPN in the town The strugglefor control of VPN did not however lead to a permanent schism in publiclife in Medzilaborce perhaps because the town is and the organisation was

60 Simon Smith

Table 33 Mayors by party in Humenneacute district in 1990 (percentage ofmunicipalities)

Party Okres Humenneacute Slovakia

VPN 18 17KDH 24 19KSS 23 23DS 0 1SDSS 0 0ind 20 25No candidate 13 3

Table 34 Mayors by party in Humenneacute district 1994 (percentage of municipalities)

Party Okres Humenneacute Slovakia (excl no cand)

HZDS 22 16DUacute 0 2KDH 24 15SDL 24 18DS 0 2SDSS 0 0Ind 20 29No candidate 1 ndash

Note VPN successor parties

Key to parties (Tables 31ndash34)VPN Public Against ViolenceKDH Christian Democratic MovementKSS Communist PartyDS Democratic PartySDSS Social Democratic PartyHZDS Movement for a Democratic SlovakiaDUacute Democratic UnionSDL Party of the Democratic Left (transformed Communist Party)

much smaller and because community life is also consolidated by thetownrsquos role as the centre of Ruthenian culture In Medzilaborce (whereRuthenians make up 40 per cent of the population) a unity of purposetranscending party affiliations is therefore more easily maintained8

The vast majority of Humenneacute district VPN groups meanwhile hadregrouped behind the lsquofoundingrsquo wing of the movement In January 1991there were 589 registered members of seventy-eight local VPN clubs inHumenneacute district of which 415 members in fifty-one clubs were in thetown itself (in Snina there was just one club with eight members plus twomore clubs with fifteen members in the surrounding countryside) Giventhat ODUacute (Civic Democratic Union)ndashVPN still had as many as 550members in the district late in 1991 it would appear that most VPNactivists had crossed smoothly into the lsquocentre-rightrsquo successor party It isperhaps surprising to note that the transition to a political party had notproduced a step demobilisation of local activity (as was the case followingthe split of OF) although anecdotal evidence suggests that during 1990before VPN kept accurate membership lists activity had been muchgreater in the countryside (according to Korba small cells of five or tenpeople existed in almost every municipality in early 1990) but had graduallyreduced until a core of committed activists remained almost exclusively inHumenneacute itself9 The organisation remained active right up to the formaldissolution of ODUacutendashVPN

A long-term legacy is also apparent A section of the current politicalscene in Humenneacute can trace its origins back to VPN which initiallycoexisted very closely with the local Christian and Social Democrats aswell as the Democratic Party (interview with Korba) Workplace VPNgroups often made the transition to trade union organisations and oneformer member of the VPN district council Jozef Balica is today amember of the Presidium of the steelworkersrsquo union OZ KOVO Someformer VPN members also continue to engage in civic initiatives includingSKOI (the Permanent Conference of the Civic Institute) which is probablythe most direct inheritor of the VPN legacy in Slovakia SKOI was estab-lished in September 1993

fifteen months after the elections which determined that the newSlovak government would not continue in the radical democraticpolitics of the Slovak and Czech governments of the post-revolution-ary era hellip [in order to] continue to protect cultivate ennoble andpopularise the ideals of November 1989

(Undated SKOI leaflet)

Its main activities consist of organising discussion fora (known as clubs) inover fifty towns targeted public information campaigns (recent campaignswere on public administration reform and on NATO membership) whichtypically take the message into provincial and rural Slovakia through


student and other volunteers and expert working groups intended tocontribute towards regional and national development projects Similarpublic educational and informative campaigns are carried out in the regionby a group which bears the name Prešov Civic Forum (POF) whosesecond branch is in Humenneacute

Both are examples of a strong wing of the Slovak NGO movementinvolved in the defence of human rights the promotion of civil society orenvironmental issues (Wolekovaacute et al 2000 20ndash1) During the last Mečiargovernment such NGOs10 were instrumental in uniting the whole sector asa political force establishing the Gremium [Panel] of the Third Sector(G3S) to present common standpoints and coordinate activity and to act asa service organisation A major role was played by former VPN activistssuch as Pavol Demeš and Helena Wolekovaacute ndash intellectual activists whowithdrew from parliamentary politics following the defeat of the originalpost-revolutionary transformation programme at the 1992 elections andinstead attempted to build democracy lsquofrom belowrsquo In many instances suchNGOs have also been catalysts for building partnerships with public andprivate sector actors which have often performed similar functions inrelation to community empowerment as the Czech Countryside Renewalprogramme (see below pp 72ndash3)11 It is symptomatic of the distinctivepost-communist political development of Slovakia that NGOs have playeda leading role in initiatives for extensive local autonomy Local councilswere initially more reticent partly in fear of government lsquosanctionsrsquo of oneform or another during the Mečiar era but also because the capacities ofrural populations for accessing external resources were still more depressedthan in the Czech case where the drive for urbanisation (and therefore thedisruption of stable communities) was not as pronounced as in Slovakiaespecially from the 1970s12 But the 1998 general election campaign provedto be a significant turning point characterised by the mobilisation of alsquocivic democraticrsquo alliance between the non-governmental and self-government sectors (headed by G3S and the two Slovak local governmentassociations) calling for a fundamental change in the lsquocharacter of thestatersquo This was a natural alliance within the polarised social conditions ofSlovakia opinion surveys from 1995 identified a strong correlation betweenmembership in various kinds of civic association and local councilsdelimiting an active citizenry sharing a distinctive set of values (above all acommitment to a lsquodemo-craticrsquo as opposed to a lsquotechno-craticrsquo conceptionof the state) and a strong lsquosectoral identityrsquo (first mobilised during theThird Sector SOS campaign in 1996 against the restrictive terms of aproposed law on foundations) (lsquoBesedarsquo 1996 264) Cooperation hascontinued both in pushing for decentralisation of competences and otherpublic sector reforms promoting subsidiarity public participation andsustainable development and in realising practical communitarian projectsmany of which have been institutionalised in the form of communitycoalitions or foundations In different places these have developed either

62 Simon Smith

from NGO attempts to establish local coordinating centres pool resourcesand accumulate a capital base for long-term project financing or from localauthority initiatives to set up funds to stimulate the growth of a local civicsector (J Mesiacutek Nonprofit no 3 1998 M Minarovič Nonprofit no 3 1999)

According to the SAIA-SCTS database of NGOs (HTTP lthttpwwwsaiaskgt) Humenneacute district has a relatively high concentration of voluntaryorganisations in comparison with the Prešov region as a whole which itselfranks third out of the eight regions of Slovakia measured by the ratio ofpopulation to NGO numbers (behind only Bratislava and Košice thecountryrsquos two dominant urban regions) Humenneacute also saw the establish-ment of a community foundation in 2000 the starting capital for which wasprovided in equal measure by the council and the Open Society Foundation(Korzaacuter 23 March 2001) Alongside SKOI and POF this constitutes anotherinitiative recalling some of the original goals of VPN ndash building socialcapital stimulating civic engagement and thereby enhancing thecommunityrsquos extensive local autonomy as well as peoplersquos quality of life In2001 it successfully competed for inclusion (as one of four Slovak towns) ina pilot urban social and economic planning scheme run by the Czech-American Berman Group consultancy firm and financed by USAID whichis designed to bring together key actors within the community By contrastMedzilaborce (since 1996 a separate administrative district) has the lowestlevel of NGO activity in the region and Snina also has a lower than averageconcentration (lsquoTretiacute sektor v Prešovskom krajirsquo Nonprofit no 12 1999 plusown calculations from SAIA-SCTS database) One of the factors behindthis disparity may well be the formative role played by VPN in theemergence of a network of civic activists in Humenneacute and the lack of such astimulus in Medzilaborce and Snina where what little civic activity VPNgenerated was later absorbed by a single unifying ethnic identity (inMedzilaborce) or channelled into narrow personal and party interests (inSnina)

Civic Forum

The following section describes of the impact of Civic Forum on the life offive west and central Bohemian municipalities during and after 1990 basedon the testimony of their mayors All were elected in the November 1990elections and served until at least 1994 The first part provides a pen-portrait of each place highlighting the most notable features of theirdevelopment during the initial phase of post-communist transformationThe accounts are ordered according to a rough categorisation of twolsquopositiversquo one lsquomixedrsquo and two lsquonegativersquo cases based on the scenarioshypothesised in the introduction as well as on intervieweesrsquo own evalua-tions The second part is structured around four variables which enable amore systematic assessment of the success or failure of OF in restoring theextensive local autonomy of communities and offer a framework for


comparison with more generalised examples These are representation self-representation (narrativising and projecting) self-regulation (autonomousdecision-making) and the reintegration of local public spaces (including thesuccessorship of OF as political subjects)

Case studies

Positive cases

SP is a small town in the west Bohemian countryside with around 3000inhabitants With a poor infrastructure in 1989 two of the main achieve-ments of the first democratically elected local council were the building ofan ecological water treatment plant (which became a model for othermunicipalities near and far) and the reconstruction of a disused countryhouse for a small church secondary school Although these projects wereinitiated by the council they relied substantially on the willingness ofcitizens to help out in the form of voluntary brigade work Furthermoreboth were of a nature which demanded considerable initial investment andsacrifice by the whole community and only promised a return (waterquality and a cleaner environment educational opportunities for children)in the medium to long-term Commenting on the victory of his electoral list(by now a grouping of lsquoindependentrsquo candidates) in the 1994 elections theformer mayor wrote

We had not made any populist gestures On the contrary we hadconstantly chided guided and perhaps educated people I did notanticipate victory and I took it as an unequivocal sign of endorsementof the work we had done at the town hall in the past four years

(lsquoLearning Democracyrsquo archive)

Although OF itself ceased to exist in 1991 many of its leading activists ndashnow independent councillors ndash and its politics of community mobilisationcan be said to have become lsquoinstitutionalisedrsquo in the emerging self-govern-ment organs of the town One of the keys to success was remainingsensitive to the traditional structure of public affairs working closely withexisting social organisations (notably the voluntary fire brigade) fosteringan atmosphere of non-partisan cooperation (embracing even communistrepresentatives) within the council chamber and refraining from makingwholesale changes among the council staff where their experience wasneeded The mayor stood down voluntarily in 1994 (continuing as anordinary councillor) and handed over the stewardship of the community toa young energetic successor who had also been in OF and who had serveda four-year lsquoapprenticeshiprsquo as deputy mayor Explaining his decision tostand down the mayor wrote lsquoI had to leave so that people understoodthat democracy is everyonersquos responsibility I wanted the citizens of SPto look on a job in the council as a servicersquo

64 Simon Smith

J is a small town (population just over 3000) within commuting distanceof Prague The course of the velvet revolution here was conditioned by thisproximity which meant that many inhabitants experienced the majordemonstrations first-hand and succeeded in infusing local life with some ofthe optimism about civic renewal which was naturally strongest in Pragueitself J had a number of specific developmental handicaps ndash relativepoverty dependence on one large heavily subsidised agricultural cooper-ative for employment an over-burdening of the local environment byweekend tourists from Prague (with over 1500 weekend cottages in thearea)13 and according to the ex-mayor a typically petit-bourgeois socialmilieu The local OF first took shape within the agricultural cooperativebut soon became primarily concerned with communal affairs Theseincluded two lsquoburning issuesrsquo ndash the future use of a special lsquomobilisatoryrsquohospital located in the municipality and resistance to plans for a motorwayextension which would have cut through a locally cherished hithertounspoiled valley These issues helped mobilise a local patriotism whichoverrode most internal sources of friction and enabled the local OF groupto collaborate with the national committee which remained largely unre-constructed until the November 1990 elections (which OF in a coalitionwith the Peoplersquos Party won convincingly) Until then OF partly due to acautious approval of the communist council leadership partly in a spirit ofdemocracy took on the role of unofficial opposition lsquomappingrsquo localproblems and involving as wide a public as possible in the search forsolutions which were then written into its local election programme TheSwiss model of self-government involving the widespread use of localreferenda was promoted and at least informally put into practice and awell-written newsletter began to come out informing citizens about theirnew rights and responsibilities as well as raising local issues The core of themovement was viewed as a reservoir for the future civic leadership of Jand members (later councillors) were sent on courses and workshopsdesigned to nurture management and leadership capabilities or communic-ation skills After the elections ordinary councillors were invited toparticipate in council (leadership) meetings in order to foster a broaderdemocratic accountability and incorporate more people into the decision-making process OF became the crux of a network of social organisationsincluding the reinvigorated Peoplersquos Party the voluntary fire brigade theCzech Touristsrsquo Club and the evangelical Czech Brotherhood Church Theircommon goal was to re-establish J as an independent entity in relation tohigher administrative bodies (J quickly took up its new right to establish alocal police station for example) In contrast to SP the dissolution of OFwas followed more or less automatically by the establishment of a localODS branch but in practice it constituted the straightforward substitutionof one organisational base for another with ODS continuing to function asa means of coordinating the efforts of an active local civic elite (andmaking it easier to stand for election since independent candidates unlike


parties have to gather signatures) In fact the ex-mayor of J (now aregional MP) left ODS following the financial scandals which led to thedownfall of the last Klaus government joining the breakaway FreedomUnion (US)

Mixed cases

Ř also serves partly as a dormitory town for Prague although it is largerthan J with a population of 11000 It retains a relatively stable socialstructure which reflects the period of its most rapid growth in the 1930s Itsgenerally unruffled existence was threatened by plans hatched in the 1970sfor what would have been the largest prison in Europe a new industrialzone and a planned expansion in the population to 30000 This providedan important mobilisatory issue for Civic Forum and as in J the(successful) protest against lsquoPraguersquosrsquo plans to dump its problems in Ř fedinto a movement to restore local self-determination and to reshape itsrelations with higher-level administrative authorities on the basis ofpartnership instead of hierarchical directives lsquoThe town wants to live itsown life again as it once did We are willing to reach agreement with thegovernment if it has essential justified intentions But it must not be ahumiliating agreementrsquo (two OF spokespeople quoted in Respekt no 101990)

Nonetheless OF was not as successful here at reintegrating the townrsquospublic space as in SP and J This was partly attributed by the ex-mayor to theeffect of Prague siphoning off potential civic activists ndash many of those whoworked in Prague felt more of an affiliation with their workplace andengaged in Civic Fora established there OF set up expert commissions toshadow the work of the national committee which were integrated into thecouncil administration after January 1990 when fourteen OF members wereco-opted onto the council one as its chairman Ř OF immediately identifiedthe local administrative structures as the target of its action and laid thefoundations for efficient democratic local government but in comparisonwith the first two examples neglected the extensive self-governing structuresof public life failing to engage with or stimulate a revival of social andcultural activity generally Moreover when OF split in 1991 fissures alsoappeared in Ř where ODS grouped a number of councillors opposed to theOF mayor The small Socialist and Peoplersquos Party groups on the council hadalready turned against OF and the period of re-establishing a collective self-regulating ethic was quickly substituted by a disintegration of intra-community relations into competing interest groups This may reflect thediffering social dynamics of a slightly larger town where more stratifiedpatterns of social interaction were rapidly visible following the establishmentof a basic market economy Thus although OF in Ř succeeded in liberatingcreative energies latent within the community this was not manifest inpatterns of collective identification or social integration14

66 Simon Smith

Negative cases

Z is a village of 500 people in western Bohemia close to SP Civic Forumwas quickly established there and its burgeoning popularity was reflectedin electoral success in both the June 1990 general election and in theNovember local election results which led to its candidate taking themayoralty A large response to a questionnaire about local problems andpriorities organised in the village by OF indicated enthusiasm for aparticipatory self-government and the results proved an invaluable guidefor the first steps of the new council according to the then mayor But asthe activity of OF itself began to concentrate around a core of ten tofifteen people the organisation started to drift towards a more elitist modeof operation facilitated by indifference towards and inexperience withpublic affairs among the wider local population There were no particularlyurgent local issues to maintain a high level of public interest in communalpolitics but proposals for lsquoradicalrsquo development projects by the OF mayor(such as for the construction of a holiday camp nearby or for the trans-formation of the local consumer cooperative) evoked a strong negativereaction in a conservative rural social milieu uncovering a latent prefer-ence for continuity in village life By contrast public opinion proved afeeble antidote to the alleged manipulation of the tendering process for asocial housing investment to the benefit of relatives of council leaders anissue which led to the mayorrsquos removal in 1996 because he opposed suchpractices OF had not precipatated the recall of the communist nationalcommittee leadership in 1990 but most of the communist representativeswithdrew from public life at the November elections and the CommunistParty organisation itself slowly petered out With hindsight the formermayor (for OF until 1991 then for its centre-left successor party CivicMovement) expresses regret about their retirement ndash in his view the com-munist municipal leadership was a better manager of local developmentand more responsible guardian of public finances than his formercolleagues within OF (who remain in charge today)

L is a very small village (population 270) in central Bohemia Itrepresents a widespread process in the Czech and Slovak countryside after1990 when the new law on municipal government enabled communitieswhich had been run as administrative sub-units from neighbouring largerparishes to re-establish their autonomy in local self-government Thepeople of L thus opted through a petition to return to the independentstatus their community had enjoyed until 197515 However this proved tobe a one-off engagement in public affairs (albeit extending to a very highturnout in the first local elections) and there is little evidence of muchlocal patriotism in L today there are no functioning social organisationsother than the Sokol sports club and the only communal life revolvesaround the pub and Sokol and specifically around an annual fundraisingcountry music festival cum sports tournament Civic Forum did not last


long and although some of its prime movers later joined ODS theirinfluence within the community was based on an ability to manipulateinformal social networks and procedures where as the former mayor putit lsquodecisions are taken in the pub and then ratified by the councilrsquo OF thushad a marginal effect on civic culture in L and may indeed havecontributed to establishing the legitimacy of a small local lsquoclanrsquo which haslargely been able to direct public resources towards its own privateinterests with impunity since public expectations of local representativeinstitutions are so low As in Z the first (OF) mayor of L proved unable togenerate a revival of civic culture (despite its size L had a rich associativelife up to the 1930s) and as a result found himself impotent against thepower of local clans who ultimately engineered his prematurereplacement The history of post-revolutionary social change in both Z andL matches the conclusions of an earlier study of eleven small villages ndashlsquopublic life has been extinguished (new interest organisations did notemerge while old ones did not activise and some disappeared nor wasthere even a revival in religious life)rsquo (Heřmanovaacute et al 1992 372)

Revival of extensive local autonomy

Representation

The Civic Fora which can be regarded as the more successful agents ofcommunity self-determination in this small sample (including the mixedcase) have as their most obvious similarity (apart from size) a commonfocus on local government as a vehicle for mobilising human potential andsolving local problems In each case this led following the November 1990elections to the effective institutionalisation of OF within the town orvillage hall One of the first steps after setting up a local group was theestablishment of something like a lsquoshadow cabinetrsquo ndash committees discus-sion fora or individual experts responsible for mapping out strategies forlocal development within specified policy areas (housing the environmentroads etc) In the two positive cases these bodies continued to exist up tothe first local elections because OF decided to wait until then beforetaking office and not to press for the early reconstruction of nationalcommittees Their main role at this stage lay in the recruitment of locallsquoorganic intellectualsrsquo ndash both people with expertise in a given area to leadcommittees examining local problems and suitable candidates for theupcoming local elections

In two other respects however our examples expose the limitations ofOFrsquos impact on local democracy in respect of the representative relation-ships within communities Firstly paternalistic patterns of behaviourtended to persist OF mayors typically tried to cultivate a different type ofrepresentative relationship with citizens to that which had prevailedbefore operating an lsquoopen doorrsquo policy for example This often led tofrustration because although local authority figures were now much more

68 Simon Smith

accessible they were unable to solve many of the problems citizensbrought to their attention (because they were either outside their compe-tence or had the character of neighbourhood disputes which called formediation rather than the kind of directive resolution the plaintiff hadenvisaged) In some cases the opening of such a dialogue probably had apositive effect on the civic culture of communities in the longer term ndash inparticular a better appreciation of the procedural fundament of democracyin contrast to the personalised clientelistic relationships which had charac-terised the previous system16 Yet the short-term effects could be counter-productive exposing the limitations of local government powers whichmade mayors appear weak in the eyes of many

The second problem most apparent in the two small rural municipalitiesL and Z touches upon issues of recruitment legitimacy and public controlof new local elites Where democratic values are in their infancy andautocratic patterns of governance the established norm it can be relativelyeasy for local authority to be usurped by particular interest groups Thisdanger highlighted in the case of post-communist societies by the Polishsociologist Gorzelak (1992) matches the experience of these two com-munities where the initial mobilisation for change following November1989 facilitated the replacement of the communist leadership which hadlost public confidence by individuals or groups whose attitude to office-holding differed little from their predecessorsrsquo (with office seen as a sourceof privilege and patronage) and whose conception of democracy was crudein the extreme (with checks on the power of the council viewed as aninfringement of the prerogatives of an electoral majority) In practice themode of governance offered by the incoming elite initially under the aegisof OF took its lead from established norms whereby important decisionsare taken by an informal village elite typically away from council meetings(often in the pub) and then merely rubber-stamped by the council itselfAccountability barely became an issue because of the low expectations ofmost people in relation to public administration

The problem was often exacerbated by the high initial turnover ofpublic office-holders where the communist leadership or even part of itleft office in 1990 this left a critically small pool of qualified and activecitizens from which to recruit a new community leadership One 1991survey of over a thousand Czech municipalities found that lsquomore than 80per cent of the representatives elected in the 1990 municipal elections hadnever before worked in any branch of local administration or self-government authorityrsquo (Kroupa and Kosteleckyacute 1996 113) The problem ofrecruitment was especially severe in newly independent municipalities likeL where no one had experience with local administration Lack of civicpotential rendered them more dependent on the state administrativehierarchy and more vulnerable to capture by special interests (basedaround dominant local familial and social networks) This in turn fosteredgreater continuity (regardless of the extent of the turnover in personnel) in


the predominantly informal modes of local governance which applyin small villages17 which worked against the dissemination of lsquouniversalpolitical institutions and valuesrsquo (Illner 1992 487) In Z and L OF failed tocarry out an effective recruitment role and eventually became one of thevehicles for the perpetuation of a system of local governance characterisedby patronage paternalism and lack of accountability

Self-representation

Most local Civic Fora invested considerable energy into a range of inform-ational and communicative activities designed to articulate local problemsfacilitate public debate and re-establish a positive self-image of thecommunity From the first days and weeks after the establishment of OFnational and district coordination centres organised lsquoexcursionsrsquo into theprovinces and countryside conceived as both fact-finding missions andpublic education ventures Local fora started to operate on a similar basisand often saw their first essential task as one of lsquolisteningrsquo in order to mapthe main concerns of local people and the main problems which a futurelocal authority should address In J and Z OF distributed questionnaires toall households which later proved useful guides for OF-led councils insetting out an agenda based on local priorities Mayors in this sampletypically recalled their most frequent task particularly at the start of theirterm of office as listening to complaints testimonies and autobiographiesand feel that they often served as counsellors as much as councillors

Self-representation is an activity which actors are better equipped topractise if they share a strong sense of place Among the goals of OF in Jfor example was to re-establish a cultural identity over and above themerely administrative functions of the municipal area This entailed re-narrativising its identity as a genuine rural community with its own distinc-tive cultural heritage and collective rituals symbolised by the reconstruc-tion of the town hall complete with a new socialcultural facility therenewal of local monuments and the promotion of its historical importanceas a centre for gold mining which has bequeathed to J many architectur-ally valuable public buildings Such a re-narrativisation constituted arejection of the suburban or dormitory character J had begun to acquiredue to the impact of out-migration from Prague

Well-functioning OF groups could also contribute to the enhancementof the projecting capacities of communities ndash their ability to envisage thefuture or a series of alternative futures and the route-maps leading tothem The programmes of local OF groups in SP and J were explicit aboutthe demanding task facing local citizens ndash all would have to join togethershare certain transitional burdens and actively participate in the interest ofcommunity development Nonetheless they were embraced and thesuccess of SP in applications for Countryside Renewal grants on an annualbasis attests to the honing of projecting skills in the community Their true

70 Simon Smith

worth is not the financial value of the grants nor the technical-managerialvalue of the plans and projects themselves but the stimulus given to localpeoplersquos creative capacities SP now hosts a Countryside Renewal school(see below pp 72ndash3)18

In Z by contrast the alternative scenarios proposed by the mayor afterthe 1990 elections were rejected by a local population whose valuesremained conservative and whose expectations for the future essentiallycontinuist lsquoI was always too revolutionary for themrsquo reflected the formermayor His transformation project for the local consumer cooperativewould have split it into several components and brought decision-makingcloser to the membership but this was rejected in favour of the co-operative managementrsquos plan which did not entail any major changes in itsoperation and as a result the property of the cooperative was allowed torun down while the management sat out the time remaining to theirpensions The fate of many local OF groups was to come up against theinherited conservatism or intolerance of a rural or small town milieu to failto produce a positive vision of change or win support for alternativenarratives of development

Self-regulation

A defining aim of local Civic Fora was the re-establishment of municipal-ities (and likewise enterprises and the other organisations and institutionswhere they sprang up) as self-regulating entities This was why ndash for all theemphasis on procedural matters discussed above ndash it was vital that peoplersquosefforts be rewarded by some visible changes in the day-to-day life of thecommunity in question People needed to see that they could make adifference at their own initiative and on their own terms The re-establishment of self-regulating capacities was given a big boost by thepresence of immediate threats to local interests against which mobilisationproved to be more or less spontaneous The victory of OF-led campaignsagainst major construction projects left over from the central planning era(a prison in Ř and a road-building scheme in J) which would haveimpacted negatively on the local environment or social climate provedimportant in rebuilding the self-confidence of local people They were signsthat the regime really had changed and the voice of ordinary citizens wasnot overlooked When citizens of Ř demonstrated in Prague against theprison scheme they shouted slogans such as lsquoIf Ř gets a prison theCommunist Party still has its positionrsquo and lsquoWhy does the government ofnational understanding not want to understand usrsquo (Respekt no 10 1990)OF thus became a mechanism for empowering latent protest movements(vain attempts had been made to initiate public hearings about the prisonscheme in the 1980s by Ř citizens who later became involved in OF) Onthe other hand where such issues were absent a learned dependency onexternal agents was difficult to overcome


According to Ivan Rynda a member of the OF coordinating committeeand later a federal MP the impact of OF on community self-regulation ismost visible in the non-governmental sector where within the environ-mental movement for instance a capacity for ad hoc mobilisation aroundspecific problems was a lasting positive outcome of the lsquoera of publicmeetingsrsquo The Countryside Renewal (Obnova venkova) movement is oneexample of a more permanent initiative closely paralleling aspects of OFrsquospolitics in the Czech Republic today Loosely integrated into the agenda ofthe Ministries of Local Development Environment and Agriculture it hasprovided assistance for around half of all Czech municipalities with theprimary aim of mobilising sustainable local resources recruiting or trainingfacilitators from within local communities (usually via cooperation withmayors) and transferring know-how to local community actors Apart frombeing a source of funding for both infrastructural and educational projectsit represents a bridge between often marginal communities (whose autono-mous civic life was restricted by central planning) and an increasinglypowerful discourse on rural development (stressing decentralisation anddiversity) which draws both on European (particularly German-Austrian)experience and on indigenous ideas which can be traced directly to theOFVPN era Blažek in fact locates its antecedents in longstanding Czechpatterns of lsquoreturnrsquo to the countryside (summer or weekend cottagesgardening or tramping lsquocoloniesrsquo ecologically oriented brigades andsummer camps) which were strengthened during the communist era ascity-dwellers went into lsquointernal exilersquo for either ecological or politicalcultural reasons (in search of either cleaner air or a less intensely surveyedpublic space) Sometimes (if not always) this could result in a mutuallyenriching exchange with villagers with incomers acting as a spur for therevival of half-forgotten traditions the organisation of local cultural lifethe restoration of public buildings and monuments and the recreation of astronger sense of community (Blažek 1997 I4 also Librovaacute in Respekt no41 1995 12 and Musil in Veřejnaacute spraacuteva no 12 2002) Activists in OF (andlikewise VPN) often shared such experiences which many sought tocapitalise on once they occupied positions of political influence Howeverafter the first (OF-led) post-communist government initiated the Country-side Renewal programme the subsequent ODS-led government took stepsto recentralise rural planning within the state apparatus

Czech academic and voluntary sector groups led by former OF memberssuch as Ivan Dejmal and Bohuslav Blažek responded by establishing anindependent Club for Countryside Renewal (SPOV) which organises alsquovillage of the yearrsquo contest and coordinates a growing network ofCountryside Renewal schools (there are now about ten) which run coursesfor lsquoregional curatorsrsquo to work in other villages and micro-regions The aimis to create a network of lsquoorganic intellectualsrsquo (it is important that they arepeople who enjoy considerable informal authority within their commun-ities) with a wide range of skills applicable to local development

72 Simon Smith

fundraising networking with neighbouring and international partnersconflict resolution and developing local renewal programmes based onparticipative dialogical methods (Blažek 1997 VI5) More recently SPOVsucceeded in winning back government support for a devolved approach tothe countryside with more room for local councilsrsquo and voluntary groupsrsquoinitiative the Countryside Renewal programme has in turn been revivedand become one of the chief planks of Czech regional planning in relationto European funding for agricultural and rural affairs intended tostimulate lsquointegrated projectingrsquo and to build on spontaneous instances ofinter-municipal cooperation (the lsquomicro-regionrsquo sub-programme wasinitiatially criticised at government level because it does not correspond toany administrative divisions in the Czech state but is instead a response tospontaneous associations between municipalities taking place from 1992)This would have been much more difficult had it not been sustainedthrough the years of government neglect lsquoby the determination of SPOVthe Union of Towns and Villages mayors MPs and a few enthusiasticofficialsrsquo the Minstry for Local Development acknowledged (Ministerstvopro miacutestniacute rozvoj 1998)

Among the case studies here SP has been the most proactive atinstitutionalising such synergies between external and internal resourcesand between public and voluntary sectors It has become the site for aCountryside Renewal school housed in the converted country housementioned above which serves as an educational resource for mayorsbusinessmen farmers and ecologists within the Nepomucko micro-regionwhich groups thirty-one municipalities with a population of 15000 and hasthe twin aims of raising local human potential and accessing EU fundingschemes Showing considerable skill at tapping into national andinternational networks and funding schemes the municipalities of themicro-region have begun to develop a niche for agro-tourism and heritagetourism (focusing initially on the arearsquos Jewish history) constructed thefirst signposted cycleway in west Bohemia and developed partnerships withBavarian local authorities

Reintegration of public space

As social actors which intervened in the reproduction of collectiveidentities and local civic cultures throughout the Czech Republic during1990 Civic Fora inevitably influenced processes of social structurationinterest formation and the reintegration (or disintegration) of communitiesin space For example in promoting marketisation and privatisation andstimulating free enterprise they indirectly contributed toward the restrati-fication of a previously highly egalitarian social structure and for many OFactivists themselves the experience proved to be a stepping-stone towardseconomic self-realisation (such as business start-ups) which amounted to achange in social status and identity


It was characteristic of the two most positive cases here SP and J thatOF forged strong links with existing social organisations in the localitysuch as firemenrsquos organisations touristsrsquo and sports clubs churches orPeoplersquos Party branches On the other hand less successful fora (Z L) andthe intermediary case (Ř) failed to develop such synergies with theorganisational capacities of other (existing or latent) groups and ultimatelyacted as disintegrating rather than integrating elements within the localenvironment In L especially this led to general demobilisation and thehijacking of community governance by a narrow clique in Ř the failure toreintegrate community life became apparent after the split of OF at thenational level which triggered the open expression of local schisms whichhad been latent for some time OF was succeeded not by the functionalpluralisation of interests and values concomitant with the gradualstratification of an artificially lsquolevelledrsquo social structure but by hostilefactions which found cover in one or another political lsquoclubrsquo In a replay ofthe frequent bane of OF there were attempts to found two separate ODScells in Ř and the vetoing of this by the partyrsquos district council (effectivelyexcluding forty lsquomembersrsquo of the second in favour of the twenty who hadset up the first organisation) forced the former mayor to run again at thehead of a list of independents in 1994 although he did also register with anODS branch elsewhere

A comparison of the local election results for 1990 and 1994 offers someinteresting indicators in respect of the successorship of OF and theestablishment of patterns of local political life (see Tables 35ndash36) The fivemunicipalities saw a diversity of trends J stands out as the place whereOFrsquos dominance was greatest in 1990 (62 per cent of the vote) and wherethis was translated almost completely into ODS hegemony in 1994 (58 percent) ODS here acted as an organisational background for a group ofpeople trying to promote a participative local politics in line with ideasborn within OF In SP OF never enjoyed such electoral dominance withonly 29 per cent of the 1990 vote (the national average was 36 per cent)but in practice it formed an alliance with a strong slate of independentcandidates (just as it cooperated closely with the villagersquos socialorganisations) who took 23 per cent of the vote In 1994 independents ndash ledby the former core of OF including the mayor ndash took 53 per cent of thevote and continued the self-confident local politics which the OF-led localcouncil had pioneered ODS with 16 per cent of the vote was a new actoron the local scene and played only a supporting role An increase inparticipation by and votes for independent candidates was a trendgeneralised across the country in 1994 53 per cent of all councillors wereindependents compared with 27 per cent in 1990 although their share ofthe vote only increased from 10 per cent to 12 per cent (the anomaly isexplained by the virtual confinement of independents to small municipal-ities where one council seat equates to a far smaller number of votes) Itcan partly be put down to the disappearance of OF the self-proclaimed

74 Simon Smith

Chapter Title 75

Tabl

e 3

519

90 lo

cal e

lect

ion

resu

lts

in fi

ve C

zech

mun

icip

alit

ies

(all

figur

es a

re p

erce

ntag

es)

Par

tyJ

SP

Ř

L

Z

Cz

Rep

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

OF

6267

2927

4647

4644

5756

3732

KSČ

1010

2327

77

ndash16

1117

14Č

SL13

13ndash

1213

ndash0

011

12Č

SSD

ndash24

273

311

1118

225

2Č

SSndash

ndashndash

ndash9

114

2In

d13

1023

2711

1343

44ndash

1027

Not

eA

das

h in

dica

tes

that

the

par

ty d

id n

ot s

tand

A z

ero

indi

cate

s a

nil r

esul

t

Tabl

e 3

619

94 lo

cal e

lect

ion

resu

lts

in fi

ve C

zech

mun

icip

alit

ies

(all

figur

es a

re p

erce

ntag

es)

Par

tyJ

SP

Ř

L

Z

Cz

Rep

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

OD

S58

6016

20ndash

ndashndash

2912

OD

A

ndashndash

1414

ndash7

147

1SD

(OH

)ndash

ndashndash

ndash24

142

1K

SČM

1820

1413

1210

ndashndash

1511

KD

UndashČ

SL19

13ndash

1510

ndash44

439

13Č

SSD

ndash17

20ndash

ndashndash

93

Ind

57

53

47

31

33

100

100

25

29

1253

Not

eO

F s

ucce

ssor

par

ties

Key

to p

artie

s(T

able

s 3

5ndash3

6)

OF

Civ

ic F

orum

ČSS

Soc

ialis

t P

arty

KSČ

KSČ

M C

omm

unis

t P

arty

OD

S C

ivic

Dem

ocra

tic

Par

tyČ

SLK

DU

ndashČSL

Peo

plersquo

s P

arty

OD

A C

ivic

Dem

ocra

tic

Alli

ance

ČSS

D S

ocia

l Dem

ocra

tic

Par

tySD

(OH

) Fr

ee D

emoc

rats

(C

ivic

Mov

emen

t)

lsquoparty for non-party-itesrsquo and the only non-communist party in the CzechRepublic to have successfully colonised even small municipalitiesKosteleckyacute estimates that many of the lsquonewrsquo independent councillorselected in 1994 had been OF activists previously (1996 358) What isfactually demonstrable is a progressive withdrawal of most major partiesfrom smaller municipalities ODS fielded candidates in only a quarter ofmunicipalities in the 1994 local elections and by 1998 the proportion wasdown to a fifth (lsquoODS se představujersquo HTTP lthttpwwwodsczgt) Yet in1990 OF had competed in 64 per cent of all municipalities which was just1 per cent fewer than the communists (Kosteleckyacute 1996 356ndash7)

In Ř OF had dominated the first local council with 46 per cent of thevote but its chief successor party at the national level ODS here emergedin opposition to the OF mayor and could not even field a candidacy for the1994 elections in which the (now recently deposed) mayorrsquos independentcandidatesrsquo list was most successful (31 per cent of the vote) Two other OFsuccessor parties ODA and LSNS also scored relatively well (14 per centand 8 per cent of votes respectively) but of these only LSNS was willing tocooperate with the independents and this left them short of a majority inthe chamber which had become riven by essentially personal animositiesIn Z OFrsquos dominant position in 1990 (57 per cent of the vote) had beensuperseded in 1994 by KDUndashČSL dominance (44 per cent) although theformer mayor campaigning for SD(OH) in alliance with independents andan ODA candidate (who had also previously been in OF) still retainedenough popularity to remain temporarily in power ndash it took until 1996before the politics and local figureheads of OF were displaced by a moreself-interested elite and a clientelistic politics L the smallest villagelooked at here exemplifies a trend typical of many small rural parishes ndashthe collapse of organised political life Whereas in 1990 voters had a choiceof three lists of which OF narrowly beat an Alliance of IndependentCandidates ahead of a Social Democrat 1994 saw a single slate of lsquoinde-pendentrsquo candidates which was in fact an informal more or less corrupt butnevertheless more or less accepted local elite No other political organis-ations remained active in the village

The Czech case studies highlight the particular problems of democraticrenewal in rural communities Whereas the changes undergone by urbansystems under state socialism represented only lsquoa modification of a uni-versal model of urbanisationrsquo with planning becoming increasingly amatter of pragmatic adjustment rural planning and in particular the collec-tivisation of agriculture produced major lsquochanges in peoplersquos attitudes tothe land and to localitiesrsquo culminating not just in the depopulation of manyof the smallest rural parishes (Musil 2001 293) but in the lsquourbanisationrsquo orproletarianisation of rural lifeworlds The construction of high-rise housingreduced the scope for small-scale family cultivation the construction oflarge cultural houses altered the ways leisure time was used industrialinvestments in the countryside and the growth of a large commuter

76 Simon Smith

population in most villages altered the social structure of rural populationsdisrupting place-bound identities and undermining its traditional collectiveexpressions (local folklore and customs) the professionalisation andcentralisation of public administration undermined the distinctive socialregulators of village communities founded on more intense patterns ofsocial interaction informal social control mechanisms and a greater generalinvolvement in public affairs (Pisca 1984 Slepička 1984) Although ndash asVašečka demonstrates elsewhere in this volume ndash autocratic modes ofgovernance personified by a strong mayor were often one trait of villagelife which did endure central planning was very effective at preventinglsquonatural authoritiesrsquo (organic intellectuals) from emerging elsewhereduring the course of collectivisation and administrative concentration arange of traditional institutions of village life such as cooperative savingsbanks residentsrsquo associations and religious societies were all but elimin-ated These had been fora for the organisation of a proud local intellectualstratum sustaining the autarky that is an integral aspect of village life(Blažek 1997 VI5) but which was seen only as a potential hindrance tothe construction of a socialism responsive to lsquoall-societyrsquo interests Villagelife thus became less distinguishable from town life in many aspects andvillages ceased to function as self-regulating social organisms19 Thefindings of a questionnaire completed by twenty-eight OF assemblydelegates from rural areas in March 1990 gave an indication of thehandicap to be overcome the Czech countryside entered the transform-ation lsquopolitically on the level of suspicion doubts protests and demandsrather than on the level of [formulating] its own adaptive strategies and thearticulation of its own distinct subjectivityrsquo (Blažek 1998 343) Moreoverthe initial impact of marketisation and privatisation in agriculture was tolsquoincrease income disparities between agricultural workers and other socialgroups hellip [and] enlarge the category of rural settlements with inadequateinternally mobilisable resources for self-sufficiencyrsquo (Hudečkovaacute 1995457) Hence the greater susceptibility of rural communities to institutionalcapture populist appeals or even nostalgia for the return of the verysystem which stripped them of socio-cultural autonomy and independentidentity (but produced an equalisation of rural and urban incomes)

Ironically the discourse of non-political politics had looked to thecommunity spirit and harmonious social ecology of villages for inspiration(the starting-point for Havelrsquos critique of state socialism was a crisis ofurban-industrial modernity) This was reflected in the high prioritisation ofrural issues in early OF manifestos However government policy in practicenever abandoned the conventional mechanisms of undifferentiated agricul-tural subsidies and infrastructure projects in which economic interestspredominated over questions of cultural or spiritual renewal and whichfunctioned to conserve the dominant position of large agricultural enter-prises and the dependent condition of rural communities OF as a politicalmovement thereby lsquolostrsquo the countryside in two senses it lost popularity in


competition with parties offering populist solutions and it abandoned themotif of spiritual renewal which a lsquorural worldviewrsquo represented for its ownpolitical philosophy Where this is preserved however ndash albeit only inscattered pilot projects ndash rural communities have undergone a renaissanceand in the process have become reintegrated into the virtual public spacesof the informational age through a mutually enriching exchange betweentheir own traditional narrativising practices and discourses developedwithin non-localised civic networks like the Club for Countryside Renewalwhich former OF activists were instrumental in creating

Conclusion

Pickvance borrowing from studies of Latin American and southernEuropean transitions from authoritarian rule has argued that post-communist social movements played a purely transitional role Accordingto his three-stage model lsquorepression of movements under an authoritarianregime gives way to an upsurge of social movements as the prospect of apolitical opening develops and to a decline as political parties become alegal mode of political expressionrsquo (Pickvance 1995 144) In the case ofHungary he explains this observation (which is not demonstrated empiri-cally) in relation to the formation of a lsquostable party system [which] hasmade politics a feasible alternative to social movement participationrsquo(Pickvance 1995 145) A more sophisticated transition model again basedon a comparison of post-communist and earlier post-authoritarian develop-ments is offered by Kunc who demonstrates that in Spain Italy andCzechoslovakia the initial phase when social movements dominatedpolitics did not initially give way to a stable party system but to thedomination of politics by (generally newly formed) parties with a discoursewhich differentiated themselves sharply from the anti-authoritarianmovements but which were nevertheless strongly marked by the politicalculture the latter had installed ndash retaining a synthetic populist discourseand a reliance on charismatic leaders such as Klaus and Mečiar (or Fragaand Berlusconi in the Spanish and Italian cases) In Kuncrsquos conception thisphase represents an intermediate period of lsquonon-standardrsquo parties but heagrees with Pickvance on lsquothe role of political parties as the central actorsof the exit from the crisis of political systems and the central actors of theirdemocratisationrsquo (Kunc 2000 240ndash1) However as some Slovak authorshave pointed out party domination can easily develop into an entrenchedlsquoparty corporatismrsquo characterised by an alliance between political andeconomic elites the effect of which is to consolidate the power of the statein the management of society thereby contradicting any democratisationproject which aims to strengthen economic and social self-regulatingprocesses (Malovaacute 1996 Sopoacuteci 2001) Slovak experience is less excep-tional than it once seemed and there is little cause for optimism that partycorporatism is just a transitional phenomenon

78 Simon Smith

The emergence of OF and VPN certainly fits the first transition of thePickvance model but subsequent Czech and Slovak developments at locallevel challenge both the inevitability and the desirability of the second (theswitch to party-dominated politics) Some of the examples abovedocument the disorganisation of public life in small communities but evenif the expectation that (new or old) political institutions would efficientlyadminister local needs was a factor in this it is difficult to argue that it hasbeen fulfilled Czech and Slovak political parties are characterised by lowmembership weak penetration of rural areas and widespread publiccynicism about their commitment to the common good Demobilisationwas thus not the result of the rapid establishment of functioning politicaland interest-mediating mechanisms but a more or less actively expressedcultural preference by communities tired of compulsory forms of politicalparticipation (Mihaacutelikovaacute 1996 426) Moreover to the extent that theinstitution-building phase of democratisation requires a higher degree ofcivic mobilisation (not least as a safeguard against elite domination andinstitutional capture) demobilisation represented the failure of OF andVPN as social movements rather than their logical outcome as purelytransitional devices On a conceptual level OF and VPN embodied apolitical philosophy which did not envisage a gradual absorption of socialmovement energy into lsquostandardrsquo political party-type organisations On thecontrary as captured by Gaacutelrsquos lsquothree-function modelrsquo they foresaw acontinuing role for social movement-type organisations and independent(formal and informal) institutions ndash including self-government organs ndashfulfilling social needs which the political system could not The nature ofcollective action would evolve as social networks reconfigured following atransitional lsquolooseningrsquo to enable participative adaptation but the level ofcollective action and the density and effectiveness of collective actorswould not be reduced Nor was this evolution a simple shift from anti-systemic to self-institutionalising forms of collective action because theneeds of civil society vary from place to place and through time It hasalready been observed that in Slovakia there is largely in reaction to theneo-authoritarian nature of the state-building process during the 1994ndash8period an over-representation of advocacy-type as against service-typeNGOs In the Czech Republic however the make-up of the sector isdifferent and service-oriented NGOs (including many lsquooldrsquo social and civicassociations) predominate Both types and the relationship between themand other actors such as political parties have an important bearing on thecharacter of a countryrsquos political system and a lasting place within it andone of the potential contributions of OF and VPN and forms of organis-ation they inspired was to enable more fluid combinations between suchactors and their different repertoires of discourse and practice20

Rynda estimates that at least 4000 to 5000 local Civic Fora were foundedby the early months of 1990 (interview) and in Slovakia too perhaps half ofall municipalities saw the formation of a group calling itself Public Against


Violence (or in eastern Slovakia often initially Civic Forum) soon afterNovember 1989 The speed and the spontaneity with which these groupsemerged testifies to the spirit of change which permeated more or less thewhole of society as well as to a certain capacity for self-organisation whichcollectives such as work units and local communities had retained in spite ofthe strict limitations on the right of free association under the communistsystem ndash often in fact because certain de facto forms of self-organisedactivity co-existed within structures which formally precluded theirexistence as local self-defensive reactions to bureaucratic centralism and thesectoral segmentation of society (Illner 1992 482 Gajdoš 1995 250)

Retrospectively a symbolic marker of the onset of a second morepermanent lsquophasersquo of the movementsrsquo existence was the creation of NadaceObčanskeacuteho foacutera (the Civic Forum Foundation) in May 1990 a charitydesigned to stimulate lsquothe revival of Czech culture education andhumanismrsquo and to support lsquothe principle of civic participationrsquo (HTTPlthttparchivradiocznadace-ofgt) Today the main focus of its activities isthe restoration of local monuments ndash easily overlooked chapels waysidecrosses statues bridges etc whose rehabilitation is seen as a practical wayof lsquogiving space to the activity of local citizens and municipal councils todemonstrate concern for the wider meaning of their home environmentrsquoThe establishment of Countryside Renewal in 1991 and the emergence ofcommunity coalitions and foundations in dozens of Czech and Slovaktowns and villages during the mid- to late 1990s can be read as the furtherinstitutionalisation of the extensive local autonomy idea that was central toOFVPN discourse Among their central aims are the mobilisation of localresources the creation of a culture of reciprocity and charitable donationthe enhancement of the local lsquoquality of lifersquo and the establishment of anindependent civic partner for local government and business The key totheir success is their ability to stimulate the latent self-help instincts ofcommunities because they rely on the projecting capacity of collective orindividual actors whose ideas the foundations then support with financeand know-how When the American CS Mott Foundation which is one ofseveral private endowment funds responsible for the spread of communityfoundation schemes across North America (where the concept is mostdeveloped) expanded its operations into Europe during the 1990s it met aparticularly positive response in the Czech and Slovak Republics wheremany communities demonstrated an immediate understanding of thephilosophy behind the movement (among them Kvačany in Slovakia asdescribed by Slosiarik in this volume) This may often reflect the presenceof formal or informal community leaders skilled at tapping externalresources and able to mobilise their neighbourhoods for local develop-mental goals skills which many people and groups acquired during the firstmonths and years after November 1989 when the global political andintellectual capital represented by OF and VPN had empowered specificcommunity agendae in a similar manner

80 Simon Smith

Such a picture of course is far from being a universal scenario In manyplaces the inertia of local institutions discourses and practices workedagainst community self-determination Studies have suggested thatmany of the first democratically elected local mayors and councillors inCzechoslovakia struggled to break free of inherited role models adopting atechnocratic self-identity and correspondingly reluctant to assume the roleof local opinion-formers or narrative constructors A FrenchndashSlovak studybased on sociological intervention (Frič and Strečenskaacute 1992) was forcedto admit that the research hypothesis which attributed councillors a pivotalrole in the formation of democratic social actors (mobilisers of localhuman potential) had little explanatory power and the lsquoconversionrsquo phaseof sociological intervention proved impossible to realise lsquoThey [a studygroup of local councillors] are unwilling to admit their own responsibilityfor the further development of democratisationrsquo displaying little faith inthe capacity of their constituents to engage in public life little willingnessto search for participative solutions to problem-solving a passive attitudetoward sources of expertise potentially mobilisable for local developmentan inability to think in terms of long-term alternative projects of develop-ment and a low capacity for self-reflection in general Similar conclusionsbased on a questionnaire survey using a much larger sample were reachedby Plichtovaacute and Brozmanovaacute They went so far as to conclude thatlsquo[Slovak] mayors do not attribute much importance to political pluralismor the independent influence of citizens [but] interpret [democracy] as astable paternalistic state with a competent political leadershiprsquo (1994 259)The study was reasonably representative of the political affiliation ofmayors elected in 1990 and showed no consistent correlation betweenaffiliation and social and political values which makes their findingsespecially challenging Both pieces of research imply that the majority ofmayors of the first post-communist electoral period were not carriers of avalue-system which would predispose them to playing a catalytic role inthe development of extensive local autonomy on the contrary they mostlysubscribed to a technocratic administrative conception of local govern-ment Evidence from the interviews conducted by this author as well asfrom the testimonies recorded in the Learning Democracy project concurthat local OF and VPN groups and the self-government authorities whichemerged from them could reproduce similar representative relationshipsto those they superseded such that local affairs remained dominated by a(partially renewed) socio-economic elite in relation to a basically passivepublic

Significant barriers to change in civic cultures were also apparent on theother side of the relationship between community leaders and publicsLocal OF and VPN activists might have temporarily succeeded in mobilis-ing their communities to take more interest and participation in publicaffairs but subsequently (as in the case of the mayors of Z and L in theCzech Republic) they found their own development projects rejected by


social milieux which reverted to a more conservative and risk-averseworldview typical especially of rural communities The intense articulationof internal and external resources which characterised the immediate post-communist period was not everywhere experienced as empowering Inagricultural areas for example restitution often produced large numbers ofabsentee owners (or co-owners of cooperatives) whose interests were notnecessarily in harmony with those of workers many of whom weresimultaneously reduced from stakeholders to mere employees Thereforeinstead of renewing the bond between farmer and soil as intended thereturn of land to its original owners could often produce a doublealienation causing rural dwellers to reject change per se (Hudečkovaacute 1995455ndash7) Rejection could take the form of voting out mayors whose policieswere viewed as instruments for an alien (urban intellectual eliteinternational) developmental conception There are also cases such as B inSlovakia where a mayor elected in 1990 after having engaged in the localVPN remains in office today (as a political independent) largely becauseno one else is prepared to take on such as unenviable post He has becomeincreasingly depressed by the apparent futility of his own attempts togenerate local patriotism invigorate local social and cultural life or makeheadway with basic infrastructure projects given the inadequacy ofexternal resources and the absence of a spirit of self-help Communal lifein the village of 900 people near Košice has all but broken down and a newgeneration of local public figures opinion-formers or social activists of anykind is nowhere to be seen (interview with mayor)

The fact that the negative scenario depicted in the introduction hasprobably been predominant however makes it all the more important toexamine the achievements of localities which were able to realise some ofthe positive potentials suggested The main preconditions for success havebeen a constructive and equal dialogue between indigenous and external(global) discourses and a natural alliance between local self-governmentbodies and multifarious social organisations (of both an old and a newtype) underpinned by a strong local identity21 Local government is hereviewed as the business of civil society rather than an extension of the state(which presupposes a fundamental change in the value orientations of publicofficials) and participation in civic affairs is forthcoming from a fairlybroad section of the local public (also entailing a change in values andbehaviour) This study has described two such Czech examples (SP and J)and identified some positive trends even in the lsquohistorically marginalrsquosetting of Humenneacute It has also pointed to broader initiatives which can beincluded under such a model (SKOI Countryside Renewal communitycoalitions and foundations) which are either directly descended from OFand VPN or informed by the same political philosophy

Frič (2000) found that mayors of many small Czech parishes not onlyvalue the role played by traditional social organisations (of which they arelikely to be members) in organising public work brigades structuring the

82 Simon Smith

social and civic calendar of villages or acting as natural recruitmentgrounds for future representatives increasingly they also understand thebenefits of cooperation with new types of NGO as the bearers of externaldiscursive andor financial resources and instigators of a dialogue aboutlocal development goals One reason why such relationships are importantis the legitimacy given to voluntary initatives by local council endorsementwhich then makes it easier to solicit support from local business and thepublic in a climate often characterised by low levels of trust a study of thefirst five community foundations to be set up in Slovakia found thatfinancial and moral support from the local authority had been a crucialfactor in their success (Strečanskyacute and Mesiacutek 1998 49ndash50) Such co-operative relationships can suffer from clientelism or lsquocolonisationrsquo (wherepublic bodies exploit NGOs to perform public services they wouldotherwise do themselves) and the same study also stressed the importanceof independent local leadership capable of resisting politicising pressurespositing as an ideal scenario the emergence of community foundationsfrom a strong voluntary sector which then works with local government asopposed to the chartering of community foundations by local government(ibid 67) ndash the lsquohardest steprsquo in establishing the successful Banskaacute Bystricafoundation was lsquodisestablishing the idea that it would be just a newappendage under the control of the town councilrsquo (J Mesiacutek Nonprofit no3 1998) Research shows that countryside renewal schemes tend to bedominated by local government bodies in the Czech Republic to a greaterextent than in many EU countries which reflects the stunted developmentof local civil society however the possibility also exists for local councils toplay a lsquocatalysingrsquo role in the future growth of the non-governmentalsector something which could be lsquoleveragedrsquo by EU programmes likeLEADER designed to stimulate multi-sectoral partnerships (Čepelka2001)

The struggle of OF and VPN for the emergence and formal andinformal institutionalisation of extensive local autonomy is the untold storyof these movementsrsquo existence but was at least as significant for thesubsequent dynamics of post-communist transformation as the politicalprogramme of reform which they sought to implement as the dominantgovernment parties at the central level For civic cultures are formedprimarily in neighbourhoods and workplaces where people interact everyday As the opening quotation illustrates political cultures in post-communist democracies cannot be taken in isolation from the way theextrication from communism occurred at the grassroots The fact thatGeišbergrsquos neighbours unable or unwilling to realise and exercise lsquotheinfluence they have on thingsrsquo represent quite widely generalisablearchetypes for the state of local civic cultures in post-communist societiesis a reflection on both the difficulty and the limited results of such ademocratising project After life returned to a more mundane rhythm inthe early 1990s and as economic hardships appeared the civic energy


activised by OF and VPN was in many cases dissipated or lsquomisappropri-atedrsquo by partial interests and populist political parties The socialmovement sector whose emergence Gaacutel and others saw as one of theprincipal missions of OF and VPN is itself compromised by a frequentlytechnocratic and elitist strategy encouraged by the institutional environ-ment in which it operates and often neglects lsquonon-politicalrsquo approachesbased on Piňosrsquos lsquopersonal examplersquo horizontal networking and recipro-city Bringing together the globally integrated intellectual world wherecultural movements for social transformation are developed and theeveryday world of local communities which lack the symbolic resources tonegotiate the transformation process narratively but preserve importantvalues and cultural resources offers hope that both can be reinvigoratedExperience shows that the space within which this is most likely to happenis local self-government the fulcrum around which various kinds ofcommunitarian initiative can develop which continue to practice (un-exceptionally and unheroically) their own versions of lsquonon-politicalpoliticsrsquo It would be erroneous to portray local communities as islands ofparticipative democracy in a sea of lsquooverparticisationrsquo ndash the lsquocalm andpeacersquo of which the mayor of Trenčianske Teplice boasts could equally bethe result of a benevolent paternalism and a limited adaptation in civicculture ndash but by daring to differ and to re-narrativise their own develop-ment independently of dominant political discourses they are the siteswhere democratisation is most contestable where the inclusiveness andflexibility of macro-political formations is most testable and where otherpossible futures can occasionally be glimpsed

Interviews

Civic Forum

Ivan Rynda (member of OF coordinating committee responsible for com-munication with local groups MP for OF in federal parliament 1990ndash2) 11 May2001

Mayor of J 1990ndash8 15 May 2001Mayor of Z 1990ndash6 16 May 2001Mayor of L 1990ndash6 17 May 2001Mayor of Ř 1990ndash4 18 May 2001Mayor of SP 1990ndash4 20 May 2001

Public Against Violence

Fedor Gaacutel (chairman of VPN coordinating committee 1990ndash1) 1 September 2001Peter Zajac (member of VPN coordinating committee 1990ndash1 founding member of

SKOI in 1993 MP for Democratic Party then Civic Conservative Party inSlovak parliament 1994ndash2002) 3 September 2001

Daniel Brezina (VPN activist and town councillor in Rimavskaacute Sobota member ofVPN coordinating committee founding member of SKOI) 4 September 2001

84 Simon Smith

Mayor of B 1990ndash 5 September 2001Mariaacuten Korba Pavol Ďugoš (members of VPN district council in Humenneacute

1990ndash91) and Jaacuten Miško (VPN activist in Humenneacute) 6 September 2001Jaacuten Hacaj (VPN activist in Pezinok MP for VPN in federal parliament founding

member of SKOI) 12 September 2001Zuzana Dzivjaacutekovaacute (co-opted mayor of Humenneacute 1990 defeated mayoral

candidate for VPN in 1990 local elections) 13 September 2001

Notes

1 A reasonable argument can be made that this was indeed de facto one of thelsquorevolutionary demandsrsquo of ordinary Czechs and Slovaks after 1989 The veryconcept of lsquoparticipationrsquo in political life undoubtedly carried many negativeconnotations from the communist era and the hope for a functional effectiveexpert-administered and non-corrupt state apparatus which would enablecitizens to enjoy the right of non-participation was self-evident if one of thethings people minded about the communist regime was lack of personalfreedom then a political settlement involving a withdrawal from each other onthe part of both state and citizen was one of the qualitative life improvementsthey registered after 1989 Public opinion surveys offer some evidence that bothCzech and Slovak populations favoured a representative or lsquocommunicativersquoform of democracy rather than a participative one (Mihaacutelikovaacute 1996 425ndash6)

2 In 1995 Wisla Surazska from the University of Bergen and Harald Baldersheimfrom the University of Oslo launched a project designed to record theexperiences of mayors and councillors who had participated in the renewal ofelected local self-government in three post-communist countries In cooper-ation with colleagues from Czech Slovak and Polish universities or academiesof sciences 65 Czech 40 Polish and 25 Slovak memoirs were collected(responses to advertisements placed in local government periodicals and dailynewspapers) Following their initial assessment prizes were awarded to the bestcontributions from each country but a planned English publication nevermaterialised Nevertheless the memoirs represent a valuable archive on therebirth of local democracy accessible to researchers both in Bergen and in thecountries studied (Z Vajdovaacute Moderniacute obec no 51 1995 23 Maliacutekovaacute and JBuček Obecneacute noviny no 44 1995 15)

3 All quotations are from the interviews listed at the end of the chapter Anony-mity is maintained in the case of interviewees contacted through the LearningDemocracy project since such a commitment was given to participants by theproject managers

4 SZOPK was an environmental NGO perhaps the most independent socialorganisation legally operating in Slovakia in the 1980s For an account of itshistory see Huba in this volume

5 The experience of VPN Pezinok was similar ndash appointments to the stateadministration including the chairman of the district national committee weremade according to criteria of expertise rather than moral credentials on thereasoning that an inexperienced person lsquowould be destroyed in that environ-mentrsquo but later many of these appointees lsquobegan to act like their predecessorsturned against us made pacts with communists failed to push through changesand eventually joined HZDSrsquo (interview with Jaacuten Hacaj)


6 The disparity was possibly greatest in agricultural cooperatives given thedispersion of the workforce often across several villages the lower educationlevels of agricultural workers and the strong informal social control character-istic of rural communities accordingly the vast majority of managements wereable to coerce support for their own transformation projects a trend that wasrepeated not only in Czechoslovakia but also in Hungary (Swain 1999)

7 VPN never achieved the degree of penetration of the countryside that OFalbeit fleetingly did and thus whilst OF competed with the Communists on anequal footing in the 1990 local elections VPN lagged behind both the Com-munists and the Christian Democrats in terms of the number of municipalitieswhere it was able to field candidates

8 Rediscovery of a Ruthenian identity was an important symbol of freedom after1989 given that communist-era policy toward the minority had promoted thelsquoUkrainianisationrsquo of Ruthenian cultural life supporting Ukrainian languageschools but not Ruthenian and forcing Greek Catholic churches to convert intoOrthodox ones An academic debate still continues as to the status of theRuthenian lsquonationrsquo in relation to other slavic ethnicities and languages (see MNevrlyacute Noveacute slovo no 10 2001 A Bajcura Noveacute slovo no 2 2002) but the 2001census showed a growing sense of nationhood among Slovak Rutheniansthemselves with 24201 self-declared Ruthenians and only 10814 Ukrainians(census forms during the communist era did not offer the choice of Ruthenianethnicity) One of the main vehicles for a Ruthenian cultural revival is RuthenianRenaissance (Rusiacutenska obroda) a cultural organisation founded in 1990 by agroup of people which included several VPN members including the presentmayor of Medzilaborce Mirko Kaliňaacutek who belonged to the lsquooriginal foundersrsquobefore joining KDH but also Peter Fecura who was the district electoralmanager during 1990 and was expelled from the district organisation when VPNHumenneacute was refounded joining HZDS (he was later appointed director of theAndy Warhol Museum) The rival Union of Ruthenian-Ukrainians in Slovakiarepresents a successor organisation to the Cultural Union of Ukrainian Workersand promotes a Ukrainian cultural identity which is perceived to have greatersupport within public institutions such as Slovak TV and Radio (where minoritybroadcasting in the two languages remains amalgamated to the detriment of thelsquoyoungerrsquo language) Given the historical associations this triggers the latentthreat of lsquoold structuresrsquo is probably more real for Ruthenians

9 A more rapid dissipation of momentum associated with the stronger controlmechanisms characteristic of rural settlements especially those dominated by asingle cooperative farm was also found in Pezinok district according to JaacutenHacaj He argues that it was in the countryside that the battle for the lsquonew faceof Slovakiarsquo was lost by VPN with the central leadership and governmentrepresentatives guilty of procrastination before suitable legislation wasproduced empowering cooperative stakeholders for instance to initiate thetransformation of their organisations (interview)

10 Sometimes referred to as lsquoadvocacyrsquo-type NGOs as opposed to lsquoservice-providingrsquo NGOs (Strečanskaacute 2000) In post-communist conditions there is aclose correspondence between this distinction and the distinction between lsquooldrsquoNGOs with their origins in communist or pre-communist associative traditionsand lsquonewrsquo NGOs emerging after 1989

11 A good example from eastern Slovakia is the Košice NGO People and Water

86 Simon Smith

which evolved from a SZOPK local organisation and today coordinates micro-regional development schemes in the Levoča Sabinov and Vranov nad Toplrsquoouregions

12 According to Gajdoš the failure of a Slovak Countryside Renewal programme toget off the ground was due to besides underfunding the failings of lsquolocal self-governing bodies to cope with new enhanced decision-making and governingcompetences and their lack of preparedness for the active coordination ofmunicipal politics and the independent implementation of the developmentalgoals of the communityrsquo (Gajdoš 1995 258) The scheme was re-established in1997 with limited state funding and is still characterised by low levels ofparticipation (only five villages contested the 2001 lsquovillage of the yearrsquocompetition) However organisers insist lsquothe fruits are visible especially incommunities which have been ldquorenewingrdquo themselves for several years and whichdo not wait for grants with outstretched armsrsquo (Obecneacute noviny no 9 2002)

13 The intensive use of the central Bohemian countryside by Prague residents forweekend and summer recreation has little multiplier effect on the micro-economies of affected municipalities because it takes the form of weekendcottages or lsquotrampingrsquo colonies whose users interact little with the surrounding(predominantly agricultural) communities In fact regional planning authoritiestend to view this legacy as a barrier to the regionrsquos development for agro-tourism or tourism linked to the arearsquos many cultural and natural heritage sites(lsquoProgram rozvoje středočeskeacuteho krajersquo Moderniacute obec no 4 2001 IVndashV)

14 Recently the members of a local housing cooperative found themselves at riskof losing their homes due to the mismanagement of its funds by the companydirectors Not only does this illustrate a failure of civic control mechanismswithin the cooperative (allegedly no membership meetings had been held foralmost four years and basic discrepancies between the official accounts and thedeposits actually banked failed to be noticed) the householdersrsquo response ndash toappeal for assistance directly to the Czech government ndash could be taken as asign of a residual paternalism The problem emerged when the company wasdeclared bankrupt shortly after the majority of flats had been transferred intothe ownership of individual householders (a step whose legality has since beenquestioned by the bankruptcy administrator) The irony is that the residentshave finally organised themselves collectively (including protests in front ofgovernment offices in Prague) now that they fear losing their newly acquiredproperties (see Hospodaacuteřskeacute noviny 10 April 2001 4 May 2001 and 12 June2001 transcript of Union of Bohemian and Moravian Housing Cooperativespress conference 16 January 2002 HTTP lthttpwwwscmbdczgt)

15 Successive administrative reforms had reduced the number of Czech municip-alities from about 12000 in the 1960s to 4120 at the end of 1989 by January1992 the spontaneous fragmentation of amalgamated units had pushed thisfigure back up to 6237 (Illner 1992 485ndash6) This was both a part of the lsquodecom-munisationrsquo of society as structures which had emerged as a consequence ofbureaucratic centralism were dismantled and a return to the traditionalcharacter of the Czech countryside where human settlement evolved into adense network of villages separated by clear boundaries such that the villagebecame the natural spatial unit for self-government and lsquoforms of spatial socialand political integration which extend beyond the level of the village were seenas the result of external forcersquo (ibid 486)


16 This has for instance been the experience of the mayor of the town ofKremnica in central Slovakia who has maintained a policy of holding alsquomayorrsquos open door dayrsquo every Wednesday since he was elected in 1990 inrecent years a smaller number of people has made use of the facility which heattributes to the success of the overall communications strategy of the councilin creating channels for public access and feedback The interactions betweenlocal authority and public have gradually been regularised and operationalisedcitizens have learned to utilise standard procedures and open door days havebecome largely symbolic of the councilrsquos open government approach which isactually realised through other fora such as public hearings public meetingsquestionnaires petitions working meetings with local business and NGOrepresentatives and use of the local media (Dom Euroacutepy 2001 46)

17 The Czech Republic (1700) and Slovakia (1850) have the second and thirdlowest average size of basic self-government unit in Europe behind France(1600) (Domino foacuterum no 18 2002)

18 A model for others has been the approach of Libčeves in north-westernBohemia site of one of the first Countryside Renewal schools here thegestation of a land-use plan for the municipality involved a team of specialists(on architecture land and social ecology archeology and transport) workingclosely with local people to identify the particular potentials of differentsettlements within the municipal area The mayor a restituent who had returnedto farm the land of his ancestors following a career in a Prague researchinstitute explains the philosophy behind this approach by reference to localpeoplersquos loss of lsquothe ability to consider the wider significances of thingsrsquo and theconsequent need to lsquodraw them into the gamersquo (Blažek 1997 IV2 and VI3)Another mayor of a north Bohemian village which has become a pioneer in theuse of renewable energy sources and which is embarking on an ambitiousproject to attract young people through an agreement with Liberec Universityto set up a small campus there recalls how crucial the initial formulation of alocal development plan and an overall lsquovisionrsquo was in enthusing other councillorssufficiently to lsquotranscend political party interests and above all the various clanswhich have existed in the village for decadesrsquo (interview with Petr Paacutevek mayorof Jindřichovice Sedmaacute generace no 3 2002)

19 In Slovakia urbanisation lsquoskipped a stagersquo (the stage of spontaneous populationconcentration in response to primitive urbanisation) and after the SecondWorld War was paradoxically a primarily lsquoruralrsquo phenomenon (in spatial terms)based on a contradiction between the localisation of population and thelocation of job opportunities which was overcome by commuting rather thanby migration in the 1970s about 80 per cent of workers worked in urbanprofessions but only a third of them actually lived in towns with two-thirdscommuting to work outside their place of residence This form of dispersedurbanisation partly reflected the inertia of an essentially feudal settlementpattern (and perpetual housing shortages in the major cities) but also resultedfrom the changing social structure of farming communities and families causedby collectivisation where women often remained on the land whilst mencommuted to factories in nearby towns To this extent it was a feature ofsocialist development per se rather than a Slovak anomaly The urbanisation ofthe entire living space of the country involving a reduction in the autarky ofsettlements and their increasing interdependence within lsquourban regionsrsquo or

88 Simon Smith

agglomerations was championed as an expression of the transcendence of classantagonisms town and country were no longer metaphysical opposities and thepassing of a specifically rural worldview was something to be marked (byestablishing museums or other monuments to a rural heritage for example) butnot mourned (Zemko 1978)

20 The recently compiled lsquoVision for the Development of the Czech Republic until2015rsquo which was commissioned by a government advisory council on social andeconomic strategy envisages a growing role for social movements andorganisations in Czech society under each of its three developmental scenariosndash as the mobilisers of resistance to globalisation and proponents of localisedsolutions based on sustainable development under the scenario lsquovictoriousmarketsrsquo as respected social partners incorporated into both governmentplanning and European Union funding structures under lsquoinstitutionaladaptationrsquo or as mediators and interest aggregators according to socialcorporatising trends identified with the scenario lsquosteady progress within thebounds of consensusrsquo (Centrum pro sociaacutelniacute a ekonomickeacute strategie 2001192ndash213 219) In one form or another the growing influence and social prestigeof the civic sector is thus viewed as a predictable and necessary component ofany likely path to social and economic modernisation The lsquoVisionrsquo was writtenby a large team among whose leaders was Fedor Gaacutel (who now works at theSocial Science Faculty of Charles University in Prague) and his 1990 lsquovisionrsquo forOF and VPN comes to mind when reading the sections on political and civicdevelopment The publication of these prognoses as the work of what is ineffect a government-supported thinktank demonstrates the continued currencyof such discourses among opinion-formers in the Czech Republic

21 A clear indication of the importance for local self-empowerment of externalpartners and discourses ndash and one which also confirms the importance of lsquohotrsquoissues which can stimulate local patriotism as seen in J and Ř ndash is the success ofVyšnyacute Čaj a neighbouring village of B in overturning a regional planningdecision to construct a land-fill waste site in the locality 250 inhabitants formeda civic association lsquoFor a healthy Olšava valleyrsquo with assistance from Friends ofthe Earth and supported by the council which documented numerousprocedural lapses in the planning process (most seriously the negativerecommendations of the Environmental Impact Assessment had been ignoredand local objections had not been properly considered) and convinced theEnvironment Ministry to veto the tip According to Ladislav Hegyi of Friends ofthe Earth the decision lsquomeans a lot for many local citizens and for the trust indemocratic mechanisms in Slovakia I am glad that our specialist researchhelped local citizens defend themselves from bad decision-making whichthreatened their quality of lifersquo (Obecneacute noviny no 17 2002) The contrast withthe depressed civic culture in B could not be more stark although furtherresearch would be required to ascertain the full range of causes of this situation

Bibliography

lsquoBeseda za okruacutehlym stolomrsquo (1996) lsquoTretiacute sektor a občianska spoločnosrsquo Socioloacutegiavol 28 no 3 257ndash70

Blažek B (undated) lsquoObnova venkovarsquo Online Available HTTP lthttpforumisuczgt (accessed January 2002)


Blažek B (1997) Sborniacutek Krajinotvorneacute programy PragueLibčeves EcoTerraškola obnovy venkova

Blažek B (1998) Venkov města meacutedia Prague SLONBuček J (2001) lsquoMiestna autonoacutemia samospraacuteva a etnickeacute menšinyrsquo Socioloacutegia

vol 33 no 2 163ndash84Buštiacutekovaacute L (1999) Znaacutemosti osobnostiacute lokaacutelniacute politiky Prague working paper

WP993 Institute of Sociology Academy of Sciences of the Czech RepublicCentrum pro sociaacutelniacute a ekonomickeacute strategie (2001) Vize rozvoje Českeacute republiky

do roku 2015 Prague GutenbergČepelka O (2001) lsquoLEADER ndash budouciacute šance pro českyacute venkovrsquo Zpravodaj

SPOV no 51 Online Available HTTP lthttpforumisuczgt (accessed 27 June2002)

Dom Euroacutepy Bratislava (2001) Informovanostrsquoou proti korupcii BratislavaFaltrsquoan Lrsquo Gajdoš P and Pašiak J (1995) lsquoLokaacutelne aspekty transformaacutecie

Marginaacutelne uacutezemia na Slovensku ndash histoacuteria a suacutečasnosrsquo Socioloacutegia vol 27nos 1ndash2 31ndash8

Frič P (2000) Neziskoveacute organizace a ovlivňovaacuteniacute veřejneacute politiky Prague AGNESFrič P and Strečenskaacute A (1992) Sociaacutelni akteacuteri v procese demokratizaacutecie slovenskej

spoločnosti (Priacutepad poslancov miestnych samospraacutev) Bratislava research reportGajdoš P (1995) lsquoTransformačnyacute proces a rozvojoveacute probleacutemy siacutediel a regioacutenov na

Slovenskursquo Socioloacutegia vol 27 no 4 247ndash63Gorzelak G (1992) lsquoMyacutety o miestnej samospraacuteve v postsocialistickyacutech krajinaacutech na

priacuteklade Polrsquoskarsquo Socioloacutegia vol 24 no 5 431ndash4Hampl M and kol (1996) Geografickaacute organizace společnosti a transformačniacute

procesy v Českeacute republice Prague Přiacuterodnovědeckaacute fakulta Univerzity KarlovyHavel V (1990) Moc bezmocnyacutech Prague Lidoveacute novinyHeřmanovaacute E Illner M and Vajdovaacute Z (1992) lsquoPolitickeacute jaro 1990 na venkově a

v maleacutem městěrsquo Sociologickyacute časopis vol 28 no 3 369ndash85Hudečkovaacute H (1995) lsquoPrivatizace v zemědělstviacute a obnova venkovarsquo Sociologickyacute

časopis vol 31 no 4 449ndash62Illner M (1992) lsquoK sociologickyacutem otaacutezkaacutem miacutestniacute samospraacutevyrsquo Sociologickyacute

časopis vol 28 no 4 480ndash92Kosteleckyacute T (1996) lsquoKomunaacutelniacute volby jako mechanismus vyacuteběru miacutestniacutech

politickyacutech elitrsquo in Hampl and kol 1996 353ndash360Kroupa A and Kosteleckyacute T (1996) lsquoParty Organization and Structure at National

and Local Level in the Czech Republic Since 1989rsquo in Lewis (ed) 1996 89ndash119Kunc J (2000) Stranickeacute systeacutemy v rekonstrukci Prague SLONLewis P (ed) (1996) Party Structure and Organization in EastndashCentral Europe

Cheltenham Edward ElgarLustiger-Thaler H and Maheu L (1995) lsquoSocial Movements and the Challenge of

Urban Politicsrsquo in Maheu (ed) 1995 151ndash68Maheu L (ed) (1995) Social Movements and Social Classes The Future of

Collective Action London SageMalovaacute D (1996) lsquoReprezentaacutecia zaacuteujmov na Slovensku smerom ku korpora-

tivizmursquo Socioloacutegia vol 28 no 6 403ndash14Mihaacutelikovaacute S (1996) lsquoKoncepcie demokracie a demokratizaacutecie (k niektoryacutem

teoretickyacutem a praktickyacutem suacutevislostiam)rsquo Socioloacutegia vol 28 no 5 415ndash30Ministerstvo pro miacutestniacute rozvoj (1998) Integrovaneacute projekty venkovskyacutech mikro-

regionů Metodickaacute pomůčka Prague

90 Simon Smith

Musil J (2001) lsquoVyacutevoj a plaacutenovaacuteniacute měst ve středniacute Evropě v obdobiacute komunistickyacutechrežimůrsquo Sociologickyacute časopis vol 37 no 3 275ndash96

Offe C (1987) lsquoChallenging the boundaries of institutional politics socialmovements in the sixtiesrsquo in Maier C (ed) Changing Boundaries of thePolitical Cambridge Cambridge University Press

Pickvance C (1995) lsquoSocial Movements in the Transition from State SocialismConvergence or Divergencersquo in Maheu (ed) 1995 123ndash50

Pisca L (1984) lsquoZmeny sposobu života vidieckej populaacuteciersquo Socioloacutegia vol 16 no2 176ndash93

Plichtovaacute J and Brozmanovaacute E (1994) lsquoDemokracia na Slovensku z poh13adustarostovrsquo Socioloacutegia vol 26 no 3 245ndash60

Slepička A (1984) lsquoAktuaacutelniacute probleacutemy sbližovaacuteniacute města a venkova v ČSSRrsquoSocioloacutegia vol 16 no 2 194ndash205

Sopoacuteci J (2001) lsquoEconomic Interest Groups in Slovak Politics in the NinetiesrsquoSocioloacutegia vol 33 no 6 535ndash48

Strečanskyacute B (2000) Tretiacute sektor a spoločnos Banskaacute Bystrica ETP SlovakiaStrečanskyacute B and Mesiacutek J (1998) Study on Feasibility of Developing Community

Philanthropy in Slovakia Bratislava ETP Slovakia and Ekopolis FoundationSwain N (1999) lsquoAgricultural Restitution and Co-operative Transformation in the

Czech Republic Hungary and Slovakiarsquo Europe-Asia Studies vol 51 no 71199ndash1219

Wolekovaacute H Petraacutešovaacute A Toepler S and Salamon L (2000) Neziskovyacute sektor naSlovensku ndash ekonomickaacute analyacuteza Bratislava Ediacutecia Tretiacute sektoacuter a dobrovolrsquoniacutectvono 62000

Zemko J (1978) lsquoVyacutevoj vidieka a mesta v Slovenskej socialistickej republikersquoSocioloacutegia vol 10 no 6 490ndash504


4 The development of theenvironmental non-governmentalmovement in SlovakiaThe Slovak Union of Nature andLandscape Conservationists

Mikulaacutes Huba

Introduction

The history of the Slovak Union of Nature and Landscape Conservationists(SZOPK) because it spans the communist and post-communist periodsillustrates some common problems affecting social organisations andparticularly non-governmental organisations (NGOs) faced with thecollapse of one set of macro-social institutions and the need to reintegrateinto the qualitatively different institutional environment which is slowlyemerging from the ruins of communism Such a process of re-adaptationthrows up a series of dichotomous choices for collective social actorscontinuity versus discontinuity autonomy versus greater institutionalis-ation centralisation versus decentralisation lsquobigrsquo versus lsquosmall-scalersquo politicsOrganisational traditions are important here as are the new opportunitiesand constraints imposed by new political social and economic conditionsespecially new opportunities for NGOs to fulfil an information-generatingfunction and thereby contribute to the governance and self-governance ofsociety A hitherto unthinkable degree of self-determination and self-reflection is apparent ndash and arguably necessary ndash if an existing organisationis to survive or a new one establish itself Organisations are ultimatelyaccountable to their members or adherents legitimised and reproducedinsofar as experiences of belonging participation solidarity or empower-ment are valued by a critical mass of individuals involved in the life of theorganisation In a real sense the internal transformation of SZOPK there-fore represents a test-case for the success of the lsquogreat transformationrsquo ofpost-communist societies a measure above all of its participativeness ndashwhether and how it is lsquolived outrsquo by grassroots actors and whether socialmovements are on the one hand accepted as legitimate players in politicaldecision-making and on the other hand able to establish a creative balancebetween utilising institutional channels of influence and reproducinglsquoalternativersquo identities

92 Author

Historical background

From its establishment in 1969 up to the start of the 1980s SZOPK wasthe only environmental NGO operating in Slovakia1 With around 3000members it remains the largest Indeed its significance extends beyondquestions of age and size ndash it developed into a movement which had asignificant impact upon the pre-history and the very course of the Slovaklsquovelvet revolutionrsquo and continued to be almost synonymous in the publicmind with Slovak environmentalism or conservationism in the first yearsthereafter

In the early 1970s SZOPKrsquos agenda had been apolitical and its member-ship consisted of a small number of enthusiasts ndash partly conservationist-romantics partly artists partly specialists from the fields of both conserv-ation and cultural heritage (such as museum curators) An importantlandmark for the organisation was its third congress in 1975 when one ofthe leading figures of Czechoslovak geography the ambitious ProfessorEmil Mazuacuter became chairman He had a strong position in the academicand political worlds while the newly elected secretary the young AndrejFedorko was a highly capable manager as well as a lsquomanipulatorrsquo Togetherthey imprinted on the organisation a mode of operation which character-ised its life up to the autumn of 1989 The organisation had a relativelyliberal character in comparison with similar organisations under strictcontrol of the regime Nonetheless it had a typically centralistic rigidvertical pyramidal structure in which central directives predominated andany form of independence ndash especially any activity which contradicted thecentral party line ndash was prevented or penalised With only a few exceptionsmembers of the core leadership were members of the Communist Party Interms of organisation the model of governance developed within SZOPKrested on a network of district committees and local organisations (ZO)covering practically the whole territory of Slovakia These were effectivelysubject to surveillance or control by the state environmental administra-tion by national committees (local government offices) and other state orparty organisations

Despite this structure however SZOPK acquired the reputation of anactively alternative even oppositional organisation in the years leadingup to November 1989 This was partly because SZOPK if it wanted tojustify its own existence had to carry out meaningful activity Its mainambitions were in the fields of research education and practical fieldactivities Given a reservoir of people who wished to devote their freetime to nature and the environment and given that there was no otherplatform for such activities SZOPK became the lsquoone-eyed king in the landof the blindrsquo It was attractive not only to environmentalists having a moreliberal- and independent-minded leadership than was the norm in otherorganisations affiliated to the National Front and one which enjoyedrelatively more freedom than for instance artistsrsquo unions (because the

Environmental NGOs in Slovakia 93

political significance of environmental issues was only belatedly appreci-ated) it acquired a wider significance for independent cultural and sociallife

Most importantly however a steadily growing number of people withinSZOPK became conscious of the seriousness of the depletion of thecountryrsquos environment the urgency of the threats to Slovakiarsquos natural andcultural heritage and the fact that there was no point in relying on anyoneelse to address these threats (the state environmental administration waschaotically divided among different resorts and national committees andthere was neither a Ministry of the Environment nor a law on the environ-ment before 1989) The seeds of an emerging social movement were firstapparent within the Bratislava ZO no 6 then later within other Bratislavabranches (nos 7 13 and 16) After the publication of Bratislavanahlas(lsquoBratislava aloudrsquo)2 their oppositional-alternative spirit spread to theorganisationrsquos Bratislava city committee which thenceforth constituted arival platform to the national leadership With this organisational base theinfluence of SZOPKrsquos lsquoradical wingrsquo was discernible throughout theorganisation and in wider Slovak society The Bratislava organisation hadaccess to the media it organised lectures discussion fora cultural happen-ings and innumerable other activities (111 different kinds of activity wererecorded in 1988ndash9) and was consequently far more visible to the widerpublic than was the SZOPK central committee

Largely as a result of the activities of the Bratislava organisation the veryterm lsquoconservationistrsquo gained a strongly positive connotation among lsquodemo-craticallyrsquo attuned circles becoming associated with concepts of indepen-dence alternativeness opposition altruism and charity as well as with imagesof the Green movement abroad Conservationists had the unanimoussupport of Bratislava intellectual circles Thanks to their activity in defenceof national cultural heritage sites they even enjoyed the tacit support of thenationally oriented constituency of Slovak society Catholic dissidentsappreciated the strong moral accent and the charitable activities of theconservation movement Political opponents of the normalisation regime aswell as perestroika communists expelled from the Party after 1968 expressedtheir sympathy seeing in the movement a kindred spirit of opposition to theprevailing social system Many scientists came to rely on SZOPK as a semi-independent platform for publishing lsquounfashionablersquo opinions and socio-logists became interested in the organisation as an lsquoisland of positivedeviationrsquo There was also support from the more independent journalistsand from those public figures who had begun to predict the necessity of far-reaching social change Last but not least among SZOPKrsquos receptive con-stituencies were the thousands of people who benefited from the practicalrestorational work of activists in the Slovak countryside the neglected ruralcommunities whom conservationists sought to help

Support multiplied after the publication of Bratislavanahlas in 1987and peaked during the velvet revolution of 1989 when the conservation

94 Mikulaacuteš Huba

movement supplied the lionrsquos share of lsquorevolutionariesrsquo and influenced theprogramme of Public Against Violence (VPN) as well as its non-partisanparticipative tolerant and socially regenerative spirit The public identifiedconservationists as the main bearers of the revolution in Slovakia not leastbecause the original headquarters of VPN was the office of the Bratislavacity committee of SZOPK in Markušova (now Marianska) Street Duringthe first post-communist months SZOPK functioned as a reservoir ofpeople and ideas a network and an infrastructure for the construction of anew democratic political system

Organisational realignment the impact of political changeand international integration on the structure and strategies of the organisation

Such a position of centrality proved to be a mixed blessing for the eco-logical movement For a variety of reasons significant political represent-ation of ecologists did not translate into the effective representation ofecological issues and paradoxically the prominence of members of SZOPKin the revolutionary events and the subsequent establishment of parlia-mentary democracy in Slovakia meant a loss of social capital for theorganisation itself The departure of many prominent members of theradical Bratislava branches was predictable as this was a community whichhad coalesced around conservationism for a variety of reasons of which anemerging ecological consciousness was only one It may also have beenhastened by the outcome of the SZOPK congress which took place lessthan a week before the velvet revolution (itself a revolutionary eventin that it was run for the first time in accordance with democraticprocedures) which produced only a stalemate in the struggle between theconservative national leadership and the Bratislava group of activistsMany of the latter therefore had little reason to remain within theorganisation or at any rate to devote much of their energy to it when theopportunity came to participate at the centre of historic political changesThe list of leading political figures hailing from SZOPK is long Jaacuten Budajndash who more than anyone symbolised the initial stages of the velvetrevolution in Slovakia ndash became the first vice-president of the Slovakparliament Vladimiacuter Ondruš became deputy Prime Minister JosefVavroušek federal Minister of the Environment Mikulaacuteš Huba and PeterTataacuter became MPs and members of the presidium of the Slovak parliamentJuraj Flamik was executive secretary of VPN Juraj Mesiacutek a federal MP andpresident of the Green Party in Slovakia Pavel Šremer was also a federalMP as well as advisor to President Havel and deputy Minister of theEnvironment

This list illustrates the apparent strength of the institutional positionwhich SZOPK quickly acquired altogether the organisation supplied sixmembers of federal or Slovak governments fifteen MPs (mostly as


candidates for either the newly established Green Party or VPN) and itsmembers held a dominant position within the federal committee for theenvironment (the equivalent of a Ministry of the Environment) Membersof the Union held the chairs of both the environmental and health andsocial affairs committees within the Slovak National Council and wererepresented on the board of directors of the State Fund for Culture as wellthe State Fund for the Environment At the local level at least 300 SZOPKmembers were elected as councillors in the November 1990 municipalelections including the mayor of Bratislava (Peter Kresaacutenek) SZOPKmembers took up influential positions within the spheres of scienceeducation and culture sat on advisory councils and specialist commissionsat the national and international scale and on the editorial boards of arange of specialist and popular publications (Eugen Gindl for examplewas editor-in-chief of Verejnostrsquo the daily newspaper published by VPN)But whether they managed to maintain and project an ecological identityin these positions is another question In both the political sphere and thecivil service many former activists showed progressively less awareness oftheir environmentalist origins once installed in their new posts

In terms of the structure of the movement the early 1990s were charac-terised by further internal democratisation and a continuous differenti-ation process SZOPKrsquos internal hierarchies were dismantled or weakenedwith the centre losing its directive role and taking on a coordinatingfunction within the organisation The union was subdivided into thirty-eight coordinating committees (thirty-six district committees and twointerest-based committees the Association of Environmental EducationCentres and the Countryside Association) each of which was essentiallyautonomous in setting its own agenda or programme The lowest level ofaggregation then consisted of around 400 ZOs to which individualmembers were directly affiliated The executive committee of SZOPK waslater accorded the de facto status of a grant commission distributing asignificant portion of SZOPK revenues in the form of project-basedfunding among organisational units Within the formerly centralisedorganisation particular sub-groups and interests established themselves asindependent or semi-independent bodies and a substantial portion oftodayrsquos ecological organisations can trace their origins to SZOPK Theseinclude for example the Slovak River Network the Society for Sustain-able Living the Society for the Protection of Birds the Centre for thePromotion of Local Activism the Consumersrsquo Movement the lsquoWolfrsquo ForestProtection Association the Carpathian Conservationist Association ofAltruists the East Carpathian Association lsquoPčolarsquo People and Water andmany others The organisationrsquos significance today in large part lies in thisrole as a breeding-ground supplying various sections of the non-governmental sector with activists

The remaining core of SZOPK concentrated initially on the apparentlypromising strategy of capitalising on its high social prestige to secure


institutional influence The Union benefited from generous state funding(and was therefore able to pay professional workers in every district inSlovakia and to set up ambitious projects including a network of lsquoeco-centresrsquo which necessitated the purchase of buildings and equipment)Conversely it initiated the creation of the state environmental boards andof ministries at both the Slovak and federal levels Having successfullylobbied for a separate state environmental administration it supplied manyof the personnel for its district offices

Considerable resources were devoted to lobbying with varying degreesof success SZOPK attempted to apply pressure for pro-ecologicalamendments to the state budget and for personnel appointments withinthe state administration sought to influence the legislative process (egtaxation law) to affect government decisions on vital issues such as theGabčiacutekovo dam project and Slovakiarsquos candidacy for the Winter Olympicsand to channel its views into important planning documents such as theReport on the state of the environment Water management policy and theState energy policy The latter two provided notable successes in the shapeof a formal obligation on the Ministries of Agriculture and the Economy tocooperate with SZOPK in the amendment and implementation of waterand energy policy Parliamentary research teams became a usefulinstrument for SZOPKrsquos lobbying campaigns as did Ekoforum an opendiscussion forum which SZOPK initiated Prior to the 1992 parliamentaryelections SZOPK sent a questionnaire to candidates for the SlovakNational Council to gauge their attitudes toward the environment atradition which one of its lsquosplinter organisationsrsquo the Society for Sustain-able Living (STUŽSR) has continued in subsequent elections At theinternational level SZOPK delegations were received by the president andother representatives of the European Bank for Reconstruction andDevelopment by representatives of the World Bank by the former chair ofthe European Parliament by numerous Environment and ForeignMinisters and by other politicians who took part in key internationalconferences on the environment in Bergen Dobřiacuteš and Rio

The most obvious and immediate impact of the macro-political changeson the life of a social organisation such as SZOPK was seen in the field ofinternational relations The period 1990ndash3 saw the movement develop ahuge network of cooperative transnational and international ties thedensity of which reflect the prestige which SZOPK acquired thanks to itsrole in the velvet revolution of 1989 as well as the strategic geographicallocation of Bratislava in a multinational border zone which has attractedmany international environmental organisations to set up regional head-quarters there Preparations for the UN Earth Summit in Rio de Janeirocame at just the right time for Slovak and other post-communist eco-logical organisations to tap into an emerging global environmentalmovement particularly given that the first preparatory meetings tookplace in nearby Vienna and Budapest in March 1990 Czechoslovak


preparations culminated with the hosting of the first pan-European con-ference of Environment Ministers at the chateau of Dobřiacuteš near Praguethe organisation of which (together with the parallel NGO summit)involved SZOPK members in a leading role The whole preparatoryprocess acted as an impulse for coordinated activity with other regionalorganisations and with government on the production of policy docu-ments and reports SZOPKrsquos own lsquomessage for Riorsquo was delivered to thegeneral secretary of the conference and other leading figures and a majorpress conference in Rio was held to highlight the specific environmentalproblems of Central and East European countries The aftermath of Riosaw SZOPK organise a cycle of lectures and discussion fora to popularisethe conclusions of the Earth Summit

SZOPK in keeping with its origins in brigade-based practical conserv-ation has never been a typical campaigning type of non-governmentalorganisation in the tradition of Greenpeace or Friends of the EarthNevertheless the first environmental campaigns after 1989 in Slovakia wereinitiated by SZOPK activists Most of these were directed against plans forlarge-scale industrial energy or infrastructure projects which threatenedlocal ecosystems and which were in most cases lsquohangoversrsquo from the era ofcentral planning When old proposals to host the Winter Olympics in theTatras region were revived in 1991 SZOPK set up a working group tomonitor the bid process It organised a visit to Albertville for ecologistsspecialists and journalists and in 1992 staged a conference called lsquoTheWinter Olympics or the sustainable development of the Tatras regionrsquowhich was designed to facilitate dialogue between representatives andcitizens of the region and ecological activists

The most far-reaching and prolonged environmental campaign inSlovakia which has received worldwide attention concerns the Gabčiacutekovo-Nagymaros dam project on the Danube This campaign effectively began inthe late 1980s when Bratislava branches of SZOPK pushed for the creationof a Danube valley national park on the basis of their own detailed projectSZOPK also published a book called Danube Story and other materialsrelating to the issue After 1989 campaigning against the dam became moreforthright Between 1990 and 1993 the following activities took place twoblockades at the site one lasting for a month fourteen meetings or demon-strations the most spectacular being a human chain involving around60000 people twenty-seven seminars conferences and other meetingsamong environmental organisations twenty of which had internationalparticipation twenty-one press conferences of which eight were inter-national dozens of excursions for interested parties three photographicexhibitions one nature camp parliamentary lobbying plus participation onboth parliamentary and independent committees which discussed theproblem Whilst the future of Gabčiacutekovo remains partially open theoutcomes so far testify to the success of the environmentalistsrsquo campaignthe Nagymaros section of the dam has been scrapped the scale of the


barrier has been reduced nineteen binding conditions imposed by theSlovak Commission for the Environment on the investor amount tosignificant improvements from an ecological perspective a EuropeanParliament resolution to a large extent vindicated environmentalistsrsquoarguments unlawful practices by the investor were uncovered and thedomestic and global public is now much better informed about the issues

Another major campaign led by SZOPK was launched on Earth Day1990 against aluminium production in Žiar nad Hronom Conservationistsappealed to the Slovak government for a lsquogift to Slovakiarsquo in the form ofthe conversion of an industrial plant which not only had catastrophiceffects on human health and the environment but had little economicperspective either with the collapse of COMECON Alternative uses forthe plant were put forward and pressure put on the government to use agrant of 600 million crown ($30 million at 1991 prices) for the rehabilit-ation of the Žiar basin and the revitalisation of historic towns in the regioninstead of subsidising continued and even extended production Thisproposal ndash put by SZOPK parliamentarians ndash failed by just a few votes Thecampaign took on an international dimension because of the involvementof the Norwegian firm Norsk Hydroaluminium and SZOPK cooperatedintensively with Norwegian and international environmental organisations

In common with the international environmental movement as a wholenuclear power has been an important issue for Slovak activists and anongoing anti-nuclear campaign has benefited considerably from newinternational contacts to organisations like Greenpeace Friends of theEarth International and Anti-Atom in Vienna There have been confer-ences publications activities to commemorate the anniversary of Chernobyl(a big rock concert was staged in Bratislava in 1992) a bike ride to thenuclear power plant in Jaslovskeacute Bohunice near Trnava to meet themanagement of the plant an international womenrsquos march from Bratislavato Trnava a lsquohappeningrsquo in Trnava and a similar action in Bratislavademonstrations and petitions against the proposed nuclear power plant inKecerovce television spots and so forth

The influence of international trends in the environmental movement isalso evident in the organisation of campaigns against car use in city centresand for better provisions for pedestrians and cyclists Bratislava quicklyacquired a tradition of car-free days bicycle demonstrations and roadblockades The Campaign for Clean Air also takes its lead from inter-national campaigns In Slovakia it has mainly involved collecting signatureson petitions to lsquopatch up the ozone holersquo

Continuity in practical conservationist activities and public education

If lobbying and a strategy of institutional influence international integra-tion and a campaigning role represented new departures for SZOPK after


1989 the core of its activities in terms of participation levels continued toreside in practical conservation based either on summer brigades or arange of more permanent biodiversity projects Both types of activity sharethe ethos of participation and socialisation which were at the heart of thosebranches of SZOPK which until 1989 acted as communities embodyingalternative values and lifestyles Many of these activities are run more orless spontaneously at the local or regional level with the central leadershipplaying a largely coordinating role Likewise resources invested in publiceducation build on a traditional understanding of the role of the environ-mental movement formulated during the communist era when the scarcityof information about society and the consequent lack of public reflectionon social (including environmental) problems represented one of thecentral mechanisms of social control employed by the regime One of thekey goals of the environmental movement in common with otherlsquooppositionalrsquo groups therefore became the creation of an informed publicopinion (for example organising and later publishing minutes from publichearings with local administrators about planned construction projects)Such a mission remains central to the self-identity of SZOPK to this day

In 1991 SZOPK decided to initiate a project to record and mapSlovakiarsquos wetlands which is an obligation according to the Ramsarconvention signed by Czechoslovakia in 1990 Two hundred volunteersmostly SZOPK members were recruited and trained in this field A seriesof projects related to wildlife conservation and zoology For exampleproject Falco aimed to link the protection of birds of prey with publiceducation about ecology evoking wide public and media interest Morethan 400 students took part some of whom went on to set up birdprotection groups thanks to cooperation between SZOPK and schools

The majority of SZOPK local branches carry out routine environmentalmonitoring activities in their own territories especially those that arelocated in national parks where SZOPK has traditionally assisted thenational parks administration its volunteers ably supplementing parkwardens in carrying out watches inventories of flora and fauna and theupkeep of paths fences signposts and so on But SZOPK has also engagedin the preparation of specialist materials to support (mostly successful)applications for new protected regions in Krupinskaacute planina ČergovDunaj-Morava and Silickaacute planina Many local branches have devotedspecial attention to the protection of traditional architectural or historicalobjects either by putting forward applications for new monuments orthrough voluntary restoration and conservation work in dozens oflocations One notable example has been the preservation of a traditionalagricultural landscape in the White Carpathian mountains (later takenover by the STUŽSR regional branch in Trenčiacuten) Another local experi-ment designed to demonstrate the viability of sustainable developmentprinciples in the countryside has been run in collaboration with the localcouncil in the village of Vištuk near Bratislava whilst a group of young


conservationists set up the VESNA farm geared towards alternative agri-culture and conceived similarly with a strong public educational purposeConservation of trees and lsquogreen beltrsquo land constitutes a major part ofSZOPKrsquos practical activities Activists are involved in public informationinventorisation and surveillance of threatened trees and green belt landThey also carry out tree-planting and tree-maintenance

SZOPK has become the leading provider of environmental educationoutside the school sector in Slovakia and is active at central regional andlocal levels It has built up a network of fifteen centres for ecologicaleducation which accounted for the bulk of the grant income whichSZOPK received in the early 1990s Most basic organisations also devoteconsiderable time and resources to educational activities in cooperationwith primary and secondary schools state regional cultural centreslibraries museums and planetaria Besides providing public educationthrough its own infrastructure SZOPK has been closely involved in theprovision of training for government environmental officers and teachersat primary and secondary schools where it has developed and taughtcourses and provided teaching materials on ecological themes Commit-ment to public education has also brought SZOPK into cooperation withorganisations and institutions such as the National Centre for CulturalEducation the Slovak Childrenrsquos Fund and various journals Between 1990and 1993 SZOPK ran the Green Gallery in Bratislava many of whoseexhibitions then toured the country The gallery also housed a library andvideo-library serving schools and public education facilities and anenvironmental advice shop The television programme lsquoEko-alejrsquo whichSZOPK initiated together with its own publishing activities also amountto major investments in public education

One of its most significant post-1989 initiatives was the launch of thelsquoSlovak forum of conservationists and creators of the environmentrsquo other-wise known as Ekoforum as a platform for matter-of-fact discussionamong all those interested in the improvement of the state of Slovakiarsquosenvironment in the full sense of the term Its regular or ad hoc thematicmeetings have given the lay and specialist public the chance to participatein debate around a particular environmental issue Another attempt toconnect with opinion in all parts of the country and all levels of society wasfacilitated by the announcement of lsquoCaring for the Earth ndash a Strategy forSustainable Livingrsquo in late 1991 (coordinated by IUCN UNEP and WWF)SZOPK was responsible for translating the document into both Slovak andCzech and subsequently distributed the Slovak version to public officialsschools libraries and centres for ecological education On the day of theformal announcement it ceremoniously handed over a copy to everymayor in Slovakia

During its entire existence SZOPKrsquos activities have been unthinkablewithout summer conservation camps Since 1989 however the burden forthis type of activity has been passed from nationwide to local and regional


structures of the organisation Stress has been increasingly laid on practicallsquofirst aidrsquo for the environment in a given region This has typically taken theform of brigade work on the upkeep of state nature reserves thereconstruction of traditional folk architecture or the clean-up of protectedareas of natural beauty Brigades have taken on additional functionsbesides their traditional purpose of education socialisation popularisationand scientific research Thus the summer camp in Bodiacuteky in 1991 grew intoa form of direct action for the protection of the Danube inspired by thecampaign against the dam while the summer camp in Vištuk has developedinto a running project designed to find a mode of sustainable developmentfor the parish

Conclusions from outsider to leading political force ndash and back again

The exceptionally high public prestige enjoyed by SZOPK together withdirect links to the dominant parties in the first post-communist federal andrepublic governments in Czechoslovakia allowed it to exert considerableinfluence up to 1992 Civic Forum and Public Against Violence bothhad strong environmental wings and were committed to a version ofparticipative democracy which offered scope for the involvement of non-parliamentary organisations in government decision-making Thus theperiod 1990ndash2 provided the best conditions for institutionalised participa-tion in government SZOPKrsquos influence then extended beyond purelyenvironmental issues for example it was among those civic organisationsinvited to participate on the creation of new human rights legislation andon plans for the establishment of an ombudsman

After the 1992 elections Slovak environmentalists found themselveswith little or no direct representation in parliament and to a large extent ndashas the new government led by the Movement for a Democratic Slovakia ofVladimiacuter Mečiar began a purge of the state administration ndash SZOPK lostits influence on the implementation of environmental policy and thedistribution of funds Its own state funding was substantially cut and it wasincreasingly less able to afford to maintain a paid staff member in eachdistrict of Slovakia Many of these personnel were not prepared to work ona voluntary basis and SZOPK proved incapable of raising alternativefunding which led to a split within the movement The leadership founditself accused of being lsquotoo radicalrsquo or lsquoinsufficiently loyalrsquo to the govern-ment by staff who had come to treat the organisation essentially as ameans of earning a living Consequently the eighth SZOPK congress inApril 1993 produced a substantial turnover in the leadership and a policyshift which clipped the wings of the more innovative progressive andradical environmentalists who had held the upper hand since 1990 Thepolitical polarisation which afflicted the whole of Slovak society in the


period around independence (in January 1993) inevitably affected SZOPKtoo In response to leadership and policy changes the majority of the moreactive groups and sections within SZOPK broke away and foundedindependent environmental organisations Some however given the looseorganisational structure which SZOPK adopted after 1989 found sufficientspace within the organisation to retain an affiliation This applies to theBratislava organisation some centres of environmental education and theAlternative Energy Fund3 But during this era SZOPK increasingly lost itsrole and authority as the figurehead of Slovak environmentalism particu-larly among the young and for the first time one can speak of newenvironmental organisations which do not owe their origins to SZOPKThis process of pluralisation was aided by the increasing activity ofestablished international organisations such as Greenpeace in Slovakiaand the increasing dependence of the NGO sector as a whole on foreignsources of funding during the Mečiar era

Today SZOPK has practically ceased to exist as a nation-wide organis-ation It survives in the form of several regional or local branches engagingmostly in traditional forms of nature protection and environmental educa-tion lsquoNewrsquo environmental NGOs are much more popular ambitious andinfluential Ironically many of these have their roots in SZOPK It is forthis historic role as the agent of first pre-revolutionary social and civicmobilisation and then post-revolutionary organisational transformationwithin the emerging NGO sector that the Slovak Union of Nature andLandscape Conservationists and especially its Bratislava branch meritsscientific consideration and public acknowledgement For the same reasonsit also shares the blame for the absence of a truly modern self-confidentand influential environmental movement in Slovakia today The prospectsfor environmentalism seemed very good in 1989 given the debt owed bythe lsquovelvet revolutionrsquo to the ideals and the human potential of pre-1989conservationism (and in particular to the community within and aroundSZOPK) But instead of being the symbolic launchpad for fulfilment of thispotential within a wide social and political context November 1989 waslsquostolenrsquo from the environmental movement and retrospectively imbuedwith a range of significations among which the desire for a lsquogreenerrsquo futureno longer figures prominently

Notes

1 A second NGO Strom Života (Tree of Life) was formed in 1979 as a youthorganisation oriented towards organising conservationist brigades and environ-mental education but without an overall conception of the environment as aproblem let alone a political issue

2 A lengthy painstakingly researched document published in 1987 summarisingthe environmental problems of the capital city region as well as touching uponits social and cultural lsquoecologyrsquo Bratislavanahlas represented an indictment of


the communist-era urban and industrial development of Bratislava and becamea rallying point for both criticism of the regime and a renewed civic activism tolsquoreclaimrsquo the city for its inhabitants

3 SZOPK set up a working group under the title lsquoAlternative Energy Fundrsquo in1990 Its main aim has been to provide information to the public about thepossibilities for use of solar wind water and biomass energy and it haspublished a number of studies on alternative energy policies


5 Dual identity andor lsquobread and butterrsquoElectronics industry workers in Slovakia 1995ndash2000

Monika Čambaacutelikovaacute

Introduction

This chapter characterises working life and industrial relations in twoSlovak electronics plants based on a comparison of selected findings fromthe second (1995) and third (2000) phase of the international researchproject lsquoThe Quality of Working Life in the Electronics Industryrsquo (see note1 in Kroupa and Mansfeldovaacute in this volume for further details)

The principal source was a survey of workersrsquo attitudes using a standard-ised questionnaire supplemented by data from other surveys and interviewswith experts In order to take into account the specific conditions of con-temporary Slovakia the findings are presented in conceptual and empiricalcontext with reference to system transformation to economic conditionsand the state of the labour market and to the framework of industrialrelations and social partnership in Slovakia during the period concerned

Post-socialist transformation towards a democratic and capitalist systemin the East European context involves a simultaneous and coordinatedtransformation of both the political and the economic system Politicalreform itself involves a combination of two elements constitutionalguarantees of citizensrsquo rights and development of the democratic right ofparticipation (Offe and Adler 1991) The civil right to private propertyoffered citizens ndash either as owners and employers or as employees ndash theopportunity to emerge from the relative homogeneity of the lsquoworkingpeoplersquo (when everyone was employed by a monopolistic owner andemployer ndash the state) via specific individual strategies The other side of thecoin was the exclusion of a further group of citizens ndash the unemployed ndashfrom the labour market

Sociological treatment of these processes in Slovakia has encompassedbiographical-interpretative approaches focusing on the behavioural andmotivational dimensions of private business formation (Kusaacute and Tirpaacutekovaacute1993) as well as on questions of social identity among the unemployed asexpressed in their autobiographical narratives (Kusaacute and Valentšiacutekovaacute

Chapter Title 105

1996) qualitative survey approaches have also been used for example toexamine the attitudes of young people towards enterprise self-employ-ment and unemployment (Machaacuteček 1997 Roberts and Machaacuteček 2001)However the prevailing methodology has involved standardised represent-ative public opinion surveys of the (declared) values of individualsInterpretation of the resulting data on generalised social attitudes hastypically led to inferences about the (non-)adaptability of the populationto the transformation from an authoriarian to a democratic politicalsystem from a centrally planned to a market economy and from a state-dominated social system to modern social policies Such interpretationshave become the basis for constructing and measuring pro- and anti-transformation lsquopotentialrsquo in society and as such they often lead to theconclusion that social adaptation to the system change demands primarilya change in socio-cultural stereotypes and attitudes As a consequenceanalysis of structural conditions and the macro-level economic and socialframework of transformation and above all of the social micro-sphere ofplants firms or workplaces has been neglected For instance the surveylsquoPerformance of entrepreneurial activities in transportrsquo (October 1992 426respondents) produced the finding that the most important motivations forbusiness start-up decisions were lsquobetter prospects for self-realisationrsquo (84per cent) and lsquothe opportunity to provide better servicesrsquo (78 per cent)Overwhelming verbal declarations for these kinds of values in surveysfrequently overshadow possible structural determinants such as (in thiscase) lsquolack of perspective of the firmrsquo where the respondent worked (47 percent) or lsquothe need to come to terms with loss of workrsquo (46 per cent)1 This isproblematic in an historical period in which research has pointed to thefrequent occurrence of lsquocognitive breakdownrsquo (Krivyacute 1993) ndash the adoptionof inconsistent beliefs when individuals agree with contradictory state-ments or when preferences declared in surveys are disconnected frompeoplersquos actual behaviour and from the development of the real situationat the level of the economy or society2

In 1995 when there were already de facto more employees in theprivate sector than in the public sector (by 1159000 to 979000) mostemployees questioned ndash regardless of which sector they themselves workedin ndash declared that they would prefer to be employed in the public sector orspecifically by a state enterprise3 For those who did not adopt this attitudethe attraction of work in the private sector was often connected with thedesire (which may or may not have been actually realised) to set up theirown firm Jobs in firms owned by another (private) person were generallyunpopular among workers In other words the private sector was valued asa sphere of self-realisation by real or potential (co)ownersemployerswhile the public or state sector was valued by the majority of real orpotential employees (Čambaacutelikovaacute 1997) Although this sample of workerswas on balance positive about the benefits of privatisation for the economyas a whole the overwhelming consensus was against their own firmrsquos

106 Monika Čambaacutelikovaacute

privatisation 458 per cent felt that state ownership was the best guaranteeof their firmrsquos development when asked to choose from a range of optionsthe next most popular of which was ownership by employee shareholderswith only 13 per cent (38 per cent favoured foreign ownership and just 17per cent supported the current management) The existence of suchdivergent opinion on privatisation in general and privatisation of onersquosown employing enterprise is all the more significant given the nature of theprivatisation process in Slovakia as a process realised and controlled bypolitical elites that derived their legitimacy and competences from citizenson the basis of free elections Employees of a particular firm were notasked their opinions except as voters in which role they were more likelyto express their views on privatisation in general

Post-socialist transformation is not a nationally isolated process Exo-genous influences have played an important role in shaping the economicand political structures of transforming societies The creation of an entirelynew class of entrepreneurs and owners has been a political processdetermined and directed by real actors In contrast to its western version themarket economy that is emerging in Eastern Europe resembles lsquopoliticalcapitalismrsquo it is a lsquoxeroxedrsquo capitalism arranged and enforced by reformelites (Offe and Adler 1991) This has two consequences firstly the success-ful negotiation of this type of transformation depends politically onprocesses of democratic legitimation and social consensus building andsecondly the transformation cannot be completed until it penetrates not justthe form but also the content of the economy It must encompass economicinstitutions economic actors (individuals firms and corporations) andlsquoeverydayrsquo economic practices

On the political level lsquothe principle of citizenship begins with the estab-lishment of political regimes in which civil rights and civic participation canbecome necessary elements of the constitutionrsquo while lsquomodern socialconflict is about attacking inequalities that restrict citizensrsquo full particip-ation in the social economic or political realmrsquo (Dahrendorf 1991 73) Inthis sense the process of democratisation is also the process of establishinginstitutions that mediate citizenship in all its dimensions ndash on the one handconnecting citizens with the polis and on the other hand connectingcitizens with the market since democratic conceptions of citizenship stressthat the rights of the citizen comprise political civil and social or economicrights

Economic democracy can be understood in a wider sense ndash as a demo-cracy with the political aims of wealth redistribution and equal access toeconomic opportunities but it also has a narrower meaning (in the sense ofindustrial democracy) ndash the participation of workers in the managementand control of the production process especially at plant level (Sartori1993) At the start of the transformation in Slovakia the sphere of politicaland civil rights was prioritised over the sphere of economic rights This isreflected in social attitudes where citizensrsquo participation in the democratic

Dual identity andor lsquobread and butterrsquo 107

process as revealed both in their declarations and in their actualbehaviour is effectively reducible to the roles and the status of a politicalcitizen With the exception of social partnership and collective bargainingparticipation is realised independently of economic activities and outsidethe working environment of citizen-employees Industrial democracy atplant level remains a potential rather than an actual expression of demo-cratic citizenship which has so far run up against both economic and socio-psychological limits Social partnership and social dialogue offer potentialinstitutional solutions to this problem they are tried and tested democraticmeans of participation in decision-making processes both in society and inthe firm (mainly in connection with social policy work conditions wagesand the status of employees) Simultaneously (and this applies especially totripartite institutions at the macro level) they are a forum for extra-parliamentary social debate geared towards the creation of social con-sensus and thus an instrument for the democratic but lsquonon-politicalrsquo andlsquoparty-neutralrsquo legitimation of the transformation process in the economicand social spheres and in the sphere of industrial relations

Social dialogue and social partnership in Slovakia

Since the institutionalisation of social partnership in the Slovak Republicsocial dialogue has been accomplished at three levels

1 the micro-level (the firm)2 the meso-level (industrial branches and regions)3 the macro-level (the tripartite)

At the beginning of the period of rapid social changes and system trans-formation a certain institutional vacuum emerged In the absence ofintermediary structures between state and society precipitately emergingpolitical parties and other institutions tried to fill this vacuum The insti-tutions of social partnership and social dialoque were established at thistime Social partnership in Slovakia has been (in comparison with mostEuropean states with a market economy) institutionalisd in the specificcontext of a social structure homogenised by the socialist system at a date(1990) when the main actors (employersrsquo associations and standard tradeunions) did not yet exist The formation of the Council for Economic andSocial Accord (as the tripartite council is officially known) was influencedat the outset not just by this relatively homogenised social structure butalso by the high political legitimacy and social prestige of the governmentafter November 1989 Trade unions ndash burdened by their past as the lsquoheirs ofstate-controlled unionsrsquo and without a clear conception of thetransformation ndash could not be a real social partner for the governmentEmployers and their associations were only just forming with the state stillhaving a near monopoly in terms of employment and enterprise The


government could therefore assume the dominant role in the tripartite Thesocial partners accepted the discourse of political elites on the need for therapid creation of a lsquocapital-creating classrsquo (enterpreneurs and employers)the need to increase the effectivity and competitiveness of the Slovakeconomy and reorientate it towards global and western markets and theneed to simultaneously maintain social peace This systemic conception ofsocial change initially enjoyed general societal support Nevertheless thecreation of the tripartite council could be considered a signal that theauthors of the new political system realized that transformation in thesphere of work and collective labour relations would lead to tensions andthat it would be necessary to create institutions in which conflicts could beresolved or prevented by negotiation

After November 1989 the government strengthened its position throughlegislative changes trade unions lost some of their co-decision making andcontrol competences especially at the level of the enterprise Attacks ontrade union competences were probably motivated in part by the assump-tion that extensive union powers in enterprises could complicate the processof restructuring and privatisation Nevertheless while trade unions gave upsome of their rights and competences in the process of democratisation theygained others including the right to participate in tripartite negotiations andthe exclusive right to represent employees at all levels of social dialogue(including collective bargaining) Privatisation made it possible for someformer employees ndash the managers of former state enterprises ndash to becamethe new owners of privatised enterprises and thus to become employers TheSlovak governmentrsquos preference for this form of privatisation reflected itsincreasingly close connections with an emerging employersrsquo interest groupThis also meant that the government could assume the support and loyalityof employers in the framework of tripartite negotiations

The remit for tripartite negotiations according to its original statuteincluded economic issues social issues wages and work conditions whilethe outcome of negotiations should be a lsquoGeneral Agreementrsquo governingconditions and relations in these spheres However it only had the status ofa lsquogentlemenrsquos agreementrsquo ndash unlike collective agreements at the enterpriseor branch level the General Agreement had no legal but lsquoonlyrsquo political ormoral force The tripartite made it possible for social partners to particip-ate in the resolution of problems connected with the transformation ofsociety and work within the framework defined by their newly specifiedcompetences It enabled them to take standpoints on legislative proposalsand the view of the tripartite council was presented in parliament as anexplanatory attachment to each bill Constitutionally however the socialpartners ndash including the government ndash have no guarantee that their agree-ment will become law since parliament (the Slovak National Council) isthe sovereign legislative power

The systemic transformation of social and labour-law conditions givenabove all by the Labour Code and the systems of social health and old age


insurance has not yet been completed in Slovakia The tripartite wasconceived as an important forum for extra-parliamentary input into theseproblems but also for dealing with questions which exceed the scope ofenterprise collective agreements and the competences of their actors Ittherefore remains relevant not least because the actual scope and extentof collective bargaining at the enterprise level is relatively narrow thecontent of collective agreements is defined on the one hand by theLabour Code (conditions in a collective agreement cannot be at variancewith the Code) and on the other hand by the legally enshrined com-petences of trade unions at the enterprise level Adjustment of both theseconstraints (ie liberalisation versus regulation of industrial relations) hasbeen one of the most important topics of tripartite negotiations Tradeunions used the tripartite to demand the legal codification of their owncompetences in relation to national or regional public institutions such asthe emerging labour market institutions In this way they managed toacquire some significant competences especially in terms of participationin new public corporations such as social insurance health insurance andpension funds However governments especially in more recent yearshave not accepted many union demands some of which wereincompatible with a parliamentary political system (for example thedemand for tripartite conclusions to be binding for the next phase of thelegislative process)

Social partnership and social dialogue have been strongly conditionedby the history of privatisation Government pledges in the course of socialdialogue and social partnersrsquo demands towards government have to beharmonised with the latterrsquos competences in conditions of ownershipplurality The state is no longer the monopoly employer and enterpreneurand the difference between conditions in the public and private sectors isincreasing Moreover differentiation between branches and regions causesfurther problems for the coordination of negotiations at the national levelwith the result that agreements passed at this level are more and moregeneral and formalistic In Slovakia the private sector now produces morethan 80 per cent of gross domestic product and more than three-quartersof the workforce is employed by private companies Thus as a result of theeconomic transformation process it is enterprise-level industrial relationswhich have the greatest significance which provides employees andemployers with greater scope to influence labour relations through legallybinding bilateral collective agreements4

The Slovak economy 1995ndash2000

In view of the standardised research methodology of the main survey datawhich this chapter draws upon a consideration of economic and industrialdevelopment in the relevant period is necessary to provide both a con-textual framework of working life (since workersrsquo evaluation of the changes


between 1995 and 2000 are reported in the survey) and also ndash given thespecificities of Slovakiarsquos economic and political development during theperiod ndash an important explanatory framework for the outcomes and changesidentified

Between 1994 and 1998 Slovakia achieved a relatively high and amongthe transition economies the highest rate of growth in GDP Howevergrowth was achieved at the cost of disequilibrium that meant conditionsfor sustainable growth were never established and a significant decline inthe rate of economic growth occurred from 1998 This disequilibrium ischaracterised by an imbalance between final consumption expenditure anddomestic production (as a volume of GDP) as a result gross domesticconsumption has been higher than the productivity of the economy couldsustain Disequilibrium is to a large extent structurally conditioned demandwhich is naturally diversified consists of mainly finished products whilesupply consists of mainly unprocessed and intermediate products In otherwords the Slovak economy suffers from a persistently low degree ofproduct finalisation The greatest proportion of this internal disequilibriumwas accounted for by expenditure in the state administration and in thesphere of investments Capital investment saw an enormous growthbetween 1996 and 1998 but was dominated by infrastructural investmentsespecially energy generation (including the completion of a nuclear powerstation) and transportation (highways) Investments in manufacturingindustry were directed mainly to less sophisticated branches contrary tothe objectives of state industrial policy which sought to change thestructure of industry in favour of production with high value added andlow material and energy intensity Thus the existing disadvantageousproduction structure was even further entrenched

The inefficient direction of investments was supported by industrialpolicy which ndash through tax allowances and large guarantees for loans toindustry ndash created a soft environment with no pressure towards higherefficiency and more competitive production programmes This furtherexacerbated the state budget deficit which in turn fed directly (throughstate expenditure and loan guarantees) and indirectly (through tax allow-ances) into the widening of the gap between consumption and productionInternal economic disequilibrium also fed into external disequilibrium interms of a deficit of the current account of the countryrsquos balance of pay-ments Foreign currency reserves were used up and the exchange rate ofthe Slovak crown fell Among the contributory factors here were therelatively high share of foreign loans the predominance of short-termfinance within the overall structure of capital and finance sourcing and thelow volume of foreign direct investments The obvious way to redress theseimbalances would involve sticking to a sustainable balance of paymentsdeficit and maintaining high-quality portfolios within capital and financialaccounts which should be restructured away from loans in favour offoreign direct investments


The low level of foreign investments in Slovakia has been partly causedby the transformation of property relations specifically by the overt pre-ference for domestic applicants when selling industrial companies ownedby the state During the prime ministership of Vladimiacuter Mečiar the favour-ing of domestic buyers and owners in the privatisation process manifesteditself in growing mistrust and caution on the part of foreign partners As aresult the Slovak economy showed the lowest level of participation ininternational capital flows within the region5

Wages

In 1997 average monthly wages in Slovakia for employees with basic andprimary education reached only 175 (when recalculated per full-timeoccupation) which is 82 times lower than the average income in EUcountries for employees with secondary education the figure was 237(86 times lower than in the EU) and for employees with universityeducation it was 501 (54 times lower than the EU mean) In 1999 theofficial minimum wage was 1162 in Luxembourg 357 in Portugal butjust 94 in Slovakia6 The level of real wages in Slovakia in 1999 was stillbelow that at the start of the transformation in 1989 In fact real wages fellfurther in 1999 by 31 per cent mainly due to price increases and risingcosts of housing water electricity gas health care services recreation andculture

Prices

The level of inflation as measured by the consumer price index reflectedthe gradual adoption of administrative and economic measures to deregul-ate prices increases in prices which continued to be centrally regulatedand tax rate changes (especially value added tax and excise duties)Between 1995 and 1998 inflation remained below 7 per cent but in 1999 itincreased to almost 15 per cent


Table 51 Foreign direct investment inflows in CEFTA countries

Cumulative Cumulative FDI (million US$) FDI per

capita (US$)1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1998

Slovakia 366 552 733 1328 1517 1700 436Czech R 2153 3191 5923 7061 6763 8700 844Poland 2828 4321 6832 12028 17705 30700 795Hungary 6632 8316 13265 16093 17529 19400 1902Slovenia 954 1331 1754 1934 2400 2600 1300

Source Foreign Direct Investment in Central and East European Countries WIIW ViennaJuly 1999

Employment

In the early phase of the transformation process employment fell mainly asa consequence of the conversion of the armaments industry and thecollapse of East European markets Further decreases in employment wereconnected with the processes of enterprise restructuring In the 1993ndash9period economic growth had no positive impact in terms of job creationWhile the increase of GDP was 329 per cent in the period 1994ndash8 theemployment rate increased by just 1 per cent That means that GDPgrowth was obtained thanks to increasing labour productivity (up 316 percent in the same period) However this was achieved simply by enterpriseslaying off surplus labour7

During the period surveyed employment gradually decreased in thepublic sector (by 24 per cent) and increased in the private sector (by 15 percent) Accordingly the share of the private sector in total employment grewfrom 405 per cent in 1994 to 652 per cent in 1998 The branch structure ofemployment has also changed The branch with the highest number ofemployees is still industry but its share of total employment fell from 303per cent in 1995 to 296 per cent in 1999 The greatest falls in employmentwere recorded in agriculture industry and construction On the other handthe number of employees increased in public administration health publicand social services education insurance and banking

Unemployment

The unemployment rate increased by approximately 6 per cent between1995 and 1999 (from 131 per cent to 192 per cent) although this is partlyexplainable by demographic trends the economy failed to create sufficientdemand for the increased supply of labour entering the market Thisshortfall has been widening whereas in 1997 the annual increase in newjobs was 160000 only 90000 new jobs were created in the year toDecember 1999 The most vulnerable groups in the labour market areyoung people without work women taking care of their children peoplewith low education skills and physically disabled people They form thecore of the long-term unemployed So-called social unemployment is also aproblem since groups on the lowest wages cannot achieve higher incomesthrough the labour market in comparison with unemployment benefit orother social benefits The ratio between the minimum wage unemploymentbenefit and social support is 4000 3456 3093

Regional differences in the unemployment rate have been deepeningAt the end of 1999 when the national registered unemployment ratepeaked at 1918 per cent the difference between the highest unemploy-ment rate (Rimavskaacute Sobota district ndash 3736 per cent) and the lowest one(Bratislava district ndash 421 per cent) was 3315 percentage points Unemploy-ment trends are alarming from the perspective of regional development in


eleven districts unemployment is more than 30 per cent and in 39 it is morethan 20 per cent (out of seventy-nine districts in Slovakia)8

Labour market policies

Labour market policies consist of a system of social support and socialassistance provided to citizens enabling them to participate in the labourmarket Today the authorities involved in labour market policies are theMinistry of Labour Social Affairs and the Family and the National LabourOffice (NLO) According to Act no 3871996 on employment the NLO wasestablished as a public corporation on the principle of tripartism based onthe cooperation and co-responsibility of the social partners The NLO isfunded on an insurance principle and is separate from the state budgetLabour market policies in Slovakia rest on redistributive and socialsolidarity principles and consist of two components passive labour marketpolicy (especially unemployment benefit and payments to health and socialinsurance funds for certain categories of registered unemployed) and activelabour market policy (the primary objective of which is to assure the rightof citizens to suitable employment through the creation of new jobs themaintenance of existing jobs and the establishment of conditions necessaryfor professional and spatial mobility) The resources for active labourmarket policy depend directly on the expenses for passive labour marketpolicy in a given year because the right to unemployment benefit is a legalright under the Employment Act Given that mandatory expenditure onpassive labour market policy has been increasing the relation betweenoutgoings on active and passive labour market policy has fallen from 1787per cent in 1995 to 1401 per cent in 1996 777 per cent in 1997 and 417per cent in 19989

Working time

The duration of working time (per year or per week) is comparable withEuropean Union countries but the flexibility of working time is lower TheSlovak labour market is characterised by the low number of employeeswho work part-time (in 1999 only 2 per cent of all workers ndash the EUaverage was 17 per cent in 1997) Besides demonstrating the low flexibilityof work patterns this also reflects the fact that the earned income for part-time work is insufficient to cover average living costs in Slovakia InDecember 1999 a new regulation on part-time work was written into theLabour Code bringing Slovak labour law into line with European Councilresolution 9781ES on part-time working and its aim is to increase theshare of part-time workers

In 1999 District Labour Offices permitted 7191267 over-time hoursabove the limits set by the Labour Code equivalent to jobs for 3596additional workers Nevertheless tighter regulation by Labour Offices saw


the number of over-time hours permitted decrease in 1999 in comparisonthe previous year when 18602896 hours were approved ndash equivalent to9301 jobs10

The Slovak electronics industry 1995ndash2000

As already noted Slovak industry is characterised by a strong dependencyon traditional industries and too low a share of modern industriesSlovakiarsquos specificity is the fact that industrial policy has to be imple-mented in a situation where much of the economy requires restructuringmeaning both the winding down of ineffective companies and industriesand a shift of economic activity into new industries and areas An indirectindicator of the level of restructuring is the ability of Slovak enterprises tosucceed in foreign markets Electronics enterprises saw exports grow by afactor of four during the last four years Yet despite these increases Slovakproducers suffer from low competitiveness in foreign markets Accordingto an analysis by the Ministry of the Economy only 18 per cent of totalexports are competitive in quality with a further 29 per cent offeringlsquostandardrsquo quality and able to succeed on grounds of price The remainder ndashmore than half of production for export ndash is problematic from the view-point of competition The problem is related to the low level of productfinalisation lsquothis is caused above all by the tendency of firms with foreignparticipation to utilise overwhelmingly components originating outsideSlovakia in the production of the final productrsquo claims A Lanciacutek generalsecretary of the Union of the Electronics Industry of the Slovak Republic(the sectoral employersrsquo organisation) Despite recent increases in theadded value of production labour productivity per employee in electronicsenterprises still falls behind average productivity in industry by as much as30 per cent The reason lies in a continuing high share of manual labourSlovakiarsquos cheap labour force remains its strongest competitive advantageand in contrast with the decrease of employment in industry as a wholeelectronics enterprises show employment growth and today they employapproximately 8 per cent of workers in industry

The electronics industry in Slovakia has been privatised since 1996 allenterprises in this branch have been in private hands The share of firmswith foreign participation is approximately 85 per cent of total branchproduction and much of this foreign capital is represented by major firmssuch as Siemens SONY ALCATEL SEL Motorola Bull ABB OSRAMand Emerson In 1999 investments in the branch reached three billion Skan increase of 44 per cent on 1998 and these growth trends are expectedto continue Capital investment also depends heavily on foreign firmsBut lsquoalthough the increases have been relatively high we cannot considerthis level of investment as sufficient because the needs of electronicsenterprises are higherrsquo according to the analysis of the Ministry of theEconomy


From dual deviation to dual identity

The questionnaires distributed in the two sample electronics plantsrevealed one very important change in industrial relations in the last fiveyears whereas in 1995 there was a tendency towards dual deviation (whereworkers identify neither with the management nor with their trade union)in 2000 dual identity (where workers identify with both plant managementand trade unions) clearly predominated11

One-sided types of identity (oriented towards either management orunion) remained almost unchanged and applicable to only a small minorityof workers On the contrary Slovak experience seems to confirm theprevailing tendency observed in the previous phases of the internationalresearch implying that East European workers too prefer either dualdeviation or dual identity to a one-sided type of identity

The explanatory hypothesis which emerges is that management andunions no longer constitute alternative sources for identification and loyaltyIn the traditional model of industrial relations based on class antagonismemployee identity is supposed to be oriented towards either managementor unions lsquoDual identityrsquo could result from the heralded shift from class-based conflict to a model of industrial relations based on organisationalintegration

The simple labour contract and the service relationship

In the relevant sociological literature (eg Giddens 1999 268 271) twobasic types of employment relations are distinguished the simple labourcontract and the service relationship The simple labour contract is charac-teristic for the situation of workers in the early phases of western industrial-isation and is associated with the traditional type of confrontationalindustrial relations This type of employment relationship implies thatwages are exchanged for labour the employee is easily replaceable at lowcost and the tie between employee and employer is limited to the wageThe service relationship by contrast is based on trust and impliesdependency relations between employer and employee In this type ofindustrial relations it is assumed that work has become more autonomousand multi-skilled and the product market more fluctuating and unpredict-able These developments force firms and their workforces to increase theircapacity as collective actors to adapt to the changing environment in a


Table 52 Distribution of four types of workersrsquo identity (per cent)

Dual identity Management-sided Union-sided Dual deviation

1995 151 125 101 3932000 402 107 126 98

Source Ishikawa et al Denki Rengo Survey 1995 and 2000

flexible way One implication is that it has become vital for management tocreate feelings of participation and identity and to train workers with abroad range of skills who are committed to their company In other wordsa larger proportion especially among unionised workers have graduallybeen offered a lsquoservice relationshiprsquo and the industrial relations system hastherefore been transformed into a more cooperative one

Is dual identity as manifest in contemporary Slovakia comparable withtrends observed in West European countries Are the causes of its develop-ment identical Which general and which specific aspects in what combin-ation lead to the emergent feelings of participation community andidentity found among these Slovak workers Is a lsquoservice relationshiprsquoreally on offer to a larger proportion of the unionised workforce inSlovakia in the early twenty-first century Are Slovak workers in electronicsplants trained and treated in such a way as to enable them to acquire abroad range of skills and to become committed to their company Ourfield observations and interviews with workers in the chosen firms togetherwith our analysis of the data obtained indicate how difficult it is to giveunambiguous answers to these questions Nevertheless we can say thatchanges in workersrsquo identity in Slovakia have been influenced not only bylsquointernalrsquo factors (changes in the quality of working life) but also bylsquoexternalrsquo factors including changes on the macro-level (especially thehigh level of unemployment and generally low level of wages) changes atthe branch level (connected with the need for restructuring and modernis-ation) and changes at the level of the plants themselves both of whichhave been transformed into companies with foreign capital involvementand both of which belong to the most successful and stable firms inSlovakia

Working life in the sample firms what has changed since 1995

Since 1995 workersrsquo identity in both firms has switched from dual deviationto dual identity In general workersrsquo tendency towards dual identity ishighly dependent on their satisfaction with work job security wages andcareer opportunities in the firm It is associated with the development of aworkforce with a broad range of skills and with the introduction of alsquoservice relationshiprsquo for a larger proportion of unionised workers(Ishikawa and le Grand 2000 45) The following changes were observedwithin the various components of workersrsquo firm-level identity

Changes in evaluations of job satisfaction

The generally positive evaluations of working life which were recorded in1995 have further improved no respondent declared that heshe wasabsolutely dissatisfied with working life in 2000 In comparison with 1995 thesatisfaction of workers with job security and welfare provision has increased


almost threefold satisfaction with pay and fringe benefits with workconditions with trust between managers and employees almost doubledSatisfaction with relationships between co-workers and with work-loadsstayed roughly the same (and relatively high) A constant relatively low levelof satisfaction on the other hand applied to evaluations of promotionopportunities training and retraining12 Relationships to supervisors saw aslight deterioration but remained satisfactory for half the workforce

Changes in evaluations of the work process

According to our interviews with experts (including trade union represent-atives at the plant-level) the work tasks of most workers ndash and especiallyblue-collar workers ndash in the two firms have not become any more autono-mous or multi-skilled Unskilled work is the norm especially for femaleblue-collar workers The proportion of workers who feel that they cancontrol what they do at work has decreased more than threefold Thenumber of workers who are convinced that they can make use of theirabilities in their work andor learn new skills is also lower The number ofworkers whose work is dictated by machinery has increased But despitethese findings fewer workers than in 1995 consider their work to berepetitive and overall satisfaction with working life is higher


Table 53 Satisfaction with working life (per cent)

Very Fairly Fairly Verysatisfied satisfied Neutral dissatisfied dissatisfied

1995 83 390 348 141 152000 52 592 314 42 0


Table 54 Satisfaction with different aspects of work (per cent)

1995 2000

Work conditions 324 635Work load 467 477Trust managers--employees 175 373Wages and remuneration 124 253Promotion prospects 185 199Training 260 270Job security 156 413Welfare provision 219 568Relations with supervisor 584 496Relations with co-workers 876 827


Changes in workersrsquo relationship to the firm

The level of both moral and instrumental commitment to the firm seems tobe high and stable Only 107 per cent of workers in 1995 and 42 per centin 2000 expressed indifference to company affairs

Changes in evaluations of interest representation

The measure of agreement with decisions by both plant-level trade unionorganisations and plant management has increased significantly in thesample firms


Table 55 How true are the following statements about your work (per cent)

I can I can partly My I can Work is use my determine work is learn new dictated byabilities what I do repetitive things machinery

1995 742 912 543 645 2922000 543 250 344 512 447


Table 56 How far do the decisions of your local union reflect your opinions (percent)

Very well Fairly well Not very well Not at all Indifferent

1995 20 263 405 141 1712000 56 580 305 19 38


Table 58 Membership agreement with local union policies and participation inlocal union activities (per cent)

Membership Agreement with union Participation (often+(very+fairly well) whenever possible)

1995 75 28 82000 67 64 18


Table 57 How far do the decisions of management reflect your opinions (per cent)


1995 12 230 447 171 1392000 09 437 432 70 52


Despite a slight decrease in union membership during the last five yearsthe level of agreement with plant-level trade union policy (ie theconviction that decisions by the union reflect workersrsquo own opinions) hasincreased significantly In both firms however the level of direct particip-ation in trade union activities is relatively low which is related to the typeof activities most typically undertaken by unions above all they areconcerned with collective bargaining and the operation of a lsquowelfareservicersquo both of which are lsquoexpertrsquo activities and have practically becomeprofessionalised in the sample firms The relatively low level of directparticipation by trade union members is thus explained by the satisfactionof employees with the representation and protection of their interests inthe areas which they consider to be key their passivity as social actors isonly a secondary explanation

The most important tasks for the trade union according to the opinionof workers were securing wage increases (in 2000 906 per cent of tradeunion members considered this very important) and protecting job security(87 per cent very important) A secondary set of tasks for unions (accord-ing to workersrsquo ranking of their importance) is connected with holidaysand leave (59 per cent) welfare services (57 per cent) and the workenvironment (50 per cent) Only around 20 per cent of workers attachedgreat importance to activities connected with work loads and workmethods working time and work organisation or education and training Asimilarly low proportion (18 per cent) considered it very important toincrease the influence of the trade unions over andor to broaden thescope for workersrsquo participation in management policies

These trends in workersrsquo attitudes toward unions suggest at least a partialmodernisation of the lsquoresidualrsquo identity associated with unionsrsquo welfarefunction under the previous regime (Slocock and Smith 2000 219) Ouranalysis showed further ndash and this may be one of the main reasons for theinception of a lsquodual identityrsquo in both firms ndash that plant managements as wellas trade unions have adopted a role in the areas considered most import-ant by workers and where they felt an absence of interest representation inthe past job security and wages In the sphere of job security workersconsider plant managements to be the single best representative of theirinterests whereas in the sphere of wages they look to the trade uniontogether with management (especially their immediate superior) in thefield of social welfare their preferred representative is the trade union Theonly spheres in which as many as half the workers felt the absence of anysubject to represent their interests were promotion and career develop-ment and training and education Thus from the perspective of tradeunions positive trends (strengthening perceptions of trade unions as acollective actor which represents employee interests well) are observablein the spheres of wages and work conditions job security and social welfareissues On the other hand the last five years have seen a loss of confidencein the influence of trade unions in the spheres of training and education


and job design The absence of representation which workers feel in thesespheres has not however had any major influence on their satisfaction withworking life or on their overall identification with trade unions andmanagement in the sample firms

Worker participation and industrial relations in the sample firms

Only one trade union organisation exists in each of the firms affiliated tothe main metalworkersrsquo union OZ KOVO the strongest trade unionamong all forty in the Slovak Trade Union Confederation Both organis-ations can boast above average unionisation rates in comparison with theaverage rate for the entire Slovak labour force of 35 per cent firm Arsquosworkforce was 55 per cent unionised in 1998 60 per cent unionised in 1999and 45 per cent unionised in 2000 in firm B the workforce is even morestrongly organised with more than 92 per cent union members from 1996to 1999 dropping to 80 per cent in 2000 which according to A Rakušanchairman of the trade union organisation in firm B was due to therecruitment of new workers on temporary contracts

New legislation introduced in December 1999 makes it possible toemploy workers for a period of six months and then to extend theircontracts for a further six months Among workers who were employedon permanent contracts 90 per cent are trade union members butamong the employees working in the ldquo26 monthsrdquo regime the figure isonly 20 per cent These are usually unskilled workers especially women


Table 59 Representational deficit on labour issues (percentage of workers whoanswered lsquonobodyrsquo when asked lsquoWho best represents your interests inthe following aspects of working lifersquo)

Job Work Job Welfare security Wages conditions Training design

1995 22 38 20 22 34 102000 7 5 6 8 18 6


Table 510 Perceptions of trade union representation (percentage of workers whoanswered lsquolocal unionsrsquo when asked lsquoWho best represents your interestsin the following aspects of working lifersquo)


1995 63 17 5 8 16 32000 75 26 48 24 2 1


In both plants a collective agreement is signed between the plant-leveltrade union organisation and the management On the branch level ahigher-level collective agreement (KZVS) is signed between OZ KOVOand the Union of the Slovak Electronics Industry Trade union leaders onthe plant level consider collective bargaining as their main task whereintheir main aims are to achieve the best possible conditions especially in thespheres of wages social conditions and labour relations matters relating tothe implementation and policing of collective agreements constitute theirsecond main area of concern

In both plants unions are financed from a combination of membershipfees (1 per cent of membersrsquo salaries) and company subsidies which coverroom rent telephone bills and the wage of the union chairman ndash accordingto the KZVS firms which employ more than 450 employees are obliged topay the salary (equivalent to the average wage within the firm) of onetrade union representative while two union representatives are entitled tosupport if the firm has more than 900 employees The employer cannotterminate the contract of an elected union representative either duringhisher term of office or for a further year The effectiveness of collectivebargaining is indicated by the fact that no labour dispute occurred in eitherfirm during the period 1995ndash2000

Conclusions

Our evaluations of work and the firm are inevitably conditioned by thewider context of economic and social conditions and the state of thedomestic labour market The restructuring of industry and the transform-ation of the economy have significantly influenced the Slovak electronicsindustry as a sub-system and the social costs of transformation have alsohit workers in this branch The workers in the sample firms are not immuneto the effects of rising unemployment falling real wages and the appear-ance of poverty in Slovak society For them ndash and for contemporarySlovakia ndash Kulpintildeskarsquos description of another work collective and heraccompanying analysis of the transformation of working life in CentralEurope holds true lsquoThese employees belong to the winners ndash they havejobs and they are quite well paid Despite this their opinions are clearlyinfluenced by the general situation which involves growing insecurity andsometimes the threat of losing onersquos jobrsquo (Kulpintildeska 2000 203)

The transformation process is connected with new challenges and adapt-ations New foreign management teams which have come into both samplefirms bring new techniques of human resource management cultivate newtypes of labour relations and could improve the quality of working life Butmore immediately they have come to be perceived by employees as theguarantors of their jobs and of the prosperity of the firm For in the year2000 our findings suggest Slovak employeesrsquo expectations from bothmanagement and trade unions remained on the level of lsquobread and butterrsquo


issues ndash and they were grateful for this much For bread we can read jobsand for butter wages jobs are a fundamental priority for workers in acountry where unemployment exceeds 20 per cent and in a sector whereessential modernisation is not yet complete wages are higher in theseenterprises than the average for a sector whose comparative advantage ischeap labour costs and usually only become a meaningful demand after theentry of foreign capital (which is presented by political and economic elitesand in the media as a condition for current stability and future prosperity)The German and French owners of these two firms are amenable to tradeunions progressive in the application of new human resource managementapproaches and at the same time have preserved existing standards ofenterprise welfare services Although they have provided job opportunitiesfor blue-collar workers they have not as a rule offered more autonomousand multi-skilled work nor prospects for career development personal andprofessional growth Participation in management and union involvementin co-decision-making likewise remain issues of secondary concern amongthese workers Despite this foreign employers have managed to engender intheir workforces a commitment to the firm and a feeling of job satisfactionsimply by providing the chance to earn onersquos daily bread through work

Our research findings therefore point to a certain discrepancy betweenSlovak and lsquowesternrsquo forms of dual identity which is unlikely to be elimin-ated as long as the contemporary phase of economic globalisation repro-duces patterns of corendashperiphery relations which impose severe constraintson the potential of local actors in countries like Slovakia

Notes

1 Source Naacutezory 1992 no 4 Respondents had the option of choosing more thanone of the alternatives

2 For instance according to the survey Contemporary Problems of Slovakia inMay 1994 (FOCUS Bratislava) 79 per cent of the public agreed with the opinionthat lsquothe state should provide a job for everyone who is willing to workrsquo 69 percent agreed that lsquoeconomic changes should proceed slowly to prevent unemploy-mentrsquo 57 per cent thought that lsquostate ownership of enterprises should pre-dominatersquo and 48 per cent thought that lsquoprior to 1989 the economy requiredonly minor changesrsquo

3 According to the EU-sponsored survey lsquoStrategies and Actors of SocialTransformation and Modernisationrsquo (carried out in the summer of 1995 by theInstitute of Sociology of the Slovak Academy of Sciences on a random sampleof 956 adults aged 20ndash59)

If it were up to you would you like toWork in a private company 123Work in a state-owned company 563Work in your own company 197Work abroad 105Not work at all 12

Source Transformation and Modernisation Codebook 1995


4 Collective bargaining is regulated by Act no 21991 on collective bargainingThis Act shapes the collective bargaining process between trade unions andemployers defining a collective agreement as lsquoa bilaterally drawn up documentwhich is legally binding and determines the individual and collective relationsbetween employees and employers as the rights and responsibilities of socialpartnersrsquo

5 On the other hand it should be noted that a high share of foreign direct invest-ment in neighbouring countries was channelled into the so-called naturalmonopolies which were still owned by the state in the relevant period inSlovakia The sale of even minority stakes in these companies would produce achange in this indicator in favour of Slovakia since such one-off capital inflowshave already occurred in the other countries The post-1998 governmentapproved a new strategy which openly supports the entry of foreign capital

6 Source Social Trends in the Slovak Republic 20007 Source Employment in the Economy of the Slovak Republic ndash entrepreneurial

reporting data8 Source The Ministry of the Economy of the Slovak Republic9 Source OECD figures

10 Source National Labour Office11 As early as the 1950s Japanese researcher Odaka Kunio (Odaka 1953) revealed

the predominance of workers with lsquodual identityrsquo based on empirical surveys ofworkersrsquo attitudes More recent research projects led by Akihiro Ishikawa haveanalysed international data obtained from the Denki Roren research project in1984ndash5 (Ishikawa 1992) and (together with C le Grand) from the Denki Rengoresearch project in 1995 (Ishikawa et al 2000) in an attempt to ascertainwhether lsquodual identityrsquo is universal in modern society or particular to Japan

12 Education and training schemes operated by both firms consist of introductorycourses for newly employed blue-collar staff lasting from one week to sixmonths and for newly employed technical staff usually six months Internalcompany training is also organised for more experienced staff In the past fiveyears approximately 60 per cent of blue-collar workers 90 per cent of technicalstaff and 100 per cent of managers have participated in training courses of atleast a week The content of training its length and the selection of participantsare determined by management

Bibliography

Bulletin Štatistickeacuteho uacuteradu SR [Bulletin of the Slovak Statistical Office] (1995) 12Čambaacutelikovaacute M (1996) lsquoK otaacutezke občianskej participaacutecie v transformujuacutecom sa

Slovenskursquo Socioloacutegia vol 28 no 1 51ndash5Čambaacutelikovaacute M (1997) lsquoUtvaacuteranie občianstva zamestnancov a zamestnaacutevatelrsquoovrsquo

in Roško R Machaacuteček L and Čambaacutelikovaacute M Občan a transformaacuteciaBratislava SUacute SAV 100ndash34

Dahrendorf R (1991) Modernyacute sociaacutelny konflikt Bratislava ARCHAGiddens A (1999) Sociologie Praha ArgoIshikawa A (1992) lsquoPatterns of Work Identity in the Firm and Plant An EastndashWest

Comparisonrsquo in Szell G (ed) Labour Relations in Transition in Eastern EuropeBerlin and New York Walter de Gruyter


Ishikawa A and le Grand C (2000) lsquoWorkersrsquo Identity with the Managementandor the Trade Unionrsquo in Ishikawa A Martin R Morawski W and Rus V(eds) Workers Firms and Unions 2 The Development of Dual CommitmentFrankfurt am Main Peter Lang

Ishikawa A Martin R Morawski W and Rus V (eds) (2000) Workers Firms andUnions 2 The Development of Dual Commitment Frankfurt am Main PeterLang

Krivyacute V (1993) lsquoProbleacutem naacutezorovej inkonzistencie a kognitiacutevnej dezorientaacuteciersquo inAktuaacutelne probleacutemy Slovenska po rozpade ČSFR Bratislava FOCUS

Kulpintildeska J (2000) lsquoTransformation of Working Life in Central Europersquo inIshikawa A Martin R Morawski W and Rus V (eds) Workers Firms andUnions 2 The Development of Dual Commitment Frankfurt am Main PeterLang

Kusaacute Z and Tirpaacutekovaacute Z (1993) lsquoO rozhodovaniacute sa pre draacutehu suacutekromneacutehopodnikaniarsquo Socioloacutegia vol 25 no 6 547ndash64

Kusaacute Z and Valentšiacutekovaacute B (1996) lsquoSociaacutelna identita dlhodobo nezamestnanyacutechrsquoSocioloacutegia vol 28 no 6 539ndash57

Machaacuteček L (1997) lsquoMlaacutedež a tri vyacutezvy modernizaacutecie Slovenskarsquo in Roško RMachaacuteček L and Čambaacutelikovaacute M Občan a transformaacutecia Bratislava SUacute SAV57ndash100

Machaacuteček L (1998) Youth in the Processes of Transition and Modernisation in theSlovakia Bratislava SUacute SAV

Ministry of the Economy of the Slovak Republic Employment in the Economy ofSR Online Available HTTP lthttpwwweconomygovskgt

Ministerstvo praacutece sociaacutelnych veciacute a rodiny SR (2000) Social Trends in the SlovakRepublic Online Available HTTP lthttpwwwemploymentskgt

National Labour Office Annual Report 2000Naacutezory (1992) Informačnyacute bulletin no 4 Bratislava Uacutestav pre vyacuteskum verejnej

mienky pri Slovenskom štatistickom uacuterade [Institute for Public Opinion Researchat the Slovak Statistical Office]

Odaka K (1993) Science of Human Relations in Industry Tokyo YuhikakuOffe C and Adler P (1991) lsquoCapitalism by democratic designrsquo Social Research

vol 58 no 4 865Roberts K and Machaacuteček L (2001) lsquoYouth Enterprise and Youth Unemployment

in European Union Member and Associated Countriesrsquo Socioloacutegia vol 33 no 3317ndash29

Sartori G (1993) Teoacuteria demokracie Bratislava ARCHASlocock B and Smith S (2000) lsquoInterest politics and identity formation in post-

communist societies the Czech and Slovak trade union movementsrsquo Contempor-ary Politics vol 6 no 3 215ndash30

Transformation and Modernisation Codebook 1995 (1995) Bratislava SociologicalInstitute Slovak Academy of Sciences (internal material)

WIIW (Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies) (July 1999) ForeignDirect Investment in Central and East European Countries and the formerSoviet Union Vienna biannual report Online Available HTTP lthttpwwwwiiwacatefdi_datahtmlgt


6 The democratisation of industrialrelations in the Czech Republic ndashwork organisation and employeerepresentationCase studies from the electronics industry1

Aleš Kroupa and Zdenka Mansfeldovaacute

Introduction

The organisation of work is influenced by the growing demands of themarket (for quality and service short delivery deadlines or flexibility) bytechnological development (automation and innovation) by changes inthe composition of the workforce (including changes in lifestyle anddomestic routines as well as increased educational levels) and by thedemocratisation of social relations In reaction to such society-wide trendsadvocates of different theoretical approaches to enterprise managementhave suggested and implemented a range of innovations in theorganisation of work over the past few decades Typically this has involvedproviding scope for greater autonomy in the accomplishment of worktasks integrating partial work tasks so that jobs are less monotonous andmake use of the knowledge abilities and qualifications of workers androtating workers between different posts Work is often carried out insmall teams enabling individuals to assume greater authority as well as togain experience of different types of work This form of organisationalstructure is designed to simplify communication and facilitate bettercoordination of the work process The expansion and overlapping of jobdescriptions is essential to effective team work where workers must beable to stand in for one another Such innovations place new demands onworkers in terms of qualifications authority relations relationships withco-workers responsibilities and working hours Thus there is a need toensure the training of workers to enable them to carry out a wider rangeof tasks The classical hierarchical relationship between supervisors andsupervised becomes a partnership based on the coordination of the workof subordinates in which the role of team leader may be interchangeableaccording to who has the most experience of a particular aspect of thework process

126 Author

In the Czech Republic just as in other advanced economies the intro-duction of such new forms of work organisation in recent years has aimedto raise productivity streamline organisational structure and at the sametime enable employees to gain greater satisfaction from work and moreeasily identify with the firmrsquos product But along with these advantagesnew work practices also carry disadvantages Among those mentionedmost often is the risk of placing too much faith in the initiative andresponsibility of workers and in their ability to learn which may reduce theapplicability of work rotation Such forms of organisation will bringrewards only as long as workers feel the need for personal and professionalgrowth They clearly also have most to offer at those points in the pro-duction process where a high degree of flexibility in terms of work tasks isnecessary and where work demands regular two-way communication orcooperation between personnel from different sections Some experts inenterprise management point to a regression in work practices in certainbranches or firms In particular several vehicle factories have reintroducedforms of work based predominantly on conveyor belt systems whichdictate work tempo for the entire production process

Besides organisational changes gradual trends are also discernible in thefield of employee representation at the enterprise level in the CzechRepublic A drop in the number of employees organised in trade unionshas been accompanied by legislative changes introducing two separateinstitutions for communication between employers and employees after anamendment to the Labour Code enabled the formation of employeesrsquocouncils and the appointment of health and safety at work representativesHowever these institutions are only permitted where there is no tradeunion organisation If none of these is present the employer is obliged bylaw to negotiate directly with employees

The level of union organisation in firms is itself influenced by changes inwork organisation Union spokespeople cite the introduction of team workndash with its relative autonomy within the framework of the organisation ofthe firm ndash as one cause of their loss of influence teams allegedly refuse todeal with unions on certain matters above all on wage issues workinghours and safety at work Teams lsquofeel that they can defend their interestsbetter and with greater effect without realising that in factories whichoperate like this an employer can enforce hisher intentions far betteroften to the detriment of the workforcersquo (Kosina et al 1998 24)

In the following section we attempt to show using two industrial enter-prises as examples how the content of work has changed for manualprofessions2 and to identify those factors which influence the attitudes ofworkers in these firms towards their trade union organisation In the caseof Firm A it was possible to track these changes through time since thesame questions were put to employees in 1995 and 2000 Our analysis ofemployee attitudes therefore relies more heavily on Firm A given thatFirm B was not covered by the first phase of research in 1995

Democratising Czech industrial relations 127

The two firms operate in the electronics industry Both had originallybeen state enterprises and underwent privatisation in the early 1990sovercoming economic difficulties caused mainly by the loss of traditionalmarkets In both firms a trade union organisation (affiliated to the metal-workersrsquo union OS KOVO) has existed continuously and the level oforganisation of the workforce exceeds the average for OS KOVO localorganisations Workers in both firms are covered by a collective agreementof a high standard Firm A became a state share company in 1991 and wasprivatised in 1993 by means of coupon privatisation Since then a wholeseries of rationalising measures have been introduced several productionfacilities were gradually shut down the organisational structure of the firmwas simplified and costs were cut across the board in response to thecollapse of markets At the same time there was a restructuring of theproduct range and the cycle of product innovation was accelerated Aresult of these changes was a reduction in the workforce by 28 per cent in1999 (to around two-thirds of its 1995 level) One of the firmrsquos strong pointsis that it has managed to retain an independent research and developmentcapacity in spite of rationalisation Fifty-eight per cent of production nowgoes for export mostly to EU countries and exports made up 55 per cent ofan overall turnover in 1999 of Kčs 2400 million Nevertheless plannedprofits have not been achieved Firm B was privatised in 1992 as a sharecompany Since 1995 the workforce has only been cut to around four-fifthsof its original size although staff turnover has been high The firm has notcarried out such fundamental organisational changes as Firm A and has hadgreater difficulty defining a long-term development plan

Changes in the organisation of work from the perspective of employees in manual professions

New forms of work organisation affect most of the manual workforce inFirm A in which 36 per cent of manual employees in 2000 stated that theyregularly work in teams and a further 34 per cent confirmed that their jobssometimes involve team work The comparable figures for Firm B were 18per cent and 29 per cent which accords with the higher share of respond-ents who said that their performance does not depend on the performanceof co-workers (436 per cent as against only 204 per cent in Firm A) andthe higher share who said their work is not organised by the rotation oftasks (309 per cent compared with 168 per cent in Firm A)

However a comparison of various features of team work (decision-making about work content dependence on the performance of others) inFirm A in 1995 and 2000 suggests a partial regression to more traditionalforms of work organisation For instance in 2000 only 23 per cent ofmanual respondents claimed they could even to a certain extent controlwhat they do at work against 318 per cent in 1995 The number of thosestating the interdependence of their own performance and that of others

128 Aleš Kroupa and Zdenka Mansfeldovaacute

also fell in this period from 618 per cent to 505 per cent Likewise in thesphere of communication another important indicator of collectivelyorganised work a drop was recorded in the proportion of respondents whofeel they can talk to their colleagues during the working day This couldreflect a rationalisation and intensification of the work process The onecontradictory indicator was a rise in the number of workers who feel theirwork is not monotonous (from 236 per cent in 1995 to 336 per cent in2000) To be able to draw convincing conclusions about the real tendencyin relation to the introduction of new forms of work organisation in Firm Awe lack fully comparable data from 1995 when the question lsquoDoes yourjob involve team workrsquo was unfortunately not included in the surveyTable 62 gives a more detailed breakdown of workersrsquo responses

Table 61 shows how work content for manual professions in Firm Achanged between 1995 (when organisational changes were beginning) and2000 (when they were in full flow) and also offers a comparison betweenFirms A and B Some penetration of computers into production is evidentin both firms with around 4 per cent of manual workers declaring thattheir jobs involve work with computers In Firm A we know that this is oneof a number of completely new activities which were demanded of manualworkers in 2000 others being administration and data processing there hasalso been a substantial increase in the amount of time spent servicing andmaintaining machinery Greater responsibility has evidently also beenshifted on to manual workers in areas such as quality control and super-vision of certain parts of the production process Conversely responsibilityfor technical development has been consolidated in the hands of qualifiedspecialists

In Firm B where reconstruction has not been so thoroughgoing thedata shows that the nature of work in manual professions is not as complexas in Firm A The testimony of manual employees in B confirms thatsubstantially fewer responsibilities for the final product including itsadministrative assurance have been delegated to them (for examplelsquoquality control and surveillancersquo is recognised as part of their job by 41 percent of workers in A but only 27 per cent of workers in B) Despite the fallin manual workersrsquo independence recorded in Firm A between 1995 and2000 the greater complexity of their work content in comparison with FirmB is also confirmed by responses on autonomy and the extent ofcompetences delegated to workers Of manual workers in Firm B 51 percent felt they could not determine their own work to any extent whereasin Firm A the figure even in 2000 was only 27 per cent

The changes in the character of work and in the evaluations of theirwork by employees summarised above indicate a gradual modernisation ofproduction and work organisation involving greater utilisation of thesynergetic effects of team work As has been noted however this process isaccompanied by a number of contradictory trends such as the partialnarrowing of scope for workers to determine their own work the greater


individualisation of production entailing a lesser degree of interdepen-dence between workersrsquo performances and probably also the loss ofopportunities to communicate with colleagues Even though manualworkers have been entrusted with more demanding tasks we did not detectany significant increase in the number of those who felt they could makeuse of their abilities (591 per cent of workers in Firm A in 1995 and 627per cent in 2000 607 per cent in Firm B in 2000) A slight decrease wasrecorded in the number of those who said that work offers them oppor-tunities to learn new things (in Firm A the figure was 511 per cent in 1995and 508 per cent in 2000 in Firm B 429 per cent in 2000) Given thegreater complexity of manual job descriptions in Firm A it is logical thatthere were more workers who evaluated their jobs as demanding enoughto require consistent improvement of their professional knowledge (447per cent compared with 291 per cent in B) But in spite of this a mere 86per cent of manual workers in Firm A said they had undertaken a trainingcourse organised by the enterprise during the past five years whilst 161per cent of Firm Brsquos workers had done so This apparently testifies to a lackof effort on the part of the firm management to make effective use ofavailable human resources


Table 61 Changes in work content in manual professions (figures show thepercentage of respondents who perform each activity during theirnormal work ie the remainder do not perform that task at all)

Firm A Firm B1995 2000 2000

All manual All manual All manualworkers workers workers(n91) (n120) (n56)

Work at machines or conveyor belts 571 750 698

Maintenance 55 302 348Quality control and inspection 66 411 265Sales marketing service 22 38 ndashProgramming specialist computer

work 00 38 41Administration data processing 00 63 ndashManagerial work 22 13 ndashTechnical development research

specialist activity linked to product innovation 77 26 41

Development of technology and production systems other engineering tasks connected with the production process 22 26 ndash

Other tasks 330 333 404


Table 62 Self-evaluation of work undertaken in manual professions (per cent)

Firm Absolutely Slightly Not Donrsquot knowfairly true true true canrsquot say

1995 2000 1995 2000 1995 2000 1995 2000

A In my work I can make use of my abilities 591 627 239 270 102 70 68 35

B 607 304 54 36

A I can partly determine what I do at work 318 230 386 372 216 265 80 133

B 182 273 509 36

A My work is not monotonous 416 336 292 318 236 336 56 09

B 327 218 436 18

A Mistakes in my workcould have seriousconsequences 659 594 207 225 49 81 85 99

B 696 268 ndash 36

A In my work I havethe chance to learn new things 511 508 307 336 125 112 57 43

B 429 375 143 54

A During my work I cantalk to colleagues 584 439 360 482 34 70 22 09

B 582 327 55 36

A My performance depends on that of others 618 505 191 239 124 204 67 53

B 163 345 436 55

A My work is dictated by machinery 437 495 276 248 172 128 115 128

B 418 273 236 73

A My work is organised via the rotation of tasks ndash 399 ndash 230 ndash 168 ndash 204

B 364 164 309 164

A My work involves mostly team workorganised by team members themselves ndash 358 ndash 339 ndash 268 ndash 36

B 181 291 491 36

A My work demands constant updating of my professional knowledge ndash 447 ndash 263 ndash 237 ndash 53

B 291 491 127 91

What impact did new forms of work organisation have on the relation-ship of blue-collar workers to managers co-workers and trade unions Thesubdivision of employees into small work groups with substantial auto-nomy leads to the strengthening of relations within the group to betterrelations with management but at the same time to looser ties with unionsEmployees tend to take care of their needs and demands throughimmediate superiors and correspondingly drift away from the unionorganisation Table 63 shows how over the years manual workers in FirmA have adjusted their evaluations of their own relationships with superiorsand co-workers For those who say they work in teams3 the growth insatisfaction with both these relationships was especially pronounced Com-paring the two firms the greatest differences were observed in assessmentsof the level of trust between managerial and ordinary workers andbetween workers and their immediate superiors In Firm A the satisfactionof workers with this latter relationship is probably the cause of theweakening position of unions which union functionaries admitted toConversely in Firm B the low degree of trust which prevails betweenworkers and their immediate superiors apparently contributes to thegrowth of union influence

Here it should be stressed that employees generally have a positiverelationship to their firm More than two-fifths (43 per cent) of employeesincluding a quarter of manual workers would be willing to do everything intheir power for the success of Firm A and in Firm B the proportions werehigher still (48 per cent of all workers and 32 per cent of manual workers)The most common attitude presupposes a reciprocal relationship betweenemployee and firm 53 per cent of all workers (69 per cent of manualworkers) are prepared lsquoto do as much for Firm A as the firm does for mersquo


Table 63 Manual workersrsquo evaluations of relationships to superiors and co-workers (per cent)

Firm A Firm B1995 2000 2000

1 2 3 1 2 3 1 2 3

Trust between managers and workers 198 363 440 471 244 286 304 179 517

Relations with immediate superior 533 300 167 722 209 69 607 196 196

Relations with co-workers 820 157 22 873 85 42 839 125 35

Notes 1very or generally satisfied 2neither satisfied nor dissatisfied 3very or generallydissatisfied

with 48 per cent of Firm Brsquos employees (625 per cent of manual workers)adopting the same stance Only 15 per cent of respondents (26 per cent ofmanual workers) in Firm A and 10 per cent of employees (18 per cent ofmanual workers) in Firm B claimed indifference to their firmsrsquo business Inthis respect it appears that Czech employees have an even closer affinitywith their firm than Slovak employees (cf Čambaacutelikovaacute in this volume)

Satisfaction with conditions at work

An integral element of workersrsquo attitudes to their firm is their satisfactionwith conditions at work which we tracked using fifteen variables (anoverview is given in Table 64) Dissatisfaction prevailed with five out offifteen aspects of work conditions in Firm A and with six in Firm B In bothcases the highest level of dissatisfaction concerned wages along with jobinsecurity in Firm A On the other hand the factors which contributed mostpositively to the atmosphere in both work collectives were good relationswith co-workers interesting work good relations with immediate superiorsand working hours

The aspects of work with which employees of Firm A were moresatisfied than those of Firm B were wages (in Firm A 18 per cent and inFirm B 7 per cent were satisfied) the competence of management (A 28per cent B 14 per cent) trust between managerial and ordinary workers(A 49 per cent B 36 per cent) training and requalification (A 37 per centB 21 per cent) provision of business information by management (A 36per cent B 21 per cent) and promotion prospects (A 23 per cent B 12 percent) A greater share of satisfied workers was recorded in Firm B inconnection with job security (B 40 per cent A 19 per cent) welfareprovision (B 48 per cent A 32 per cent) work load (B 64 per cent A 53 percent) working hours (B 83 per cent A 73 per cent) and equal oppor-tunities between the sexes (B 52 per cent A 37 per cent)

Employees of Firm A as noted feel a loss of security about theiremployment something which is confirmed by comparing the survey datafor 1995 and 2000 A heightened sense of existential threat and resultingfeelings of dissatisfaction are connected with the comprehensive restructur-ing of the enterprise which has occurred in recent years and which involvedthe closure of one plant resulting in the redundancy of around a thousandemployees Firm Arsquos employees are also less satisfied with welfare provisionalthough the situation here has in their view improved since 1995 Socialpolicy in the enterprise is gradually being shaped into a means of promotinglong-term motivation among personnel and moving away from short-terminstrumental benefits aimed at satisfying individual social needs Signific-antly the increase in employee satisfaction with their employerrsquos socialpolicy occurred in spite of cut-backs in spending on some traditional areas ofenterprise social provision such as employee recreation and subsidised meals(although the enterprise catering system has been thoroughly overhauled)


Overall 67 per cent of employees in Firm A were satisfied with their jobin 2000 (15 per cent were dissatisfied) with slightly fewer expressingsatisfaction in Firm B (61 per cent) although fewer were actually preparedto indicate dissatisfaction (13 per cent) A clear improvement is detectablein Firm A since 1995 when 48 per cent of respondents expressed satisfac-tion and 24 per cent dissatisfaction

Social mobility and authority relations in the firm

From the perspective of management (or governance) Firm A has a moreopen organisational structure than Firm B 31 per cent of employees in theformer felt that managers provide professional and career development


Table 64 Satisfaction with individual aspects of conditions at work (per cent)

Firm B Firm A

Dis- Dis-Satisfied Neutral satisfied Satisfied Neutral satisfied

Physical work conditions (lightingheating noise) 52 18 30 (41)47 (19)22 (40)31

Trust between managers and ordinary workers 36 25 38 (32)49 (32)28 (37)24

Work load 64 22 14 (49)53 (28)26 (23)21Working hours 83 9 8 (68)73 (15)13 (17)14Wages and

remuneration 7 19 74 (15)18 (18)18 (67)64Competence of

managers 14 31 55 (15)28 (37)37 (48)34Promotion prospects 12 36 52 (24)23 (32)41 (43)37Training and

requalification 21 36 43 (29)37 (28)37 (43)26Job security 40 29 31 (31)19 (30)21 (38)60Equal opportunities

for men and women 52 31 17 (33)37 (38)36 (30)28Welfare provision 48 34 18 (23)32 (39)36 (38)33Relations with

immediate superior 68 16 16 (60)73 (25)17 (16)10Relations with

co-workers 89 9 2 (84)88 (14) 8 (2) 3Interestingness of

work 73 19 8 (67)70 (18)20 (16)10Provision of business

info by management 21 16 63 36 28 36

Note Figures in brackets are from 1995

opportunities for the workforce but only 16 per cent thought so in thelatter Comparison of the starting and current posts filled by employeeslargely supports this evaluation in Firm B career progression was notedmore often among manual workers (19 per cent had been promoted sincejoining the firm whereas only 13 per cent had in A) however amongadministrative workers (A 18 per cent B 6 per cent) and among technicalstaff (A 34 per cent B 28 per cent) promotion was a more commonphenomenon in A Indeed demotion was more often found among Brsquosadministrative and technical staff (13 per cent of administrative workersand 22 per cent of technical workers occupied posts below their startingpositions in B but only 5 per cent and 10 per cent respectively in A)

The determining factors influencing career mobility chances in theopinion of employees were (in Firm A) work performance productivity orresults (61 per cent said this was important in gaining promotion) and to alesser extent good relations with bosses (23 per cent) (in Firm B)performance and results (35 per cent) good relations with bosses (28 percent) and assertiveness (12 per cent) Thus employees of Firm B portray anenvironment in which mobility chances are dependent on a combination offactors whereas Firm A is perceived by its employees as an organisationwhich essentially rewards on the job performance and results

Relations between managers and ordinary workers in Firm B areapparently highly rigid The clear majority of employees (68 per cent)believed that managers evade responsibility (51 per cent thought the same inA) 53 per cent said they fail to delegate competences to the employees theymanage (38 per cent in A) whilst only a minority felt managers show aninterest in the opinions and ideas of their staff (55 per cent in A) Notsurprisingly as Table 64 shows trust within the hierarchy of the firm isscarcer in B than in A and satisfaction with the competence of managers islower Only a quarter of employees in B expressed conviction that themanagement has a conception of the firmrsquos long-term development com-pared with 54 per cent of employees in A At any rate strategic ideas aremore rarely divulged to employees (82 per cent in Firm B felt uninformedabout company strategy and only 47 per cent in Firm A) Howeveremployees do not project their criticisms on to immediate superiors in eitherfirm 68 per cent of employees in B and 73 per cent in A were satisfied withthe most direct form of authority relations they are involved in

Perceptions of foreign ownership

Given that the penetration of foreign capital into the Czech Republiceither by investment in an existing enterprise or by opening completelynew plants is an ever more common occurrence some of the most interest-ing survey findings related to employeesrsquo perceptions of and expectationsfrom foreign investment In each firm this was a relevant issue Firm Balready had direct experience as 25 per cent of shares belonged to a


foreign owner in 2000 while Firm A was looking for a foreign strategicpartner Expectations of tightened work discipline are clearly associatedwith foreign ownership (such expectations are 20 per cent higher in FirmB) as are to a lesser extent hopes for improved managerial competenceActual experience with foreign ownership also seems to produce expecta-tions of greater stability of employment and higher wages in Firm B Yetwhere direct experience is lacking in Firm A the mere prospect of foreignownership is viewed as a potential cause of disruption to employment andwage-cutting In both situations negative expectations are associated withforeign ownership concerning cooperation between management and tradeunions and the representation of employee interests In sum foreignownership is viewed in terms of a trade-off between positive and negativeexpectations

Trade unions in changing circumstances employeesrsquo perception of their role

The level of unionisation of both firmsrsquo workforces has followed the normin the Czech Republic of a continuous fall since 1989 The most significantcause of falling membership was the extensive privatisation of industry inthe course of the 1990s Owners of newly emerging firms or operationalunits mostly sought to prevent the establishment of union organisations intheir workplaces and employees were afraid to join existing workplaceunion organisations fearing possible sanctions by the employer Availabledata and national union leadersrsquo own estimates indicate a level ofunionisation of around 33 per cent of the Czech workforce in 2001

Aside from the fall in membership unions have also had to cope withnew roles associated with political democracy and a market economy Untilthe amendment to the Labour Code which came into effect at the start of2001 unions were the only organisations empowered to represent employeesand negotiate with employers in order to sign enterprise collective agree-ments The new legislative environment presupposes greater plurality inthe representation of employees abolishing the monopolistic position ofunions if only on paper for the time being However unions retain aprivileged status wherever they exist they are automatically considered tobe the sole representative of the employees and the partner of the employerfor the purposes of collective bargaining other forms of representationonly come into play in unionsrsquo absence

The decline in union membership is also related to the reproduction ofsocial norms of behaviour and social attitudes which are the heritage of theformer regime and support a largely formal or passive mode of belongingto unions A section of the labour force has yet to fully understand that themain role of unions lies in securing through bargaining employeesrsquoexistential needs wages and work conditions Nevertheless a comparison ofdata from 1990 and 1998 reveals that attitudes towards unions were


changing during the 1990s and that the general level of trust unions enjoyamong employees has risen

In the second half of the 1990s there was a reduction in collectivebargaining in Czech enterprises as measured by the number of successfullynegotiated collective agreements and by the number of employees coveredby such agreements Only in the past two years has this reduction beencompensated for by more widespread extension of higher-level collectiveagreements practised by the Social Democrat government which tookoffice in 1998 lsquopartly as a mechanism to encourage enterprises to joinbusiness associationsrsquo (Rychlyacute 2000 3) The total number of employeescovered by collective agreements was estimated at 40 per cent of theworkforce in 2000 (ibid)

In both firms surveyed here union organisation was above the nationalaverage for firms in which the KOVO union operated in 2000 One of theexplanations is that the firms themselves and their union organisationshave enjoyed an uninterrupted existence In Firm A 597 per cent ofemployees were members of the union organisation in Firm B 76 per centEmployees of both firms with just a few exceptions were aware of theexistence of the enterprise collective agreement and expressed satisfactionwith its content Their subjective evaluation is in fact corroborated by acomparison of both firmsrsquo collective agreements with the norms for thesector

Inevitably there are differences between the interests of employees andmanagers manual workers and administrative staff which are given bytheir different positions within the enterprise and the distinct aims theyeach pursue However they ought to have a common interest in theproduction and productivity of the firm since these fundamentals influenceprofit and wage levels safety at work and so on and this should underpin acertain degree of intra-enterprise solidarity In reality according to collateddata for both enterprises the interests of employees accord most closelywith those of their immediate superiors (286 per cent declared identicalinterests and 386 per cent similar interests) and with those of manualworkers at the plants (195 per cent identical 416 per cent similar) In boththese respects the level of solidarity was higher in Firm A than in B InFirm A employees expressed greater solidarity with these two collectiveactors than with the union organisation a pattern which was reversed inFirm B probably because of a greater representation of union members inthe sample Significantly however both work collectives exhibit a tendencytowards the kind of lsquodual identityrsquo identified by Čambaacutelikovaacute for theSlovak firms in the same study (see her chapter in this volume) In bothfirms the lowest degree of solidarity was declared towards the topmanagement (305 per cent declared partially divergent 273 per centlargely divergent and 109 per cent contradictory interests) and towards theenterprise director Compared with the situation in 1995 antagonisticopinions were generally less frequent in Firm A in 2000 the one exception


being a distancing of employee interests from those of technicians andengineers

Both the survey data and in-depth interviews conducted in the two firmssupport the following conclusion the greater the difference between theinterests of workers and their immediate superiors or between workersand management (which is probably given by inadequate communication)the greater a compensatory identification of workersrsquo interests with theirunion organisation Middle management especially lower middle manage-ment (foremen and workshop managers) traditionally act as intermedi-aries between ordinary workers and managers in these firms But wherethose channels work badly alternative albeit often less effective solutionsare sought for the realisation of interests through collective actors

Positive evaluations of immediate superiors also came through stronglyin responses to the question lsquoWho best represents the interests ofemployeesrsquo as Table 65 shows Whether in respect of work conditionssafety at work or the organisation of work it was immediate superiors whobest represented the interests of the greatest number of respondents The


Table 65 Collective actors which best represent employee interests in specificareas (per cent)

Firm A Firm B

Firm Local Immed Firm Local Immedmanage- union super- No manage- union super- Noment org ior one ment org ior one

Conditions at 106 111 712 67 50 340 510 90work (86) (108) (643) (162)

Safety at work 178 120 534 130 220 200 490 70(ndash) (ndash) (ndash) (ndash)

Training and 178 19 476 303 180 20 410 390requalification (165) (22) (467) (346)

Earnings 139 154 500 207 130 220 370 270(136) (76) (565) (223)

Welfare 101 543 72 236 40 780 50 110provision (122) (445) (127) (304)

Org of work 159 14 712 96 90 20 690 200job design (115) (33) (665) (187)

Overtime 87 58 630 212 90 220 540 150conditions (78) (82) (519) (322)

Transfers and 149 24 678 135 160 120 550 170job placements (277) (38) (549) (130)

Promotion 188 24 394 380 90 ndash 280 620prospects (ndash) (ndash) (ndash) (ndash)

Notes Figures in brackets are for 1995question was not asked in 1995

domain of unions according to the same section of the questionnaire iswelfare provision The spheres in which employees felt the greatest deficitof interest representation (where they most often responded lsquono onerepresents my interestsrsquo) were training and requalification and promotionprospects

Despite high levels of union organisation in both firms in neither caseare employees especially active participants in union life Only 178 percent of workers said they took part in union activities regularly whereas462 per cent said they attended union-organised actions occasionally orrarely Among manual workers the proportions were only slightly better20 per cent take part regularly (167 per cent lsquowhenever possiblersquo and 33per cent lsquooftenrsquo) Such a low level of activity could be the result (or thecause) of a certain distance between the union organisationrsquos policy andthe opinions of individual workers at least in Firm A where only 414 percent of respondents felt that union policies were identical to their ownopinions in Firm B the figure was 71 per cent In addition 163 per cent ofemployees in A expressed complete antipathy towards their unionorganisation expecting nothing at all from it an attitude shared by 4 percent of employees in B

Comparing the situation in Firm A with that in Firm B where themembership and status of unions is higher but relations with managementmore problematic suggests that improved communication with manage-ment and superiors together with the existence of a stabilised productionprogramme and a low risk of redundancies (now that the job cutsassociated with fundamental restructuring have been completed) lowerthe expectations of workers toward unions and act as a disincentive toparticipation in their activities

Table 66 summarises employeesrsquo opinions on what kind of union activ-ities are important at the level of their enterprise their views largelycorrespond with contemporary understandings of unionsrsquo mission (protec-tion of the worker social provision) but a residual conception of unions asorganisations which organise recreation and free-time activities partiallyendures The top priority for union activity is viewed as protection of jobsand employment followed by holiday provision and leave securing higherwages and administration of company-based welfare facilities and servicesAmong manual workers greater accent was laid on both holidays andwages whilst little priority was accorded activities seen as the domain ofimmediate superiors and management such as the organisation of workproduction technology work loads and job design and education and train-ing Since an important aspect of union activity was repeatedly identified asattention to work conditions we asked employees what would lead toincreased union influence in this area The overwhelming agreement wasthat an expansion of union rights was needed with the second mostpopular response being lsquogreater participation by workers in enterprisemanagementrsquo


140 Author

Tabl

e 6

6P

rior

itie

s fo

r un

ion

acti

vity

in t

he fi

rm (

per

cent

)

Fir

m A

Fir

m B

12

34

5A

v1

23

45

Av

Job

secu

rity

and

em

ploy

men

t pr

otec

tion

370

125

139

260

87

129

520

280

80

50

70

163

Wor

k ti

me

redu

ctio

n9

626

029

817

315

42

6629

032

024

06

08

02

07

Wor

k lo

ads

and

job

desi

gn12

523

122

623

113

02

696

022

034

027

08

02

92

Hol

iday

s an

d le

ave

442

394

101

14

38

167

470

400

90

30

10

168

Wag

e in

crea

ses

538

183

139

82

48

175

560

200

170

40

20

168

Ent

erpr

ise

wel

fare

fac

iliti

es a

nd

serv

ices

341

346

154

82

67

197

370

420

150

30

20

183

Edu

cati

on a

nd t

rain

ing

144

226

370

135

96

256

100

300

320

210

70

269

Wor

k or

gan

d pr

oduc

tion

te

chno

logy

159

135

279

260

154

277

40

230

250

350

130

304

Wor

k en

viro

nmen

t (h

azar

ds

and

dise

ases

)28

830

315

49

114

42

0633

043

09

03

012

01

79

Per

sonn

el t

rans

fers

115

250

279

202

144

267

190

390

270

50

100

220

Influ

ence

ove

r m

anag

emen

t po

licie

s18

319

222

119

220

72

5414

028

022

020

015

02

57

Not

es

1ve

ry im

port

ant

2fa

irly

impo

rtan

t3

not

so im

port

ant

4no

t im

port

ant

5un

clea

rE

xclu

ding

lsquounc

lear

rsquo

Conclusions

Our findings reveal a number of problems in the field of human resourcemanagement which clearly exist in both firms and which given obligingexternal circumstances could lead to a decline in the loyalty of employeeto employer to the destabilisation of pro-firm attitudes among employeesor to a reduction in professional reliability and an increase in turnover ofqualified employees Some 12 per cent of employees in Firm A and 17 percent in Firm B were (definitely or possibly) considering a change of job atthe time of the research in 2000 with 63 per cent in A and 46 per cent in B(definitely or probably) ruling out this option One of the complicatingfactors however when considering the causes of the level of potentialpersonnel turnover is the differing level of unemployment within thedistricts where each firm is situated Firm A lies in a district with aboutaverage unemployment of 95 per cent in 20006 whereas the prospects forfinding alternative work appeared to be better near Firm B whereunemployment was only 56 per cent

The introduction of team work for manual workers does not resembleits text-book version in either firm In some respects the measures intro-duced by their managements have had the opposite effect limiting someof the key attributes of team work such as greater independence indetermining work content and job design interdependence of workersrsquoperformance or opportunities to acquire new skills Innovations in theorganisation of work involving more complicated work patterns haveseemingly influenced the relation of blue-collar workers to managers co-workers and trade unions The subdivision of the work collective intosmall work groups with greater autonomy has often led to greatersolidarity both within the group and with management but weakenedties to unions Employees take care of their own needs and demandsthrough their immediate bosses and have less recourse to their unionorganisation Where good communication between management andworkers is combined with a stable production programme and thus jobstability people have lower expectations of unions and feel less need totake part in their activities Nevertheless it was possible to detect acertain improvement in employeesrsquo attitudes to unions in keeping with ageneralised trend in Czech society during the late 1990s As trade unionsadapted to a democratic system and a market economy at nationalsectoral and local levels our findings notwithstanding differencesbetween the two firms indicate a partial recovery in their relevance toemployeesrsquo needs

Notes

1 Our research was undertaken as part of the ongoing project lsquoThe Quality ofWorking Life in the Electronics Industryrsquo which is coordinated by ShiraishiTosimasa (Denki Rengo) and Ishikawa Akihiro (Chuo University Tokyo) and


whose third phase covered the UK France Sweden Finland Germany SpainItaly Taiwan South Korea Japan Slovenia the Czech Republic SlovakiaHungary Poland and Estonia

2 Manual professions were chosen because they represent the majority ofworkers in both firms (58 per cent in Firm A and 56 per cent in Firm B)because they constitute a relatively homogeneous group from the perspectiveof work content and because the rate of unionisation among them is highest

3 Given the low representation of manual employees working in teams (forty inFirm A and ten in Firm B) we did not include team work as a separate criterionfor comparison in Table 63

4 World Value Survey Czech section 1990 and 19985 The average rate of unionisation in firms where OS KOVO operates was 56 per

cent in 19996 Unemployment in the whole district (Chrudim okres) was 10 per cent according

to official statistics in 2000 although in the subregion in which Firm A issituated unemployment was 58 per cent The preceding year 1999 had been adifficult one in the district with a number of major employers such as TRANS-PORTA and TRAMO going bankrupt But the district authorities have beenextremely proactive in starting up job-creation schemes

Bibliography

Jakubka J (2000) lsquoNovela zaacutekoniacuteku praacutecersquo Personaacutelniacute servis 7ndash8Janata Z (1998) lsquoFormation of a New Pattern of Industrial Relations and Workersrsquo

Views on Their Unions the Czech Casersquo in Martin R Ishikawa A Makoacute Cand Consoli F (eds) Workers Firms and Unions Industrial Relations in Trans-ition Frankfurt am Main Peter Lang 211ndash24

Kosina M Vtelenskyacute L and Kovaacuteř M (1998) Noveacute směry v organizaci praacuteceMetodika KOVO Prague OS KOVO

Kubiacutenkovaacute M (1999) Ochrana pracovniacuteků - naacuterodniacute studie Prague ČMKOSRychlyacute L (2000) lsquoSociaacutelniacute dialog ndash naacutestroj modernizace sociaacutelniacuteho modelu (1)rsquo

Sociaacutelniacute politika 9 2


7 Local community transformationThe Czech Republic 1990ndash20001

Zdenka Vajdovaacute

Local community and local government

The first moments after the November 1989 regime change caught localcommunities in the Czech Republic unprepared Moreover the furtherfrom Prague ndash the centre of the civic mobilisation and the subsequentpolitical changes ndash the more uncertain the situation became Other majorcities such as Brno and Plzeň quickly assumed a similar role as epicentresof change but in most localities people had difficulty comprehending whatwas happening and the first few months of 1990 were critical indetermining future developments the danger was that apathy mistrust andindolence would prevail Civic Forum played a vital role at this time byopening information channels between the cities and rural or peripheralparts of the country Students were the principal actors tirelessly attendingpublic meetings organised by local activists and authorised by the localauthorities (still then known as national committees) These citizensrsquomeetings became fora for expressions of courage for the acquisition oftrust and for the activisation of values which had long been disengaged

The initial political changes at the local level concerned the creation oflegislative and institutional foundations for the renewal of municipal self-government and for the democratic functioning of local public adminis-trative organs The resuscitation of representative bodies and of theirautonomy in decision-making about public affairs was the first step in thetransformation of public administration within the context of eachmunicipality In part this involved the decentralisation of competencesfrom central institutions to municipal councils and administrations the firstmajor step towards territorial reform was taken in May 1990 whenregional national committees the key component of the old centralisedsystem of public administration were abolished2 The second phase of thedemocratisation of local government culminated in November 1990 whenmunicipal elections installed the first generation of democratically electedcouncillors as a new local political elite

The period from the fall of the communist regime to the first municipalelections had a number of special characteristics which were often decisive

Chapter Title 143

for the future development of particular communities An institutionpeculiar to this period was the round table as a place for negotiationsbetween oppositional (revolutionary) forces and the pre-existing establish-ment usually represented by the national committee and the communistorganisation Round tables typically led to personnel changes in manag-erial posts and the replacement of the nomenclature by new political elitesa process which was regulated by a law on the reconstruction of nationalcommittees which set a deadline of the end of March 1990 for itscompletion (parliament was also reconstructed in the same way) Thereconstructed national committees then continued to administer localaffairs until the November elections Where it was successfully realised ndashwhere sufficient numbers of motivated and uncompromised people wereforthcoming (regardless of whether they had experience of localgovernment or not) ndash subsequent developments received a significantboost (Heřmanovaacute et al 1992) It was important that this period was usedto prepare new organisational arrangements which could be implementedimmediately after the elections

Changes in the civic culture of small municipalities

Applying the concepts of social heritage (Elias and Scotson 1987) andsocial network (Buštiacutekovaacute 1999) to an analysis of the memoirs ofrepresentatives of the first generation of municipal councillors and mayorsit is possible to gain an insight into how this critical period was experiencedand interpreted by its principal actors This section examines the memoirsof two mayors3 belonging to two different generations who entered localpolitics in 1990 with different types of social heritage Mayor A was a managed 50 in 1990 elected in November in a village with 520 inhabitantsMayor B was a man of 30 in 1990 elected in a municipality with 4000inhabitants The size of municipality is fundamental to their narratives4 ina small municipality private matters coincide with public ones the mayor isconstrued as a politician and executor of political decisions and his (her)story becomes the story of the municipality itself and vice versa the storyof the municipality is the story of the mayor and frequently also his (her)family

Mayor A was born into a strict Catholic farming family in 1945 Hardwork discipline obedience parental authority and God were the mainvalues associated with his upbringing At the beginning of the 1950s hestarted school and a discrepancy between home and school education wasinescapable His father had resisted land collectivisation but only atconsiderable cost to the family ndash even harder work poverty and persecu-tion Inner conflict in addition to conflict with his fatherrsquos attitudes madehim strive to escape his familyrsquos social heritage to change his inheritedidentity to reach some harmony with the world around In 1958 when hisfather entered the united farmersrsquo cooperative in the village he could

144 Zdenka Vajdovaacute

begin to build a personal career via secondary school technical universityand finally an academic post in a research institute But his peasant originprevented him from fully realising a professional career he was not askedto join the Communist Party and thus could not take up any seniorposition in the institute Having failed to find a position adequate to hisqualifications in the social network defined by his profession and havinglost the status in the local community social network derived from hisfamilyrsquos former prestige he retreated to the privacy of his own family Astranger in the village community a citizen of second rank he succumbedto resignation in his professional career the privatisation of his personallife and a condition of limbo as if awaiting resurrection and recognitionThere were some opportunities to lsquocheatrsquo fate notably the spring of 1968and the advent of the lsquoGorbachev erarsquo in 1984 but every attempt onlyconfirmed his position of second-rank citizen and his situation in theinstitute was not altered even in November 1989

His own account of how he entered politics opens with a description ofa public meeting

It was the beginning of December 1989 and the meeting place wascompletely full

Everyone anticipated with baited breath what the five students fromBrno University were going to say Perhaps they expected that theywould make the revolution Many were merely curious

For many people the revolutionary mood was just somethinginteresting and new in their lives and they were certainly not preparedto make any sacrifices Maybe it was fear spread by the former leadersand their allies

You could sense this immediately when the students invited peopleto speak There was silence I couldnrsquot wait any longer I raised myhand and felt the anticipation and tension channelled towards me fromall sides I was standing face to face with my fellow citizens who insuch a small municipality can always watch everyone else from anintimate distance

Everyone stared at me at least thatrsquos how it seemed since the totalsilence deepened the tension No raised fists no strong gestures Onlywords a simple address

lsquoDear fellow citizens dear citizens of A all of you who came heretoday of your own free willrsquo

Almost immediately I felt that most of the people trusted me Youcannot help feeling touched by that trust and by the historical impor-tance of the moment As if thoughts hidden for years suddenly brokethrough the artificially built dam and started to float invisibly anduncontrollably through the air

Is this the truth or just a moment of relief I am no different fromthe others I was also suspicious

Local community transformation 145

lsquoThe students came here to explain the meaning of their actions toawaken usrsquo I carry on in a voice that is barely coming through my tautthroat

What made him speak out and break the anxious silence The chal-lenge of striding out from the lsquonormalisation mudrsquo and the unpredictablerisks associated with this moment explain why nobody started to speakHow did it happen that he spoke up And how was it that people trustedhim The obvious explanation is that he had not in fact abandoned orbeen stripped of his social heritage He had ignored it only in a vainattempt to obtain a new identity which would allow him to accomplish aprofessional career At the crucial moment however when he decided tointervene in the public meeting he in effect acknowledged the existenceof this social heritage (his family origins their status in the municipality)and reclaimed it not as a burden a limitation or a bad sign but on thecontrary as something which could evoke a warm trust among his fellowcitizens in the hall The social heritage that he had tried to shake offwhich once made him a stranger and a private man in the local com-munity a citizen of second rank in a society under a totalitariancommunist regime now began to mutate into social capital in step withthe political transformation of society towards plurality and democracyIn this moment he was to win back his inherited identity among hislsquorespected fellow citizens rsquo who no longer looked on him as a strangerand citizen of second rank

He immediately became the spokesperson for Civic Forum in thevillage He was elected mayor in 1990 and once more in 1994 From hismemoirs it seems that he did not join or form any partial social networksbased upon strong ties instead he remained rather weakly tied into theextensive social network of the community as a whole He establishedformal channels of communication (radio a local newsletter) between thepublic of the municipality and himself as mayor He developed newconnections oriented outwards from the municipality and embeddedhimself as a social actor into these new social networks

Mayor B describes himself as an engineer with university educationand fluency in several foreign languages He started his professionalcareer in 1984 in a region where the main industry was mining It seemsthat he was not greatly constrained by the communist regime as hedeveloped a good career in landscape recultivation The father of twochildren he was also a member of local social organisations such as thebeekeepersrsquo union and the Czech Union of Nature Conservationists ndashrespectable organisations and respectable leisure time activities How-ever the regime regarded environmental protection activities as subversiveones while beekeepers have a reputation in literature as the mother-landrsquos awakeners an unfortunate reputation to have under a modernauthoritarian regime


Mayor Brsquos account of his entry into local politics runs as follows

I took part in the activities of Civic Forum in a municipality which hasalways been one of the exemplary ones in the district

Our municipality was the principal beneficiary of the accumulationof resouces from mining within the district This is how large concretehousing estates were built for miners at the beginning of the 1980sintruding into a previously peaceful community The construction ofhousing estates was followed by further resources to build a medicalcentre a new grammar school and a new nursery school a sewagetreatment plant new roads a shopping centre a funeral parlour andother attainments of the time People moved in to the new flats if theyhad the right contacts to the right people Many new family houseswere built at the time as well ndash naturally only for those who had theright contacts or the right position within the system

All of a sudden the velvet revolution cameBut what do they want these people from Civic Forum Everyone

has nice clothes good shoes there is bread and milk in the shops everyday and there is even a public water main in the municipality and newroads everywhere

Most councillors voted against co-opting new members from CivicForum allegedly because they had no previous experience and nowthey would like to lsquomake decisionsrsquo In the spring of 1990 members ofthe Municipal National Committee (MNV) actually protested in frontof the District National Committee (ONV) building with a postersaying lsquoCitizens of B are against co-opting new members to theDistrict National Committeersquo

The chairman of the MNV resigned citing health problems andthree months later his deputy resigned in a similar way The MNVsecretary stayed on as head of the administration until the election

The election was drawing nearer Former MNV deputies dividedthemselves into four groups and formed four lists of candidates and allof sudden there were no communists any more ndash instead they calledthemselves Social Democrats the Movement for Moravia and Silesiaand so on Civic Forum shared one list of candidates with the ChristianDemocrats Some were very surprised that those who lsquohad no previousexperiencersquo gained most votes and eight of the fifteen council seats

In such a polarised and difficult situation nobody wanted to run formayor Nobody

The electoral procedure approved at the first meeting of themunicipal council was based on simple voting ndash every councillor wasto write the name of the proposed mayor on a piece of paper

Thus I became the youngest mayor in the district and one of theyoungest in the republic In two months I was to celebrate my thirtiethbirthday


Mayor B holds an honourable place in the social network of the localcommunity due to his familyrsquos social heritage and especially the standingof his father the chronicler of the municipality who probably rankedamong the traditional local elite

He was an activist in Civic Forum from the beginning and received thesecond largest number of votes in the first local elections His fellowcitizens clearly ratified his honourable position within the community butthe previous establishment ndash the outgoing members of the nationalcommittee ndash did not want to resign local power In the local councilenvironment he found himself isolated unable to draw on his own socialnetworks He therefore oriented his new relations outwards not onlyacross the municipality border but also thanks to his knowledge of foreignlanguages by setting up projects on an international level based oncooperation with municipalities abroad After the first electoral term hereturned to his profession enriched by newly acquired personal contacts

Development of local public discourses during the first free election campaigns

June 1990 saw parliamentary elections take place in Czechoslovakia Turn-out was massive and the majority of citizens rejected the communists Boththe elections and the preceding electoral campaign were historic events notonly for subsequent developments on a national scale but equally for thetransformation of local society During the previous five months at leastthirteen new political parties and movements were formed in addition tothe three quasi-political parties which survived from the pre-1989 era (theCommunist Party the Peoplersquos Party and the Socialist Party) Around tenof these made some inroads (or held their own) in the political life ofsmaller towns and rural municipalities but the existence and standing ofCivic Forum in a given community was paramount At this level thetrustworthiness of those who affiliated to Civic Forum had a determininginfluence on the trust which the movement enjoyed and on what it actuallyrepresented In small communities more than anywhere the electioncampaign turned into a contest between Civic Forum and the CommunistParty or alternatively the communists versus lsquothe restrsquo

For illustration we can cite two contemporary accounts of the electioncampaign in small Czech municipalities5

Example 1

On 30 April 1990 the Communist Party put up posters in a municipality of1000 inhabitants By the next morning they had been spray-painted overor touched up with the message lsquoLiarsrsquo The rest of the campaign was alsomarked by anti-communism Slogans and verses attacking the CommunistParty appeared one ditty about lsquorotten cherriesrsquo led to a fight in the pub


(the cherry was the communistsrsquo election symbol) rumours circulated thatparty members were going round the old people in the village threateningthem Civic Forum pointed to rumours circulated by the communists Theelection campaign was personal and prejudiced People had lost their fearand made use of the chance to speak out but often only expressednegative emotions directed at particular people who represented the oldregime in one respect or another During the campaign controversialdecisions by local administrative organs in the past were brought to lightThese had often been the result of direct commands or unqualifiedjudgments by central organs including for example permission obtainedfor the construction of a lodge in a protected area which was issueddirectly by the Ministry of Agriculture Personal and family grievancesfrom the era of collectivisation and from the normalisation era were airedand such conflicts led to some strange political alliances

Example 2

The election campaign in this municipality of 3000 inhabitants took placeagainst a background of the unravelling of a conflict set in motion by thereconstruction of the national committee and pitting Civic Forum againstthe Communist and Socialist Parties But it was a conflict of particularpeople not parties or ideologies The crystallisation of lsquopolitical opinionsrsquobegan with a fight (involving a police officer) during which one personsuffered injuries serious enough to cause his absence from work for afortnight and continued with hysterical outbursts at pre-election ralliesand on the pages of the local press The happy ending at the electoral urnswas soured by the filing of a complaint by the district electoral commissionagainst one of the participants in the lsquocrystallisation of political opinionsrsquofor electoral sabotage and several people collected their voting cards andwent to vote in another ward

It is difficult to judge how much the electoral campaign affected thedecisions of voters one way or another but it certainly served anotherpurpose ndash as a hitherto unimaginable opportunity to express attitudes andopinions It called forth emotional rhetoric and poorly articulated opinionIt created a situation where people were forced to reveal more aboutthemselves than could be read from cadre questionnaires It was anopportunity for the gradual realisation that another value system existedin which previous behaviour actions statements or reticences took on newsignificances of guilt or vindication It was a huge opportunity for com-munication

Local elites and their political culture

At the first local elections in November 1990 Civic Forum won the mostcouncil seats nationwide (32 per cent) followed by independent candidates


and groupings (28 per cent) The Communist Party won 14 per cent ofcouncil seats the Peoplersquos Party 12 per cent and the Social Democrats 2per cent The turnout was 74 per cent These figures represent a thoroughturnover of local political elites 80 per cent of councillors elected in 1990had no previous experience of public administration The size of themunicipality was directly correlated with the extent of the turnover thelarger the community the greater the discontinuity between pre- and post-November elites The 1990 intake of councillors was characterised by anover-representation of people with a technical or scientific education halfof them were university educated 21 per cent women and their averageage was 42 In general they were people who had kept a distance from theprevious regime refrained from joining any of the permitted politicalparties and had joined the civic protest movement at the moment of socialexplosion Their triumph at the local level indicated significant politicalsupport for the new regime Although their opinions and attitudes wereoften closer to the political orientations of the new power centre than tothose of the citizens who elected them they represented a link between thecentre and the peripheries which shored up the unity of a shaken society(Baldersheim et al 1996)

Turnout in 1994 was 62 per cent but in 1998 it was only 45 per cent Theother major intervening development has been a decrease in the share ofseats won by political parties and taking into account the number ofindependents who stood on party lists as well just 23 per cent of council-lors were members of political parties after the 1998 elections comparedwith 63 per cent between 1994 and 1998 Other recent findings corroboratethe conclusion that Czech local politics is founded on a concept of


Table 71 1994 and 1998 local election results Votes and seats won by party (per cent)

Party Votes Seats

1994 1998 1994 1998

Independents 1 14 12 55KSČM 15 14 13 9KDUndashČSL 6 11 8 11ČSSD 11 18 8 7ODS 35 24 31 9ODA 10 ndash 6 ndashUS ndash 8 ndash 1Others 12 11 22 8

Key to partiesKSČM Communist Party of Bohemia and MoraviaKDUndashČSL Christian Democratic UnionndashCzech Peoplersquos PartyČSSD Czech Social Democratic PartyODS Civic Democratic PartyODA Civic Democratic AllianceUS Freedom Union

community rather than on political party organisation (Vajdovaacute 19961997) A related characteristic is the formation of coalitions at local levelwhich respect neither leftndashright oppositions within the political spectrumnor the guidelines of central party apparatuses but instead match the inter-personal networks of a local social system (Buštiacutekovaacute 1999) The rejectionof party organisation by local political elites can be interpreted as a willing-ness to compromise but it also problematises the essence of a politicalsystem based on competition between parties aspiring to power gover-nance and decision-making Given that the size of a community has beenshown to be a significant factor in forming the attitudes of citizens andlocal political elites (Dahl and Tufte 1973) it is not surprising that theattitudes of local elites towards parties varies with municipality size evenin the Czech Republic large towns (with a population above 50000) are adifferent case where political parties are considered a standard componentof the local political system without which democratic self-governmentwould be hindered

Pragmatism in small town politics

The idea that self-government is a non-political affair rests on the assump-tion that there are no divided interests in a community The task of non-political self-government is either to do the best for all citizens or to carryout the orders of central government in both cases there is nothing to decideor agree on and no one whom it is necessary to convince Yet even inlocalities politics is a process involving issues of who gets what when andhow and political decision-making revolves around these intrinsicallypolitical questions which invoke opinions and require legitimisation lsquoThereis no such thing as the technical administrative resolution of politicalproblems And since politics is more about opinions than truth and rightpolitical processes ought to be as open as possible to the influence ofcitizensrsquo (Offerdal 1995 203) However the attitudes of local elites in smallCzech towns during the 1990s can still be described as pragmatic accordingto a longitudinal empirical research project6 Local politicians understandtheir role as one of solving practical problems in which there is no room forpolitics During the first electoral term the priorities of local councils werethings like security sewerage waste water treatment environmental im-provements water supply and waste disposal in other words basic conditionsfor the existence and smooth running of the community Not until 1997 doessurvey data suggest that other problems such as local transport housing forlow-income groups and leisure-time services had gained precedence7 Theimplication is that by then at least in larger municipalities (by Czechstandards) basic infrastructural needs had been met However this had notbrought about a change in the pragmatic approach of local politicians whocontinued to view local politics as a technical-professional activity in whichexpertise should have the decisive say


Influence and decision-making

According to the mayors of towns and villages above 2000 inhabitantsinterviewed in 1997 the greatest say in decision-making about communalaffairs belongs to those actors with a legally defined role in local publicadministration the council the board and the mayor Since 1992 theiropinions on the role of the council have not changed but mayors areincreasingly apt to view their own decision-making role as more significantthan that of the board The influence ascribed to non-local public adminis-trative organs ndash district offices and central government ndash has decreased intime while the administrative components of local government (the officeand the chief administrative officer) are ranked behind the elected organsin terms of influence Although local political systems comprise othersubjects such as political parties associations and interest organisationschurches businessmen and local enterprises their influence was seen assmall and the same applies to so-called lsquoold structuresrsquo Only in the case ofchurches were significant regional variations in these appraisals foundreflecting the stronger influence of religion in Moravian than Bohemiansociety The attitudes of local elites towards the influence of the ordinarycitizen reflected a certain optimism about the role of citizens in 1992around 40 per cent attributed citizens a large degree of influence a further40 per cent lsquomediumrsquo influence and 20 per cent little influence But by 1997this enthusiasm among mayors for civic participation had faded 20 percent ascribed citizens a major influence and 40 per cent little influence

Cooperation as an element of the political culture of local elites8

Cooperability implies the ability of local self-governments to incorporate aprinciple of cooperation with other subjects into procedures of governance(Vajdovaacute 1998) The concept invokes the personal characteristics of peoplein local government but is again most strongly dependent on the size of thecommunity and the corresponding level of complexity of public adminis-trative functions Relations between local self-government organs them-selves and with other institutions can be characterised in terms of theirfrequency urgency longevity and content about which our survey findingsprovide only limited testimony They tell us only how much importance isattributed to cooperation with various subjects by mayors Neverthelesssince mayors are the actors whose decision-making influence is generallyconsidered greatest within a community (together with the council and theboard) their evaluations of the importance of different cooperative relation-ships can with allowances be taken as a rough operationalisation of actualcooperation at the local level9

If we rank actors according to the importance attributed to them bymayors first place goes to employees of the local authority who are in turnranked according to their position in the organisational hierarchy the chiefadministrative officer first followed by heads of departments and then


other officials That cooperation with these actors is regarded as importantrequires no explanation since they staff the administrative organ which isdirectly charged with providing services to citizens The next mostimportant relationship according to mayors is with citizens themselvesLower down we find the mayors of other municipalities which indicatesthat the necessity of cooperation with neighbouring councils is felt eventhough a third of respondents did not consider the absence of regional self-government bodies at that time as a problem10 Least importance wasattributed to establishing cooperative relationships with trade unionsrepresentatives of political parties other than the respondentrsquos own andother local politicians Private business interests in the locality onersquos ownpolitical party and representatives of non-political and non-economicorganisations including NGOs were placed roughly in the middle of thescale which in the case of the latter seems to indicate an expression ofopenness towards the community and responsibility towards the particip-ation of citizens in public affairs

Cooperability as indicated by the attitudes of mayors increases withage but decreases with education it is more strongly associated withmayors from a lsquoblue-collarrsquo background than those from a lsquowhite-collarrsquobackground and is correlated with non-membership of political parties butwith membership of other organisations whether recreational or profes-sional No correlation was found between overall cooperability and whetheror not a municipality had developed cooperative relationships with foreignpartners but membership in regional national or international municipalassociations was associated with greater cooperability At present theMinistry for Local Development recognises 372 municipal associations inthe Czech Republic (including micro-regions) and it is evident that thisform of cooperation has become an important way of addressing problemswhich stem from the small size of most Czech municipalities Cooperabilitywas found to be lowest among representatives of medium-sized towns(20000ndash100000)

Civil society restoration the reshaping of civic culture in town life

The social changes in the post-socialist Czech Republic can be interpretedas a process of increasing social differentiation and a complementaryprocess of increasing mutual interdependence in a more complex type ofsociety lsquoBeing interdependent with so many people will very probablyoften compel individual people to act in a way they would not act exceptunder compulsion In this case one is inclined to personify or reifyinterdependencersquo (Elias 1978 93ndash4) While major social changes are takingplace this condition will be more frequent one understands the worldaround even less than usual feels stressed by incomprehensible uncon-trollable forces and this generates feelings of powerlessness hopelessness


and apathy The feelings of powerlessness dependence and of an unevenposition are further accentuated by the interdependence of so manypeople Perceptions of binding social networks as blind social forcesexacerbate feelings of powerlessness in peoplersquos own lives The period afterNovember 1989 was such a period in Czech society The transformationprocesses in the political economic and social spheres started at the sametime but have been proceeding at different speeds (Musil 1992) Againstthe background of these changes it ought to be possible to observe changesin an individualrsquos feelings as he or she is exposed to powers they do notunderstand but which act with the force of powers of nature

Research on the political culture of local communities allows us tohypothesise that general value orientations are characterised by an attitudetowards oneself and power which can be labelled lsquooutsider syndromersquoaccording to the concept of lsquothe established and the outsidersrsquo put forwardby Norbert Elias (1987) Furthermore lsquooutsider syndromersquo was found to bethe most significant factor for political attitudes and political participationby citizens in a locality Its importance for political participation and fordistinguishing patterns of political culture has been demonstratedempirically (Vajdovaacute and Kosteleckyacute 1997)11

To help explain the development of patterns of political culture andpolitical participation in localities it would be important to know iflsquooutsider syndromersquo is strengthening or diminishing Empirical data in factsuggests that the very strong sense of powerlessness identified in localcommunity studies shortly after the velvet revolution has diminished in the1990s

The citizen in the local community

Local communities in three Czech towns with 9000ndash14000 inhabitants ndashBlatnaacute Českyacute Krumlov and Velkeacute Meziřiacutečiacute ndash were the subjects of repeatedsociological surveys during the 1990s12 They show that during the period1992ndash8 individualsrsquo feelings of powerlessness which we assume to have acrucial role in forming attitudes and influencing behaviour have beendiminishing (see Table 72)

These figures indicate both that citizens found it very difficult to orientthemselves in the new post-revolutionary regime in the 1990s and thatrapid changes in politics and economics threw individuals into situations inwhich they felt exposed to stresses whose origin they did not understandand whose magnitude they could not anticipate However it appears thatthis extreme situation has passed and the new conditions are becomingmore acceptable more understandable and easier to cope with peoplersquospowerlessness is in decline

The same trend is visible on the indicator of social capital whichmeasures mutual trust openness and the strength of peoplersquos integrationinto the social networks of local communities Two questions were posed


lsquoDo you have someone to go to in difficult situationsrsquo and lsquoDo peopleever ask you for helprsquo The existence of social capital in inter-personalrelationships creates conditions in which people have someone to go to intimes of difficulty and conversely places them in a position to help othersThe demand for mutual assistance has apparently not changed over timeand is roughly the same in all three towns one-quarter of people are neverapproached for help 26ndash32 per cent are rarely approached and only 5ndash6per cent are approached very often However the other measure of mutualassistance ndash whether people have someone to go to ndash showed significantimprovement between 1992 and 1998 even if the rate of change differed inthe three cities the improvement was greatest in Blatnaacute and least in ČeskyacuteKrumlov Unfortunately the way the questions were asked makes itimpossible to identify the precise nature and frequency of the contactswhich people have at their disposal or actually make use of The responsesare merely indicative of the openness of social networks and the kind ofinteraction between people and their environment and any connectionbetween attitudes of powerlessness and attitudes which express theinvolvement of people in local social networks must also be deduced withcaution However there was an unmistakeably frequent correlationbetween powerlessness and situations in which respondents are unable toturn to anybody for help suggesting that declining feelings of power-lessness may be produced by the growing density of networks of contactswhich can be used in critical situations and conversely may open the doorto mutual openness and trust between people The question needs to beasked whether the growth of connections is not just a manifestation of arather negative kind of cronyism but further analysis of other aspects ofpowerlessness suggests that the first explanation is more likely ndash that itreflects the emergence and growth of social capital in the local community


Table 72 Changing feelings of powerlessness (percentage agreement with thestatement lsquoSometimes I feel totally powerless in respect of what ishappening around mersquo)

Town Agreement Year

1992 1994 1996 1998

Blatnaacute Disagree 6 10 13 14Partly agree 33 33 46 52Agree 61 57 41 34

Českyacute Krumlov Disagree 7 11 15 13Partly agree 32 36 41 42Agree 61 53 43 45

Velkeacute Meziřiacutečiacute Disagree 6 11 13 13Partly agree 23 29 41 46Agree 70 61 46 41

Further research focused on respondentsrsquo attitudes to certain types ofmotivation for individual behaviour in society The aim was to test whetherambition is the decisive factor in motivations for individual behaviour(people were asked whether they agreed that lsquoto earn the respect of othersone has to be ambitiousrsquo) or whether behaviour is motivated by normfulfilment (by assessing agreement with the statement lsquoit is necessary toovercome laziness to be energeticrsquo) Positive attitudes to both kinds ofmotivation were observed for 70ndash95 per cent of respondents in all threetowns and at all stages of the survey with positive attitudes to normativemotivation being more frequent in every case Nevertheless over timecertain changes in attitude occurred which can be characterised in terms ofa weakening of extreme attitudes ndash a decrease in both strongly positive andstrongly negative attitudes In particular the imperative of lsquobeing energeticrsquoeased between 1992 and 1998

The citizen in local politics

Our conclusions concerning the mutually conditional dependence ofgeneral value judgments and attitudes to local politics are based on thestrong connection which was observed between attitudes to local politicsand feelings of powerlessness The key attitude towards local politics whichwas tested in the three towns during the 1990s was whether the possibilityof an ordinary citizen influencing the town government has changed since1989 This can be viewed as an indicator of a positive attitude to thetransformation of local society assuming the possibility of influencing themanagement of public affairs in towns is regarded as a positive and desir-able result of the transformation The results show that negative attitudesto the transformation (a perception that the possibility of influencing localgovernment has not increased) are fairly infrequent (ranging from 6 percent in Blatnaacute in 1992 to 20 per cent in Českyacute Krumlov in 1998) Further-more there was a demonstrable connection between positive attitudes totransformation and the rejection of feelings of powerlessness

Other aspects of citizensrsquo attitudes towards local politics were also fol-lowed albeit not in each of the four surveys do citizens feel competent inlocal politics do they feel responsible for decision-making about townaffairs and empowered to participate in them both during elections and atother times Do citizens regard local politics as relevant to their own livesin the local community are they concerned about decisions of the localgovernment Do citizens want to participate in managing public affairs dothey feel obliged to lsquomeddlersquo in them

The following conclusions apply to the political culture in all thesurveyed towns

bull The relevance of local politics for citizens decreased slightly over thelast decade although the proportion of people for whom local political


representation is important is constant ndash about one-fifth in each townThis is in accordance with citizensrsquo attitude to the functioning of localgovernment the number of people who are entirely ambivalent aboutits functioning has increased The implication is that the gap betweenprivate and public spheres has widened

bull The competence of citizens in local politics has also changed littleextreme attitudes have softened but approximately half the populationof each town does not feel competent to participate in local politics

bull Positive attitudes to participation in public affairs were observedamong 30 per cent of citizens in Blatnaacute 41 per cent of citizens in ČeskyacuteKrumlov and 36 per cent in Velkeacute Meziřiacutečiacute in 1998 This does notconstitute any major change over time there was a small increase inpositive attitudes in Velkeacute Meziřiacutečiacute and Českyacute Krumlov and none at allin Blatnaacute

bull Certain attitudes are mutually reinforcing if citizens feel competent inlocal politics they are more likely to find local politics relevant and willfeel obliged to participate in decision-making about the townrsquos publicaffairs

bull Attitudes towards powerlessness and local politics are similarly con-nected citizens who feel powerless often regard themselves asincompetent in local politics view local politics as irrelevant to theirprivate lives and are less inclined to participate in the public affairs oftheir town

Conclusion

This chapter has summarised a number of research findings concerninglocal civic and political cultures in the Czech Republic in the first decadefollowing the collapse of communism It can be assumed that they pointto phenomena quite widely generalisable within post-socialist societiesconnected with the struggle by particular communities to manage thecomplex transformation they are undergoing by redeploying social capitalresources adopting more participative forms of decision-making andgovernance and renegotiating the terms of communication and cooper-ation between local actors and with the external political environment Thedynamics of these processes nevertheless differ in communities of differentsizes In small municipalities there tends to be only a very limited numberof people capable of adopting a leadership role in the community and itwas more or less impossible to replace a complete team of leaders afterNovember 1989 which led inevitably to greater continuity in personnelMoreover the social milieu of a village is such that private and publicspheres easily merge into one another and formal roles (within the localcouncil for instance) are not readily distinguishable from peoplersquosinformal social prestige given by their position in local social networks orby their familyrsquos social heritage Therefore the most practical way forward


after 1989 was often simply to adapt (incrementally) to new conditions anddemands using the same lsquohuman potentialrsquo as before Even in the relativelysmall towns which have been examined in the latter part of this chapterthere existed a much larger pool of citizens able and willing to take on civicleadership roles and the existence of a formal or informal opposition tothe governing team has been a factor influencing the dynamics of theircivic cultures ever since 1989 A greater degree of anonymity facilitated bylarger communities guarantees the existence of a space for constructiveopposition and the eventual alternation of local political elites Corres-pondingly there is a greater distance between citizensrsquo private and publiclives and the dissemination of new attitudes towards participation in localpolitics is therefore a potentially smoother process given that it does notimply such a radical identity crisis The problem which small town com-munities have to face is rather the danger of non-participation by citizenscaused by their withdrawal into private affairs or by tendencies towardsfeelings of powerlessness against the impersonal face of social changes

Notes

1 Supported by the GA of ČR grant 4030017132 The first suggestions for a new territorial administrative arrangement for the

Czech Republic were accompanied by the airing of suppressed nationalismsoften voiced by regional nomenclatures and newly established nationalistpolitical parties which lobbied for the creation of a Moravian or MoravianndashSilesian homeland

3 The following analysis draws on the international comparative research projectlsquoLearning Democracyrsquo which was carried out in Poland Slovakia and theCzech Republic in 1995 and financed by the Norwegian Research Council Theempirical data consisted of written memoirs of councillors or mayors who wereelected and served in the first electoral term after the change of regime TheCzech collection of memoirs has sixty-five items forty-three authors wereelected mayor in the first term and most were re-elected in the autumn of 1994ten contributors are women The memoirs have different length and contentbut most of them cover the following topics how it came about that they wereelected as municipal councillors local government policy decision-makingsolving specific local issues

4 In the Czech lsquoLearning Democracyrsquo sample 37 per cent of municipalities hadfewer than 2000 and 50 per cent fewer than 5000 inhabitants This actuallyconstitutes a significant under-representation of the smallest municipalitiessince nationwide 90 per cent of municipalities have fewer than 2000 inhabit-ants and 60 per cent fewer than 500 A highly significant process during theperiod immediately after 1989 was the fragmentation of municipalities as areaction to their forced amalgamation in the 1970s and 1980s which hadoccurred in the name of effective public administration but often against thewishes of their inhabitants In 1989 there were around 4100 municipalities inthe Czech Republic which had increased to 5800 at the start of 1991 andstabilised at the present level of 6200 in 1996 The driving force of this process


was the desire for independence but it has often adversely affected communi-tiesrsquo developmental potential

5 From a research project carried out by the Sociological Institute of the CzechAcademy of Sciences lsquoChanges in Local Societyrsquo which examined a panel ofthirty-five municipalities with 10000 or fewer inhabitants based on lsquodiaries ofeventsrsquo compiled by local correspondents during the period leading up to theJune general election

6 Researchers interviewed panels of local elites and representative samples ofadult citizens in three Czech towns every two years The size of the samples wasin the range of 400ndash60 respondents The surveys focused on attitudes determin-ing political culture and on the social networks of local politicians

7 In 1997 a survey of local public administration was carried out in the CzechRepublic as part of the international comparative survey financed by theNorwegian Research Council lsquoLocal Democracy and Innovation IIrsquo the firststage of which had been undertaken in 1992 The countries involved wereHungary Poland the Czech Republic and Slovakia Mayors of towns andmunicipalities with more than 2000 inhabitants were interviewed

8 This section uses the same survey findings cited in note 79 Responses were collated using an ordinal five-point scale where 1 meant

lsquocooperation is unimportantrsquo and 5 meant lsquocooperation is very importantrsquo10 Following the re-establishment of municipal self-government the next step in

the reform of public administration intended to strengthen self-governing anddemocratic tendencies in Czech society was the establishment of regions asself-governing territorial entities operating at a scale between municipalitiesand the central state The debate shifted to and fro in parliament and in thepublic realm for seven years (Vajdovaacute 2001) about whether to have regions ornot how many and what their competences should be before a constitutionallaw was finally passed on the creation of higher territorial self-governing units(VUacuteSC) in 1997 followed by further necessary legislation which establishedthirteen regions plus Prague as of spring 2000 The first regional elections thentook place in autumn 2000 Turnout was poor at just 336 per cent

11 lsquoOutsider syndromersquo was indicated by five statements Four of them wereadopted from Putnamrsquos study (1993 110) and a fifth was added which was amodification designed to focus on local politics Respondents were asked toexpress their agreement on a four-point scale When factor analysis was appliedone factor explained more than 50 per cent of variance We labelled it lsquooutsidersydromersquo

12 Local Democracy and Innovation (1990ndash2) Political Culture of Local Com-munities (1993ndash5) Cultural Changes in a Czech Locality (1996ndash8) and SocialNetworks in a Local Political System (1997ndash9) supported by GA of ČR and theCzech Academy of Sciences

Bibliography

Baldersheim H Illner M Offerdal A Rose L and Swianiewicz P (eds) (1996)Local Democracy and the Processes of Transformation in East-Central EuropeBoulder CO Westview Press

Buštiacutekovaacute L (1999) Acquaintances of Local Political Leaders (in Czech) PragueSociologickyacute uacutestav AV ČR Working Paper 993


Dahl RA and Tufte ER (1973) Size and Democracy Stanford StanfordUniversity Press

Elias N (1978) What Is Sociology New York Columbia University PressElias N (1994) The Civilising Process Oxford Blackwell PublishersElias N and Scotson JL (1987) Established and Outsiders Oxford Basil BlackwellHeřmanovaacute E Illner M and Vajdovaacute Z (1992) lsquoPolitical Springtime in 1990 in

Village and Small Townrsquo (in Czech) Sociologickyacute časopis vol 28 no 3 369ndash85Heřmanovaacute E Vajdovaacute Z (1991) lsquoTransformation of Political Parties in Small

Czech Municipalitiesrsquo in Peacuteteri G (ed) Events and Changes The First Steps ofLocal Transition in East-Central Europe Local Democracy and InnovationProject Working Papers Budapest lsquoHelyi democraacutecia eacutes uacutejiacutetaacutesokrsquo Alapiacutetvaacuteny140ndash6

Musil J (1992) lsquoCzechoslovakia in the Middle of Transitionrsquo Daedalus vol 121no 2 175ndash95

Offerdal A (1995) lsquoPolitics and Problems of Organizational Design in Local Self-governmentrsquo in Faltrsquoan Lrsquo (ed) Regions Self-government European IntegrationBratislava Institute of Sociology SAV

Putnam R (1993) Making Democracy Work Princeton Princeton University PressVajdovaacute Z (1996) lsquoPolitical Culture ndash Theoretical Concept and Researchrsquo (in Czech)

Sociologickyacute časopis vol 32 no 3 339ndash51Vajdovaacute Z (1997) Political Culture of Local Political Elites The Comparison of a

Czech and East-German Town (in Czech) Prague Sociologickyacute uacutestav AV ČRWorking Paper 973

Vajdovaacute Z (1998) lsquoUnderevaluated Capital ndash Cooperability of Mayors of CzechTownsrsquo (in Czech) in Revitalisation of Problematic Regions Uacutestiacute nad LabemFSE UJEP

Vajdovaacute Z (ed) (2001) Regional Elections ndash the Council of the Uacutestiacute nL Region ndash2000 (in Czech) Uacutestiacute nL FSE UJEP

Vajdovaacute Z and Kosteleckyacute T (1997) lsquoPolitical Culture of Local Community TheCase of Three Townsrsquo (in Czech) Sociologickyacute časopis vol 32 no 3 445ndash65


8 Civic potential as a differentiatingfactor in the development of localcommunities

Martin Slosiarik

Introduction

In the last decade of the twentieth century Slovak society embarked on aset of social transformations entailing fundamental structural changesThe most significant for the purposes of this chapter was the renewal ofthe social political legal and cultural identity of communities includingthe re-establishment of the sovereignty of towns and villages The mani-fold problems associated with this ongoing transformation process findexpression in the socio-spatial organisation of society at the macro-meso- and micro-level Here the focus is on the micro-level specificallythe municipality

The dispositions of particular territorial communities ndash in terms of theircapacity to adapt to new developmental trends to activate and effectivelyutilise their potentials ndash are varied In many residual characteristics such asstate paternalism and low awareness of any territorial belonging are stillevident The solution of problems typical for rural settlements requires theremoval of barriers inherent in the atomisation of territorial communitiesand the creation of an active local society Extrication from marginalisationdemands that local communities not only react to external processesinfluencing their lives but above all that they adopt the role of an actor ndashan active subject oriented toward the solution of existing problems in anattempt to change the situation of the community for the better

Such an active approach is legitimised by the expansion in the self-governing competences of territorial communities in Slovakia A change inthe legal status of local councils (the 1990 law on municipal government)along with the implementation of civic and political rights affords eachcitizen of a municipality the right to participate in decision-making andprojecting geared towards improving the settlement conditions of the localcommunity However participation is conditional on the existence of acertain potential as its source of energy Below we will argue that thefundamental precondition for participation can be conceived of as civicpotential However we are not suggesting that other potentials (demo-graphic educational economic housing ecological etc) are irrelevant asresources for the development of particular local communities

Chapter Title 161

During the social transformation tendencies towards disintegration anddecentralisation legitimised by the transfer of competences to the locallevel have increased the need for revitalising activities especially in under-developed settlements and in settlements earmarked for managed declineby the preceding regime Many rural villages fall into this group includingthe two which form the object of this study ndash Kvačany and LiptovskeacuteKlrsquoačany in north-central Slovakia Our selection of case studies wasdetermined by two sets of considerations

1 Their structural similarity in terms of demography the educationallevels of the populations housing and environmental conditions ethnicand religious affiliations economic activities and the existence of acertain popular autarky Previous research (A-projekt 1994a 1994b1994c 1995) confirmed such structural similarities

2 A differentiation between the two communities in their recent approachto improving living conditions Each one initially drew up a localdevelopment project as a planning instrument identifying short-medium- and long-term aims Their implementation in both casesexplicitly counted on civic activity ndash the arousal of citizensrsquo interest intheir neighbourhood and the quality of life therein In Kvačany therealisation phase of the project was successfully started and wasquickly manifest in a variety of activities leading to improvements insettlement conditions (the setting up of a community foundation thepublication of a monthly magazine about the community and thesurrounding micro-region the restoration of small wooden architec-tural objects respecting their authentic character the realisation ofmini-grant projects the establishment of a club for friends (emigreacutes) ofKvačany initiatives in agrotourism annual contests for the mostbeautiful front garden brigade work to construct a sewerage systemrenovation work on bus shelters the cemetery the cultural centreparks etc) On the other hand similar activities have been slow to getstarted in Liptovskeacute Klrsquoačany in spite of the very similar socialstructural characteristics mentioned above

This paradox led us to formulate an explanatory hypothesis that thedifferent reactions of the two communities to the demands of social trans-formation are the result of differing levels of human potential andspecifically of civic potential

Theoretical starting points

Territorial community as an integral social system

One of the theoretical starting points of our analysis which serves as abroader frame of reference for the conceptualisation of civic potential as a

162 Martin Slosiarik

comparative advantage in local development is a model of social realitygrounded in the idea of the social system The territorial community has anorganic character (Pašiak 1990 72) Even though it does not have a purelysocial character its social determination is dominant and hence we canconsider the territorial community as a social system Here we draw onSchenkrsquos thesis that lsquoorganic social units are social systemsrsquo (1993 132)According to Hirner lsquoamong the most significant forms of [social system]are a range of territorial social systems from homes through villagestowns districts and regions to states They are characterised by the multi-tudinous dimensions of their self-realisationrsquo (1970a 120) The village ndash theform of spatial organisation of society most relevant to our research aims ndashis a relatively closed social system

Territoriality is a basic identificational marker delimiting places ofcollective interest in settlement patterns Pašiak specifies territorial condi-tions settlement activities and resulting neighbourhood bonds betweenpeople as the basis of territorial communities It is on this objective basethat the particular subjective signifiers of these communities then emerge ndashconsciousness of mutual belonging cooperation and assistance sharedsocial norms elements of self-government social institutions a publicinterest components of citizenship and civil society (Pašiak 1990) The finallayer of a territorial communityrsquos self-expression is the municipality withits determining social dimension Territoriality is in other words a neces-sary but insufficient condition for the emergence of this social dimension

Self-regulation as a constitutive definition of integral social systems

lsquoSocial systems are self-regulating systemsrsquo (Hirner 1970a 119) Pašiak(1990) also stresses self-regulation and self-organisation as the essence ofthe social existence and reproduction of human settlements In reality itwould be more appropriate to speak of relative self-regulation since lsquoingeneral [social action] is always the product of self-determination anddetermination by othersrsquo (Schenk 1993 123) The degree of self-regulationof a social system is given by the degree to which its members participatein governance and the degree to which governance is the product of theself-realisation of individuals

According to Hirner (1970b) a normally functioning social systemcomprises a number of relatively open sub-systems each of which operateswith a certain degree of self-regulation which can be deployed within limitsHe adds that each sub-system is partially bound by the need to performmediatory functions in relation to the coordinating centre of the entiresystem Schenk expresses this reality as follows

Every social system is made up of sub-systems and as an open systemis simultaneously a sub-system of a wider system In this sense it mustboth respect and to a certain degree regulate two contradictory

Civic potential as differentiating factor 163

tendencies ndash an integrating tendency which ensures its functioning as acomponent of a higher-order entity and a self-affirming tendencywhich enables the strengthening of its own autonomy

(Schenk 1993 72)

Abnormal situations can disrupt this balance in one of two ways

1 If the coordinating centre of the system dominates the self-regulationof the entire system to such an extent that the self-regulation of sub-systems is depressed or eliminated

2 If sub-systems become closed and thereby forego the advantages ofparticipation in the self-regulation of the global social system

From our perspective the first case is more relevant specifically in connec-tion with the existence of serious system failures in various spheres ofsociety which are generated by the residual operations of a centralisticadministrative-bureaucratic type of social governance which impacts uponterritorial communities as social sub-systems In this case the abnormalityis the suppression of self-regulating capacities and the resulting ossificationof those components of a sub-system which are the potential instigators ofdynamic tension or the carriers of functions which support the durability ofthe entire system

In the recent past it was scarcely possible to speak of the self-regulationof territorial communities as a fully effective process The self-regulation ofSlovak municipalities was not fostered by the specific needs of the inhabit-ants but was deformed insofar as their real needs ndash as the expression oftheir inhabiting of a particular place ndash were not taken into account andwere replaced by alien needs enforced from above presented as the needsof lsquosociety-wide reconstructionrsquo Instead of the functional integration ofneeds generated lsquofrom aboversquo and lsquofrom belowrsquo knowledge of specific localneeds was abused to increase the effectiveness of directive administrativegovernance the consequence of which was to narrow the space availablefor the self-realisation of inhabitants of a settlement

Local government as the self-regulation ofterritorial communities

One of the most significant systemic changes for territorial communitiesduring the new historical era which began in 1989 in Slovakia (then part ofCzechoslovakia) was the restoration of local self-government Self-administration and self-governance can be considered specific expressionsof self-regulation which we have argued is one of the defining features ofsocial systems The dominant conception of governance in pre-1989Czechoslovakia suppressed the self-regulatory mechanisms of territorialcommunities and thus their practical scope for self-administration


[The dominant mechanisms of governance involved] the weakening ofthe civic and moral responsibility of specialists their indifference tothe fate of real people the undervaluation of the roles and desires ofthe lay (but sometimes even specialist) public an exclusive orientationon decision-makers the self-importance of groups of experts who aresure that they alone know best what people need Such non-particip-ative directive approaches to governance linked to the convictionthat there is only one lsquotrue pathrsquo and that is the very one which hasbeen adopted in a given historical moment (often in cabinetsubjectively through the forcible assertion of a group interest as thelsquosocietalrsquo interest) led to damaging manipulation of people The resultwas a mode of decision-making about peoplersquos living conditions inwhich no one asked their opinions and in which people were deprivedof information about their living conditions

(Krivyacute 1989 344)

The renewal of local self-government in Slovakia

The current stage of the transformation of society involves a continuingsearch for a suitable model of coordinating public administration andorganising the relationship between the state administration and self-government The process of renewing local self-government is thus acomponent of the wider process of revitalising civil society This entails thedemonopolisation of power and its diffusion within the structures of civilsociety Establishing self-government in towns and villages was an import-ant step in this direction

The first turning-point in the renewal of local self-government inSlovakia were the council elections of November 1990 One of the explicitaims at that time was to revive local communities with a series of effectsanticipated in the political sphere (the development of local democracy) inthe economic sphere (the development of local economies and employ-ment creation) in the social sphere (the stabilisation of social relations andthe strengthening of the integrity of territorial communities) and in thecultural sphere (the creation or resuscitation of local cultural traditions)

A dominant role was played by the state in the renewal of Slovak localself-government The state apparatus planned and implemented the newconception of public administration as part of its broader conception of thedemocratisation of society and the construction of a democratic state The1990 law on municipal government re-established a twin system of publicadministration in which formally independent local self-government co-existed alongside a state administrative hierarchy It is therefore difficult toargue that new lsquorules of the gamersquo emerged as a certain lsquonormative extractrsquo(ibid) ie that they flowed spontaneously from a newly dominant mode ofaction The situation was rather one where new rules were lsquodeclared andinstalledrsquo by the state They will become truly effective rules and thus


actual social mechanisms if and only if they are accepted by individualsand groups and reflected in their activities Societal responses thereforeenter the frame as a condition of their lsquoself-confirmatory legitimacyrsquo (ibid)and thereby a precondition for the consolidation of social transformationAlthough structures (rules and roles) regulate human behaviour they donot operate of their own accord Indeed they are intrinsically associatedwith permanence invariability and repeatability and therefore any tenablereflection on changes in society which have been declared or projectedmust focus attention on people as the bearers of dynamism in the socialsphere

The relevance of human potential to the self-regulation of territorial communities

Change in rules of play and the nature of roles or social mechanismsregulating human behaviour is inevitable However the lsquoinaugurationrsquo ofchanges in real life can founder on insufficient human potential on theinability or unwillingness of individuals and groups to react in an adequateway to new conditions lsquoas well as the fundamental danger that our socialrules of play will be changed insufficiently belatedly or chaotically afurther danger is inadequate human potentialrsquo (ibid 346) In the sphereof local self-government the rules of play in the era of national committeesfunctioned as brakes on social self-regulating mechanisms and indirectlycaused people to apply their own lsquointernal brakesrsquo They have notresponded automatically to the release of external brakes

enterprise risk self-sufficient decision-making responsibility individualexpression creativity the development of talents respect for othershard work honour empathy with suffering ndash these are after all notunassailable ldquoanthropological constantsrdquo Nor are they variableswhich can be summoned immediately at the moment when the needarises

(Ibid 346)

On the other hand the depletion of human potential (and thus of thepotential for self-regulation) cannot of itself justify the formulation ofconceptions which treat the individual as a mere object Nor does itdiminish the legitimacy of legislative provisions for local self-governmentintended to strengthen the self-regulation of territorial communities assubjects of political economic social and cultural life

Civic potential

Adopting the perspective of Potůček (1989) according to whom humanpotential is an internally structured phenomenon it follows that the


renewal of self-government involves the activation of some of its dimen-sions just as the destruction of local self-government means the suppressionof particular aspects of human potential Our assumption is that therenewal of self-government in Slovakia is part of a wider reconstruction ofboth public administration and civil society Self-government fulfils manypublic law functions whereby it closely corresponds with the stateadministrative apparatus However as an autonomous non-state organis-ation with full sovereignty to perform a delimited range of public duties itbelongs to civil society

Within the statendashcivil society duality self-government acts as an inter-mediary channel between the individual and the state nonethelessit is founded albeit in miniature on the same principle as the state ieon the abstract and universal status of the citizen Citizenshiprelates to both the state and to self-government

(Šamaliacutek 1995 205)

In participating in the administration of the public affairs of his or hermunicipality a person is acting as a citizen and thus in the renewal of theobjective conditions for the operation of local self-government it is thecitizen and his or her civic potential which becomes the focus of socio-logical interest

Correspondingly it was civic potential which was the dimension ofhuman potential suppressed with the destruction of local self-governmentduring the state socialist era According to Pašiak for example the liquid-ation of municipal democracy meant that lsquocitizenship lost its meaning ascitizens became inhabitants and the municipal community perishedrsquo (199123) Sopoacuteci writes that lsquoit is only possible to speak of citizens in connectionwith self-governing communities Only in democratic local self-government can citizens assert their rights and freedoms which flow fromtheir status in the communityrsquo (1993 4)

According to Schenk lsquoit is especially important and useful to investi-gate the potential of social formations during periods of intensified socialdynamismrsquo (1993 152) The ongoing transformation of Slovak society isunquestionably such a period and the attention which has been devotedto the potentials of social formations is a response to the need to identifytheir internal resources for development at the same time as it is aresponse to the continued indifference and passivity of decision-makersto the needs wishes or entitlements of the citizens of territorial com-munities

Reflections on the potential of social formations are reactions to thefact that the possibilities of centralised directive management of socialresources are limited and to the existence of a diverse field of resourceswhich it is not only impossible to activate but even to recognise as


resources from the centre Locally-bound resources can only beintegrated into the reproduction of social reality from below

(Illner 1989 295)

The concept of civic potential is derived from the concept of citizenshipThe historical development of citizenship was long and complex culminat-ing in the mid-twentieth century since which time three dimensions ofcitizenship are discernible lsquocivic political and social the combination ofwhich gives individuals the right to participate in the communityrsquo (Wallace1993 164) In sociology citizenship is understood as lsquothe status whichprovides all with full membership of a certain community all who have thisstatus are equal in the rights and responsibilities accruing to itrsquo (Marshallin Sopoacuteci 1993 10) Differences between participant individuals in terms oforigin race nationality socio-economic status religion ideological orpolitical opinions are irrelevant to their status as citizens and recenthistory has also seen the decoupling of civic status from economic position(Dahrendorf 1991) However civic status only expresses the formal aspectof membership of a particular group At this level all citizens are equalDifferentiation between citizens (in the sense that we may say that oneperson is a lsquobetterrsquo citizen than another) is possible when our attentionshifts from civic status to the concept of civic role This is the dynamicactive side of membership of a particular community

In terms of our theoretical approach we interpret civic role as the spacein which an individual acts as an autokinetic individual (as distinct fromthe portrayal of an individual reduced exclusively to being the passiveenactor of a systemic role by certain sociological approaches) Whenever arole is occupied by a concrete person its realisation is conditioned by his orher socialisation including in the case of civic roles the idiosyncratic waysin which a person adopts and utilises all that accrues to his or her civicstatus From the perspective of the aims of this study those aspects of civicroles which mobilise people as catalysts for the development and repro-duction of terrritorial communities are of greatest relevance This requiresthe presence of a certain reservoir of energy which converts civic statusesand civic roles from possibilities into realities Hirner (1976) expressedthese possibilities as the subjective possibilities of the autokinetic memberof a social system The self-regulation and self-administration of aterritorial community would be impossible without such a reservoir ofenergy residing in the subjective possibilities of citizens-inhabitants Theyrepresent lsquothe potentials of social systemsrsquo (Schenk 1993 160) and deter-mine the quality of community self-regulation and the performance of civicroles In the public life of territorial communities where a person expresseshim- or herself as a citizen civic potential is the key limiting factor

Civic potential is thus understood here as a cultural product anacquired human characteristic which is internally structured and repre-sents a personality trait necessary for the performance of civic roles in a


local context where an individual generally has to act in cooperation withothers for the preservation or alteration of conditions in the territoriallyrestricted environment of their community

Dimensional analysis of civic potential

In order to operationalise the concept of civic potential it is necessary tobreak it down into components (dimensions) susceptible to analysis A firststage was to select the most significant dimensions identified by existingstudies Then we took into account our own research aims and our limita-tions in terms of data-gathering and empirical testability Civic potential wasthus operationalised as a phenomenon which integrates six dimensions

bull local democratic potentialbull legal awarenessbull action potentialbull associative potentialbull information-handling potentialbull value systems

In the following analysis each of these dimensions is characterised by acomplex of empirically testable indicators designed to approximate theiractual operation The integration of these partial indicators at a higherlevel (the level of each dimension) is achieved by constructing syntheticindicators (indices)

Dimension 1 local democratic potential

The indicators of this dimension of civic potential were chosen in order toidentify the readiness and willingness of inhabitants of territorial com-munities to defend the civil political and social rights of one group ofresidents against infringement by another group If a critical mass ofcitizens is not prepared to guarantee the opportunities for participationwhich flow from the constitution and the law on municipal government orif a civic attitude is not adequately expressed in congruent patterns ofbehaviour self-government may develop along lines different from thoseenvisaged at the moment of its renewal rather than strengthening localdemocracy and expanding the opportunities for citizens to administer anddetermine the affairs of their communites it may instead create space forthe assertion of various particular interests associated with local politicalor economic actors without regard for the overall interests of the com-munity and its ordinary citizens

To prevent this process citizens must dispose of a certain level of demo-cratic potential in the local context expressed as respect for the rights ofminorities (meaning minority views rather than ethnic minorities) respect


for the rights of every citizen-inhabitant to elect and stand for election tothe local council to vote in local referenda to take part in local councilsessions or other public meetings to address suggestions and complaints tothe municipal authorities to make use of municipal facilities and publiclyaccessible communal property to set up civic initiatives associations orclubs at the level of the community and so forth Local democraticpotential thereby delimits our capacity as citizens to prevent or expeditethe formation of lsquosmall-scale totalitarian structuresrsquo (Gorzelak 1992)

In Kvačany and Liptovskeacute Klrsquoačany we set out to determine whethercertain groups of citizens were subject to discrimination or were denied anequal chance to exercise their rights in relation to municipal self-administration We attempted to measure citizensrsquo propensity to resolve aseries of hypothetical situations in the public life of the community eitherin harmony or in contradiction with democratic principles anchored in theSlovak constitution and the law on municipal government We did so byadapting the method of testing democratic potential formulated by Roško(1994) on the basis of lsquoaction modelsrsquo ndash describing a number of problemsituations and asking respondents to indicate agreement or disagreementwith various proposed solutions (see Table 81 on p 178)

Dimension 2 legal awareness

The degree of legal awareness citizens possess has an obvious relevance totheir reactions to the suppression of othersrsquo civil political or social rights Itdenotes that aspect of their cognitive armoury which relates most directlyto their citizenship Whereas for dimension 1 we tested citizensrsquo prefer-ences for democratic solutions in certain modelled situations here ourpriority was to discover how well versed they were in democratic legalprovisions One citizen may be an lsquointuitive democratrsquo whose democraticdecisions are informed lsquoby the heart rather than the headrsquo whilst anothermay act non-democratically even though he or she is fully cognisant ofdemocratic provisions Legal awareness is a product of an individualrsquosacculturation and socialisation as Stena stressed when identifying publiceducation in citizenship and democracy as a key orientation point in thepath of extrication from post-communism (1993) In measuring legalawareness we made use of the same modelled situations as before thistime asking respondents to evaluate each proposed solution in terms of itscompatibility with the Slovak legal system

Dimension 3 action potential

Whereas local democratic potential was understood in terms of negativefreedom (freedom from) action potential accentuates positive freedom(freedom to) Negative freedom involves the defence of onersquos actions frominterference by others


Whether the principle in terms of which we define the sphere of non-intervention is derived from natural law or natural rights the useful-ness or the demands of a categorical imperative the sacredness of asocial contract or any other concept by which people seek clarificationand justification for their convictions this type of freedom meansfreedom from the elimination of intervention beyond a certain bound-ary which moves but is always recognisable

(Berlin 1993 27ndash8)

In our case when we tested local democratic potential this boundary wastaken as the existing legal order However citizenship also provides citizenswith positive freedoms ultimately deriving from their desire if not forcomplete independence then at least to participate in the processes andconditions by which their lives are determined

People want to be subjects not objects to be led by their own reasonand conscious goals and not by causes which impact upon them fromoutside They want to be someone and not no one someone whodecides someone who exerts self-control and not someone who actsaccording to the signals of the external environment or other people asif a thing an animal or a slave unable to play the role of a humanbeing ie to construct their own aims and rules and realise them

(Ibid 31)

Sartori also offers the opinion that true self-government lsquodemands the actualpresence and participation of interested peoplersquo (1993 285)

As an expression of the positive freedom of citizens-inhabitants of asettlement action potential captures their potential for participation in theformation and reproduction of a relatively autonomous local communityAt the local level the solution to problems often falls predominantly on thelocal council which is expected to initiate solutions create conditions totake care of

Obviously it cannot be said that these expectations are misplaced ndashafter all it is an elected government or parliament in miniature whichhas accepted a measure of responsibility But there is one caveatbecause local democracy does not end with the election of the mayorand councillors

(Faltrsquoan 1993a 12)

According to Čambaacutelikovaacute

From the perspective of the substance of civic participation it is impos-sible to ignore the objection that elections are a fundamental butdiscontinuous act just as it is impossible to ignore the fact that a


discontinuity exists between the choices made in elections and actualgovernment decisions

(Čambaacutelikovaacute 1996 51)

A self-governing community must therefore initiate activities not onlytowards the council but also directly as the self-sufficient supplier of manyof its own needs Action potential should ultimately express the location ofour respondents on the axis between public passivity and public activism

The source of action potential is the internal dynamic of social problemssince it is during their solution that participation is generally provokedThis internal tension is the result of contradictions between the needs ofinhabitants of a place and the conditions for their satisfaction Participationin solving local problems is most likely to arise in those areas of public lifewhere there is dissatisfaction with the prevailing state since this is wherecitizensrsquo intervention is called for The willingness of a citizen-inhabitant toparticipate in addressing various inadequacies in settlement conditions cantake many different forms from a total refusal to participate through theorganisation of petitions participation in sessions of the local councilinterrogation of councillors formulation of suggestions for solving particularproblems all the way up to the actual realisation of projects to improveconditions in the community (for example through voluntary work)

In order to identify the various aspects (partial indicators) of localsettlement conditions about which it would be most appropriate to askrespondents we identified areas of likely tension in the public life of thecommunities leaving aside disputes between individuals and families Thefollowing issues were included

bull the cleanliness of public spacesbull seweragebull funeral arrangementsbull leisure facilities (sports pitches childrensrsquo playgrounds clubs etc)bull green spacebull the quality of roadsbull the quality of street lightingbull flood controlbull religious facilitiesbull waste disposalbull pavementsbull security crimebull job opportunitiesbull fire safetybull cultural facilities (cultural centre library etc)bull provision of places for relaxation (eg benches for sitting)bull promotion of the municipality


Dimension 4 associative potential

To consider a person as a citizen necessitates consideration of their involve-ment in civic associations whether these have a public charitable or interest-based (recreational) mission The civic right of association represents aparticular form of power available to individuals in pursuit of their goalsAssociative potential can therefore be defined in the local context as theability of citizens-inhabitants to form associations of a political or non-political character for the purposes of satisfying a need The stimulus for theemergence of associations is given by the fact that certain needs can only besatisfied collectively We are concerned here with associations of an instru-mental character which demand that citizens express the will to become amember as distinct from natural collectivities like the family community orstate where the acquisition of membership is not an intentional act

Both political and non-political associations articulate group interestsand expectations in relation to local representative organs or attempt tofind allies (representatives) within such organs They thereby become animportant information channel forcing local politics to respond to thearticulation of collective interests At the same time association especiallyof an interest-based or recreational character functions through the self-fulfilment of interests and needs at the local level lsquoSuch a ldquoself-organisingmechanismrdquo is needed mainly at the local level and above all in ruralsettlements where local government often need not or cannot satisfy all[the communityrsquos needs]rsquo (Falt rsquoan 1993b 14)

A precondition for the renewal of civil society in Slovakia is socialdifferentiation ndash the dismantling of monolithic bonds and structures Follow-ing the collapse of communism

[differentiation] was evident in the proliferation of self-help groupssupportive associations and local civic initiatives Many of them arecompletely new initiatives in public life others renewed their existenceor came out of illegality An increase in subjectivity is apparent both inthe numerical pluralisation of forms of public representation andmore profoundly in the heightened autonomy of populations hithertoreduced to an object of decision-making insofar as the formation ofassociations has occurred spontaneously without external directionand as a direct expression of a populationrsquos identity

(Stena 1991 10)

In many cases a continuity is apparent in the activity interests and goalsof civic association some groups that is carry out the same activities asbefore 1989 although by attaining full legal subjectivity new possibilitiesare open to them Examples include sports and physical education clubsactivity circles hunting societies voluntary fire brigades or common landboards A further category of civic initiatives common in rural areas


includes charitable and humanitarian organisations like the Catholicorganisation Charita and the Red Cross which are oriented not towardsthe satisfaction of the grouprsquos own needs but towards service to othersAssociations promoting the development of national traditions Slovakculture and history such as branches of Matica Slovenskaacute or amateurdramatics societies fulfil a similar role in community life In both casessuch organisations build upon traditional patterns of associative activitystrongly embedded in rural communities which simultaneously becomeresources enabling their response to emerging social conditions A newphenomenon on the other hand is the establishment of associations ofcitizens oriented towards new values such as those promoting localdemocracy legal awareness or civic participation in the determinationprocessing and presentation of know-how related to the functioning ofrural communities These include community coalitions and foundationslike that described below or by Smith elsewhere in this volume

All the above associations which cover the most commonly occurringtypes at the local level in Slovakia have in common an apolitical characteror better a civic orientation (which does not preclude their interaction withlocal government) Of course there are also forms of association of anexplicitly political nature whose logic is not merely to pursue collectiveinterests but to gain a share of power within the local community propor-tional to their support among the citizens of the municipality Generallyspeaking we are talking about local branches of political parties Since thisis seen as a qualitatively different type of associative activity our investig-ation of associative potential distinguished between political and non-political (recreational charitable or public educational) association as twofundamental sub-types of this dimension of civic potential

Dimension 5 information-handling potential (informedness)

It is unrealistic to expect people to adopt responsible civic attitudes as longas they are insufficiently informed about the life of the territorial commun-ity A citizenrsquos participation in the development of the community isrelated to his or her potential to handle information both as a receiver ofinformation about the life of the community and as a bearer of informationabout his or her own needs entitlements and desires For the purposes ofthis study however we concentrated on a certain segment of inhabitantsrsquoinformation-handling potential namely the degree of their lsquoinformationalsaturationrsquo or informedness about local public affairs

Each citizen has the right to receive information Citizensrsquo overallinformedness about public affairs ought to engender motivation toparticipate in solving problems and to act responsibly in relation to thecultivation of the local environment Only an informed citizen can com-prehend a problem and weigh up advantages and disadvantages as theyimpinge upon him- or herself and the community as a whole


Research in other countries as well as in Slovak towns has documentedhow greater informedness of citizens about their town as a complexadministrative system stimulates more active participation in itsmanagement and development and more active involvement in thecultivation of the built and natural environments

(Gajdoš 1994 454)

This observation undoubtedly applies to rural communities tooGiven that we have operationalised this dimension in relation to the

citizen as information receiver our research excludes consideration of boththe source of information and the accessibility of information on localpublic affairs This reduction was undertaken consciously in view of thedifficulty we would have had in operationalising a more holistic (internallyunstructured) conception of information-handling potential empirically Inpractical terms what we did was to identify several important areas ofpublic life and ascertain the degree of informedness of citizens about

bull cultural events organised in the municipalitybull the agenda of recent local council sessionsbull decisions taken by the mayorbull the work of the municipal authoritybull existing problems in the communitybull suggestions for the solution of the above problemsbull the activities of civic associations in the communitybull local development plans

Dimension 6 value systems

The final dimension of our analysis of civic potential expresses citizensrsquopreferences for particular culturally grounded value systems which maystrengthen or weaken their chances of participation in public affairs Valuesystems function to sustain a relatively stable relationship betweenindividuals and social reality The concept of vertical structuration of socialphenomena identifies values as one of the deepest levels of social realitywhich inform its more superficial expressions (Laiferovaacute 1993 (afterGurvitch)) Even when circumstances living conditions or even entirepolitical and economic systems change value orientations have a greaterinertia In our research situation this means that even when citizens haveacquired civic and political rights and even when they have begun toparticipate actively in the functioning of municipal communities they maynot necessarily fully utilise their rights in practice The full utilisation ofrights is limited by preferences for particular values that is by the lsquovalue-loadingrsquo of citizens-inhabitants

A number of recent sociological studies have documented apathy as adominant pattern of civic behaviour in Slovakia Our assumption is that


the dominance of this pattern is the result of the saturation of society bycertain value preferences which can be referred to as communitarian Bythis we understand lsquoa certain type of relation which becomes established ina given society or community on the basis of social shortage economicinefficiency legal uncertainty an absence of political democracy and so onrsquo(Turčan 1993 234) Communitarianism finds expression in value prefer-ences such as take more than you give risk-free gain recognition andrespect without responsibility avoidance of discussion of lifersquos fundamentalsfear of drawing attention to oneself low self-sufficiency lack of individualresponsibility for public affairs the disappearance of the individual as anactor as a result of the dominance of impersonal mechanisms reliance onothers ndash above all the state These characteristics became strongly estab-lished in totalitarian political systems with their pronounced anti-individual tendency

Communitarianism became diffused throughout the entire mechanismfor the functioning of society and of the individual within society Witha change in the mode of development as tendencies evolve towardsthe application of democratic procedures within the mechanisms ofsociety communitarianism becomes a relational type with an anti-civicinfluence on human action in particular in the case of communitariantrends transferred from the [pre-1989] era such as the rejection ofpublic forms of the pursuit of interests and citizensrsquo demands theprioritisation of private interests withdrawal to onersquos own privatesphere in order to have a peaceful life and so forth

(Ibid 235)

What enables individuals to transcend this condition is commitment to thevalues of freedom the rule of law independence and engagement in publicaffairs and social problems as the opposite of indifference blindness andapathy

In an attempt to empirically map the distribution of this dimensionamong respondents in the two villages we asked them to judge the follow-ing concepts enterprise self-sufficient decision-making acceptance ofresponsibility free expression creativity honour hard work respect forothers the possibility of setting up private businesses the possibility ofinfluencing public affairs education opinion plurality In each case theywere to award the concept a mark on a five-point scale according to thedegree of its importance to their own life

Civic potential as an integrated variable

Although we have broken down civic potential analytically into six dimen-sions our ultimate aim was to construct an overall index of civic potentialIn order to do so we weighted each of the partial indices (represented by


the six dimensions) equally having standardised them by means of trans-formation on to a scale from zero to one

Research findings

In each village our panel of respondents constituted a random sample ofthe adult population using the electoral register in Kvačany weinterviewed sixty of the 415 registered voters in Liptovskeacute Klrsquoačany fortyout of 270

Local democratic potential

At the most general level there were significant differences between thetwo samples In Kvačany the average index for local democratic potentialworked out at 09375 but in Liptovskeacute Klrsquoačany only 0800 this impliesthat there is a higher probability that situations arising in the public life ofKvačany will be resolved in accordance with democratic proceduresFurther analysis showed that the greatest difference between the twocommunities occurred in the case of attitudes toward the communist eraSome 40 per cent of respondents from Liptovskeacute Klrsquoačany supporteddiscrimination against people with a communist past advocating theirdisqualification from access to local public office (as candidates for thelocal council) A high proportion of the community would thus denyanother group of citizens the right to exercise their active electoral right toparticipate in the self-government of the municipality In Kvačany such astance was taken by only 10 per cent of respondents

The second largest difference was recorded when respondents wereasked to consider the relationship of citizens to the local council 15 percent of the Liptovkseacute Klrsquoačany sample favoured censorship of criticism ofthe council which would undermine public control of council activity andconstructive cooperation between local decision-makers and the otherinhabitants of the settlement In Kvačany only 17 per cent of respondentstook such a non-democratic stance

Legal awareness

Indices of legal awareness worked out roughly the same in each settlementbut were lower than the indices of democratic potential ndash 06125 in Kvačanyand 06250 in Liptovskeacute Klrsquoačany Whereas when testing local democraticpotential more citizens of Kvačany chose democratic solutions in everysingle modelled situation this was not the case when we tested respondentsrsquolegal awareness for the same situations In other words many of therespondents in Kvačany are intuitive democrats who are inclined to resolvesituations in accordance with democratic procedures even though they lackformal knowledge of the latter The presence of such a type of civic potential


can generally be viewed as a positive factor for the healthy functioning of aterritorial community in spite of the fact that an element of uncertaintysurrounds behavioural patterns which are only lsquointuitivelyrsquo democratic

In Liptovskeacute Klrsquoačany correlation of the first two data-sets reveals thepresence of a relatively high number of lsquounconscious non-democratsrsquo(those who choose non-democratic solutions without being aware of doingso) In the case of this type of civic potential there are legitimate fears thatsupport could grow for discriminatory practices in local public life Table81 compares the results of democratic potential and legal awareness testsin the two communities

Action potential

Action potential is viewed here as an especially important dimension ofcivic potential given that a key research aim was to identify factors potenti-ally promoting local development it has a particularly direct influence onthe character of public life and the improvement of living conditions in thelocality Here we found a statistically significant difference between thetwo villages in favour of Kvačany which had an index of action potential of04595 compared with 02565 in Liptovskeacute Klrsquoačany Orientationally this


Table 81 Occurrence of different types of lsquodemocratrsquo according to responses toaction models (figures are percentages)

Model 1 Model 2 Model 3 Model 4

Kvačany

Conscious democrats 467 517 600 750Unconscious democrats 500 383 300 233Conscious non-democrats 00 33 67 00Unconscious non-democrats 33 67 33 17

Liptovskeacute Klrsquoačany


NotesModel 1 lsquoImagine an ex-prisoner has just moved into your community bought a house andapplied for residency A week later his house is destroyed by a flood Should he be entitled tofinancial help from the local authority even though he has yet to start paying council taxesrsquoModel 2 lsquoShould those in your community with a communist background be banned fromholding office in the local councilrsquoModel 3 lsquoShould the votes of those who have lived longer in the village count for more in areferendum about local issuesrsquoModel 4 lsquoImagine you are a councillor and a local resident writes to a regional papercriticising the work of the council of which you are a member Should the writing of sucharticles be prohibitedrsquo

implies that the former community is capable of activising about 46 percent of its theoretical maximum of action potential in the solution of localproblems concerning the quality of community life but the latter onlyabout 26 per cent

Respondents in Liptovskeacute Klrsquoačany were much more liable to expressdissatisfaction with the quality of the lived environment which is logicalgiven that a number of developmental projects have already brought aboutconsiderable improvements in living conditions in Kvačany However theindex tests the willingness of only the unsatisfied respondents to par-ticipate in solutions to the source of their complaint and in every case thiswas higher in Kvačany in seven areas of public life more than 50 per centof dissatisfied citizens were ready to take part personally in carrying outimprovements (cleanliness of public spaces religious facilities leisurefacilities green space funeral arrangements cultural facilities and pro-vision of places for relaxation) Only in one area (leisure facilities) was thisso in Liptovskeacute Klrsquoačany

The lowest degrees of action potential in both settlements were recordedin respect of waste disposal sewerage fire safety job opportunities thequality of roads security and street lighting In these areas respondentsevidently expected more substantial intervention from their elected localrepresentatives or from the organs of the state administration Table 82compares the results of action potential tests in the two communities


Table 82 Percentage of respondents who expressed a willingness to participateactively in solving local problems

Kvačany L Klrsquoačany euml2 Significance

Cleanliness of public spaces 810 472 974 0020State of religious facilities 722 286 800 0005Leisure facilities 714 600 108 0299Green space 714 437 392 0048Funeral arrangements 692 375 374 0530Cultural facilities 625 95 1163 0001Places for relaxation 619 447 160 0207Promotion of municipality 474 259 226 0133Flood control 405 111 502 0025Pavements 400 138 480 0028Waste disposal 389 37 1053 0001Sewerage 356 231 173 0188Fire safety 333 103 379 0052Job opportunities 304 29 1027 0001Quality of roads 304 139 311 0078Securitycrime 276 77 365 0056Quality of street lighting 200 100 087 0352

NotesStatistically significant at 95 level of probability

Statistically significant at 99 level of probability

Associative potential

Our findings also revealed a statistically significant difference between thetwo territorial communities in terms of associative potential for whichrespondentsrsquo answers produced indices of 03375 in Kvačany and 01875 inLiptovskeacute Klrsquoačany inhabitants of the former showed a greater willingnessto associate in order to deal with local issues Of course associativepotential is in both cases absorbed (to a certain degree) by actualinvolvement in political and non-political organisations In Kvačany just 67per cent and in Liptovskeacute Klrsquoačany 75 per cent of respondents said theywere members of local political organisations but 733 per cent and 475per cent respectively were organised in non-political associations Givensome overlap in membership of the two types of association this meantthat overall 770 per cent of respondents in Kvačany and 530 per cent ofrespondents in Liptovskeacute Klrsquoačany were organised Of these members 682per cent in Kvačany but a mere 175 per cent in Liptovskeacute Klrsquoačanyconsidered their membership as lsquoactiversquo

In Kvačany the following voluntary organisations exist (excluding poli-tical parties) the Red Cross the Union of anti-fascist veterans a voluntaryfire brigade a sports club a hunting club covering the wider micro-regiona common land board an amateur theatre company a youth union branchand the Oblazy foundation In Liptovskeacute Klrsquoačany there is also a branchof the Red Cross a voluntary fire brigade and a common land board aswell as a local organisation of Matica Slovenskaacute But the differencebetween the two communities lies less in the number of organisationsrepresented and more in the activity of members this is indirectlyindicated by the greater extent of cross-membership of differentorganisations in Kvačany which has demonstrably enabled more effectivemutual communication and cooperation in local development A criticalrole is played here by the one lsquonon-traditionalrsquo organisation in the abovelist Oblazy This community foundation integrated several of Kvačanyrsquosopinion-leaders including the mayor the head of the local agriculturalcooperative (the main employer in the village) the Catholic priest and thehead of the primary school All of these are active members of othersocial organisations which was important in popularising the foundationrsquosaims within the community It thereby quickly acquired popular legitimacyand was able to mobilise people to take part in several public worksprojects to improve local living conditions For although the majority offinancial resources it utilises come from external grant programmes ineach case they are conditional on local participation grants have beenobtained to purchase various items of equipment but the work itself hasbeen performed by Kvačanyrsquos citizens


Information-handling potential (informedness)

The indices produced to estimate the informedness of inhabitants of thetwo communities about local affairs did not indicate any significant differ-ence at the most general level even if respondents in Kvačany wereslightly better informed (06325) than those in Liptovskeacute Klrsquoačany (05975)However partial indicators reveal some more interesting trends In bothsettlements citizens are apparently best informed about cultural events 90per cent felt well informed in Kvačany and 80 per cent in LiptovskeacuteKlrsquoačany Informedness about existing problems in the community wasabout 75 per cent in both cases There were big differences with respect toinformation about mayoral decisions and civic associationsrsquo activities inthe former case respondents from Liptovskeacute Klrsquoačany felt better informedby 72 per cent to 49 per cent whereas more respondents from Kvačanyknew about their local civic associations (55 per cent to 30 per cent)

Value orientations

Our index of value orientations was slightly higher in Kvačany (08328)than Liptovskeacute Klrsquoačany (07570) but the difference is not statisticallysignificant It bears repeating that the index attempts to place respondentsrsquovalue orientations on a hypothetical scale between communitarian andlsquoanti-communitarianrsquo values the high values indicate that both populationstend to adopt an anti-communitarian stance on most issues and tendtowards a responsible mode of civic behaviour However given our findingswith regard to local democratic associative and action potential it is clearthat these declared values are not always manifest in other dimensions ofcivic potential particularly in Liptovskeacute Klrsquoačany


Table 83 Indices of civic potential dimensions in Kvačany and Liptovskeacute Klrsquoačany

Dimension Kvačany L Klrsquoačany t-test Signific U-test Signific

Local democratic pot 09375 08000 3135 0003 ndash ndashValue orientations 08328 07970 1582 0117 ndash ndashInformedness 06325 05975 0644 0521 ndash ndashLegal awareness 06125 06250 0174 0862 ndash ndashAction potential 04595 02565 4092 0000 7285 0001Associative potential 03375 01875 3450 0001 7500 0001

NotesStatistically significant at 99 level of probabilityFor action and associative potential (non-parametric) Mann-Whitney U-tests were usedbecause the populations did not fulfil the criteria for use of parametric t-tests

Civic potential summary

Aggregating the indices for each of the six dimensions of civic potential wearrive at values of 06354 for Kvačany and 05439 for Liptovskeacute Klrsquoačanywhich is a statistically significant difference in favour of Kvačany Table 83summarises the survey findings with statistically significant differenceshighlighted

The greatest differences between the two populations were apparent inthe dimensions local democratic potential action potential and associativepotential whereas insignificant differences were found in the dimensionslegal awareness information-handling potential and value orientations Inother words there was little or no difference in those aspects of civicpotential where citizen and community act and reproduce themselves inthe realm of knowledge or consciousness (through cognitive transactions)but where citizen and community act and reproduce in the sphere of beingor behaviour (manifesting cognition in the performance of citizenship)significant distinctions were observed This clearly has important conse-quences for the resultant activities of each community in the improvementof living standards and settlement conditions

Conclusion

The renewal of local self-government thrust Slovak settlements and theirinhabitants into new situations the reassertion of the principle of self-government opened the way for participation in the life and developmentof settlements by locally active subjects This chapter has identified andanalysed (on the basis of an empirical study in two villages) one import-ant factor ndash civic potential ndash which differentiates between small localcommunities in terms of their potential to influence their own develop-ment notwithstanding similar initial conditions in terms of such factorsas demographic economic or ecological characteristics

Bibliography

A-projekt sro (1994a) Kvačany ndash anketa Liptovskyacute Hraacutedok unpublished reportA-projekt sro (1994b) Liptovskeacute Klrsquoačany ndash anketa Liptovskyacute Hraacutedok unpub-

lished reportA-projekt sro (1994c) Liptovskeacute Klrsquoačany Prieskumy a rozbory Liptovskyacute Hraacutedok

unpublished reportA-projekt sro (1995) Kvačany Uacutezemnyacute plaacuten siacutedelneacuteho uacutetvaru Liptovskyacute Hraacutedok

unpublished reportBerlin I (1993) O slobode a spravodlivosti Bratislava ArchaČambaacutelikovaacute M (1996) lsquoK otaacutezke občianskej participaacutecie v transformujuacutecom sa

Slovenskursquo Socioloacutegia vol 28 no 1 51ndash4Dahrendorf R (1991) Modernyacute sociaacutelny konflikt Bratislava Archa


Faltrsquoan Lrsquo (1993a) lsquoObčianske iniciatiacutevy a miestna samospraacutevarsquo in Postup prizabezpečovaniacute programu obnovy dediny Bratislava 12ndash16

Faltrsquoan Lrsquo (1993b) lsquoFormovanie perspektiacutevy lokaacutelnej a uacutezemnej samospraacutevyrsquo inSlovensko ndash Kroky k euroacutepskemu spoločenstvu Bratislava

Gajdoš P (1994) lsquoK problematike informovanosti obyvate13ov o probleacutemoch siacutedlarsquoSocioloacutegia vol 26 nos 5ndash6 454ndash60

Gorzelak G (1992) lsquoMyacutety o miestnej samospraacuteve v postsocialistickyacutech krajinaacutech napriacuteklade Polrsquoskarsquo Socioloacutegia vol 24 no 5 431ndash4

Hirner A (1970a) lsquoK systemologickej orientaacutecii v socioloacutegiirsquo Socioloacutegia vol 2 no 2113ndash26

Hirner A (1970b) Sociologickaacute analyacuteza Kysuacutec Bratislava ČSVUacutePHirner A (1976) Ako sociologicky analyzova Bratislava UacuteŠIIllner M (1989) lsquoMetodologickeacute otaacutezky zjištrsquoovaacuteniacute sociaacutelniacuteho potenciaacutelu uacutezemiacutersquo

Socioloacutegia vol 21 no 3 295ndash306Krivyacute V (1989) lsquoEfekty žaby a kravy v zauzleniach spoločenskej dynamikyrsquo

Socioloacutegia vol 21 no 3 343ndash8Laifeŕovaacute E (1993) lsquoMikrosocioloacutegia G Gurvitcha v optike suacutečasnostirsquo Socioloacutegia

vol 25 nos 1ndash2 85ndash94Pašiak J (1990) Siacutedelnyacute vyacutevoj Bratislava VEDAPašiak J (1991) lsquoRenesancia obecneacuteho spoločenstvarsquo Socioloacutegia vol 23 nos 1ndash2

23ndash31Potůček M (1989) lsquoLidskyacute potenciaacutel československeacute společnostirsquo Socioloacutegia vol 21

no 3 325ndash38Roško R (1994) lsquoDimenzie demokratizmu a kognitiacutevnostirsquo in Slovensko v 90

rokoch trendy a probleacutemy Bratislava 9ndash15Šamaliacutek F (1995) Občanskaacute společnost v moderniacutem staacutetě Brno DoplněkSartori G (1993) Teoacuteria demokracie Bratislava ArchaSchenk J (1993) Samoorganizaacutecia sociaacutelnych systeacutemov Bratislava IRISSlosiarik M (1999) Občiansky potenciaacutel ako diferencujuacuteci faktor rozvoja siacutedla

Bratislava diplomovaacute praacutecaSopoacuteci J (1992) lsquoRevitalizaacutecia roly občana v podmienkach miestnej a uacutezemnej

samospraacutevyrsquo in Občianska spoločnos na prahu znovuzrodenia Bratislava SAV31ndash45

Sopoacuteci J (1993) Medzi občanom a štaacutetom Probleacutemy miestnej samospraacutevy naSlovensku Bratislava SAV

Stena J (1991) lsquoUtvaacuteranie občianskej spoločnosti ako rozvojovyacute probleacutem suacutečasneacutehoSlovenskarsquo Socioloacutegia vol 23 nos 1ndash2 7ndash20

Stena J (1993) lsquoObčan v postkomunizme vecneacute a vyacuteskumneacute probleacutemyrsquo Socioloacutegiavol 25 no 3 177ndash92

Turčan Lrsquo (1993) lsquoK recepcii komunitarizmu v suacutečasnej slovenskej spoločnostirsquoSocioloacutegia vol 25 no 3 233ndash40

Wallace C (1993) lsquoKoncepcia občianstva v suacutečasnej svetovej socioloacutegiirsquo Socioloacutegiavol 25 no 3 163ndash75


9 Group strategies of localcommunities in Slovakia facing social threats

Imrich Vašečka

Introduction

The transformation of Slovak society the direction and design of whichwere determined in the late 1980s and early 1990s represents an oppor-tunity for the renaissance of local community and the solution of socialproblems according to the principle of subsidiarity But the period has alsoseen the reappearance of social problems and dangers hitherto forgottenor suppressed

This chapter focuses on the basic strategies of selected local communi-ties that found themselves facing social threats The aim of the researchsummarised here was to find out how local communities cope with theproblems of economic transition and which conditions (social institutionalorganisational and cultural) either facilitate or hinder their adaptationConsequently we are concerned with collective social activities orientedtoward the solution of social problems and threats impacting on the wholecommunity The analysis should enable the identification of

bull collective social activities and group strategies that a local communityapplies in order to eliminate social threats and seek opportunities fordevelopment

bull resources that a local community can locate and mobilise to cope withchanges in life chances and development opportunities

For the purposes of this research lsquolocal communityrsquo is defined as a territori-ally distinct self-governing social group

bull within which members satisfy their basic needs create a net of mutualsocial relations share a common bond to the territory on which theylive and ascribe a mutual significance and sense of belonging to thelocal community

bull within which primary and informal groups associations organisationsand institutions develop their activity and interact with one another

bull the life of which is organised by the smallest unit of self-government(the municipal council) whose task is to coordinate the pursuit of

184 Author

common goals and the solution of problems ascribed importance bymembers of the local community

Four communities were selected as case studies from one socio-culturalregion of Slovakia Spiš which has a rich history of municipal self-govern-ment Each community can be characterised according to the type of threatfaced the size and structure of its population and the mode of governanceof its mayor In fact they form two pairs of neighbouring communitiesselected because (within each pair) both communities have similar popul-ation characteristics were founded around the same time and facedcomparable social threats in the early 1990s threats of much greaterseverity than in other nearby communities

Briefly the communities can be characterised as follows

Communities 1 and 2Type of threat faced in early 1990s mass unemployment caused by thedisappearance of most employment opportunities in and around themunicipality

Size and social structure large communities with heterogeneous struc-tures in terms of profession and ethnicity around a third of inhabitants areRomanies

History the communities were founded in the fourteenth century andwere traditionally connected with ore mining and wood processing

Communities 3 and 4Type of threat faced in early 1990s impending extinction due to unfavour-able demographic processes and planned large-scale capital investments

Size and social structure small remote communities with up to 500inhabitants mostly working in farming and forestry with a high proportionof retired people and a very low proportion of Romanies

History the communities were established in the fourteenth centuryand were traditionally involved in wood processing

Data on all four communities was obtained using various sociologicalmethods ndash observation standardised questionnaires interviews with com-munity authorities and inhabitants

Social threats to communities

Social threats are defined as those problems which inhabitants consideredas having a highly disruptive effect on life in their municipality and demand-ing an immediate reaction by the municipal authority or local community

The first pair of communities were both important centres for miningactivity and metalworking undergoing cycles of boom and decline depend-ing on the fortunes of the iron ore mining industry Community 2 hadbeen the economic centre of a large mining hinterland in the period

Group strategies for facing social threats 185

immediately after the Second World War workers commuted there frommore than fifty surrounding villages Nowadays after the collapse of iron-ore mining the municipality is a marginal part of Spišskaacute Novaacute Ves districtCommunity 1 was never such an important centre but more recently itseconomic importance grew in association with the timber industry In bothcommunities the emergence of a social threat became apparent in the early1990s as the combined result of developmental trends initiated by thecommunist regime and hasty corrective measures after 1989 The mainsymptoms are connected with

bull the social consequences of a badly implemented down-sizing of the ironore mining industry and the armaments industry in the early 1990s

bull the ecological consequences of the extensive development of mining(mainly in Community 2)

bull the demographic and cultural consequences of the deportation of so-called Carpathian Germans and other related migration processesafter the Second World War

bull the social consequences of the forced settlement of nomadic Romaniesin the 1950s and of the subsequent assimilation policies introduced bythe communist regime which stripped Romany communities of theiridentity culture and specific forms of social integration

Our account begins with Community 2 whose post-1989 development isemblematic of a fate which afflicted many Slovak towns that were essenti-ally products of communist-era industrialisation policies After the collapseof a regime with which these communitiesrsquo well-being was intrinsicallylinked they fell victim to a process of deindustrialisation which was oftenjust as politically driven as subsidies to industry were stopped overnightwith no regard to social considerations This compounded the sense ofinjustice among inhabitants who felt they had been written off withoutbeing given a chance to prove the viability of the local economy The rapiddislocation of a social ecosystem based around one (artificially supported)enterprise as the primary source of employment welfare and communityintegration presents an opportunity for observing a type of system trans-formation which is archetypal in its brutality

Threats facing Community 2

Community 2 expanded very rapidly after the Second World War andreached a population of almost 7000 in the 1960s However the unprofit-ability and ecological impact of mining extraction led to its gradualcurtailment from the mid-1960s and the townrsquos development turned tostagnation The governmentrsquos decision to cease extraction in 1992 meantthat the town faced potential collapse a direct economic threat nowmagnified unfavourable demographic cultural and ecological trends

186 Imrich Vašečka

The prevailing demographic trends in the community are the declineand ageing of the lsquomajorityrsquo population and the rapid growth of theRomany population Of roughly 3000 inhabitants 1100 are Romanies butif present trends continue they will make up 1700 out of a population of3000 by 2010 Given the cultural divide between ethnic groups and thefailure to address the problem of their coexistence there are severe tensionsin the community

The danger of subsidence due to the collapse of mine shafts beneath theoldest part of the municipality led to the evacuation of roughly 2000inhabitants to the nearest district town thirty years ago Most of these werelsquooldrsquo families whose ancestors had lived in the community for centuriesTheir emigration exacerbated the demographic changes that had begun inthe 1940s with the disappearance of the Jewish community as a result ofthe Holocaust Next the Germans were violently deported and werereplaced by forcibly settled Romanies and immigrants from all overCzechoslovakia attracted by the iron-ore industry During the years thatfollowed the Romanies established their own specific social world in twoperipheral colonies (ghettos) Meanwhile the influence of lsquonewcomersrsquo onthe social life of the community and the economic leadership of the minegrew although lsquoold-timersrsquo managed to maintain their dominance ofpolitical life until the beginning of the 1980s The division between thesegroups remains alive in the community ndash indeed it was reawakened by theelection of a newcomer as mayor in 1994

The social norms which have developed in the two peripheral ghettoshave had the effect of socialising the Romany population into unemploy-ment marginalisation and general backwardness They live in extremelydegraded environmental and social conditions dependent on socialassistance child benefit and usury Alcohol addiction is higher than amongthe majority population Perceptions of the Romany commonly held in therest of the community are extremely negative some insist that 80 per centof the Romany population here are mentally handicapped and think thatRomany children are not taken care of properly Given the high birth rateamong Romanies the coexistence of both ethnic groups is likely to remainconflictual in the generation to come For the majority population theRomany problem is the dominant threat facing the community as theirfundamentally different way of life is perceived as a threat to lsquoorderrsquo in themunicipality In our interviews with the inhabitants of both Romanycolonies we came across mentally handicapped individuals but the figureof 80 per cent is dismissed by Romanies themselves as a figment ofimagination stereotypes and stigmatisation They see their main problemsas the lack of any way out of their hopeless situation and the unaccom-modating or demeaning manner in which the majority population dealswith them In numerous interviews with non-Romany inhabitants weregistered demands for the separation of the two communities and demandsaddressed to the government (the state) to adopt stricter administrative


criteria for Romanies than those that apply for the majority population Sogreat is the social distance that approximately one-tenth of respondentsfelt that all the responses on our questionnaire were too mildly formulatedand inserted their own words to express their attitude the opinion lsquoshouldbe kicked out of the countryrsquo was one of the more moderate responses1

Perceptions of economic and social threats in Community 2 stressunemployment the lack of economic activity in the community unsatis-factory housing and declining living standards After the liquidation of themine in 1992 unemployment reached 71 per cent of the adult population(100 per cent of Romanies 40 per cent of the majority population) Withsmall fluctuations this level has held steady up to the present andunemployment now has a long-term character Most inhabitants have fewqualifications no experience outside the mining profession and the age ofmany unemployed also militates against the success of re-qualificationprogrammes There are multiple reasons for the 100 per cent rate ofunemployment among Romanies in the community including the unwilling-ness of some employers to hire local Romanies distaste among otheremployees for working with Romanies a lack of demand for low-qualifiedworkers on the local labour market and a reluctance of some Romanies togo to work Additional factors leading to high unemployment in the com-munity are its isolation from the main transport links the low purchasingpower of the local population which prevents the development of a localservice sector the inadequacy of local human capital resources to stimulatethe development of private enterprise and the geographical immobilityof the population given that there are no easily accessible externalopportunities

A ban on construction in force since 1961 means that no new housinghas been built since that time People have grown used to living with theconstant danger of the collapse of existing structures due to subsidencePhysically the town has became an lsquoopen air museumrsquo of life in the 1950swhere housing (mostly in blocks of flats) is sub-standard and some flats areoccupied by three generations of a family to lower living costs Familybudgets are often dependent on the relatively high pensions of retiredminers The council itself is heavily dependent on state subsidies since itsincome from property and business taxes is low and because the forestry itowns is not economically exploitable due to contamination Nonetheless inrecent times the local authority has been able to build up some capital andbegin to revive economic activity in the community

Community 2 suffers from severe ecological threats concentrations ofmercury in the soil exceed allowable limits there is a water shortage insome parts of the settlement and parts are also at risk from mining-induced subsidence Municipal forests are contaminated chemically andhave little economic value depriving the community of possible revenuefrom the sale of timber which is an important source of income andeconomic activity in other parts of the region



On the site of the present-day settlement there was once a mining villagewhere iron ore extraction was later supplemented by wood-cutting andprocessing Woods now surround and partially isolate the municipalityAdministrative reorganisation in 1996 led to its incorporation within thenew district of Gelnica and this has led to a rise in status and moreoptimism about the future The community has about 2800 inhabitants ofwhom 900 are Romanies

The threats which confronted the community at the beginning of the1990s were serious but less extensive and intensive than those facingCommunity 2 Principal among them were the down-sizing of the iron oreand armaments industries triggering a decline in economic activity both inthe community and in the wider region The result was a third of inhabitantsout of work but unemployment among the Roma is practically 100 per centParadoxically representatives and inhabitants of the community alikeregarded the terms and perspectives of inter-ethnic coexistence ndash and notunemployment ndash as the biggest threat to the community if lsquomeasuresrsquo are nottaken But their fears are not as heightened as in Community 2 apparentlydue to the greater lsquomaturityrsquo of the local Romany population Othercommunity problems are not perceived as threatening as they are graduallybeing solved but the municipal infrastructure remains underdeveloped thecommunity still has no mains water supply no sewerage no sewage treat-ment plant and neither a cultural centre nor a social care facility

Residentsrsquo and officialsrsquo perceptions of the communityrsquos strengths con-centrate on the extensive woodland lying within municipal boundaries themajority of which is owned by the municipality Given the relatively cleannatural environment the chance exists to exploit the timber commercially

Communities 3 and 4Both communities are situated near the source of the river Torysa in themountainous area of central Spiš Both are at the end of roads beyondwhich extend woods requisitioned for military training sites The traditionalsources of employment in both communities were forestry and agricultureincluding pastoral farming Today the majority of inhabitants commute towork elsewhere while children also attend schools in neighbouring villages

Both communities were first settled in the fifteenth and sixteenth centur-ies by Ruthenians but today about 95 per cent of their inhabitants considerthemselves Slovaks and the rest Romanies They are small communities(up to 500 inhabitants) and have declined in size considerably since thelate nineteenth century when Community 3 was two and a half times itspresent size and Community 4 was twice as large Both communitiesare ageing at present the proportion of pensioners is more than one-third Most adults only have basic education or technical secondary-levelqualifications


Threats facing Communities 3 and 4

These underlying negative potentials were compounded by more specificthreats In the early 1970s a military training area was established in closeproximity to both communities and parts of their municipal forests andpastures were expropriated Since the livelihood of these communities andtheir inhabitants was tied up with forestry and pastoral farming this was asevere blow Moreover five other villages which formed a coherent culturaland economic whole with lsquooursrsquo were evacuated from the centre of themilitary zone Communities such as these thereby found themselves over-night in a distinctly peripheral position Both were simultaneouslyreallocated to the category of lsquonon-centralrsquo municipalities which under thecentral planning system meant less money from the state budget whichwas then their only possible source of income Their marginality was thusgiven an official stamp

In the 1980s their remaining territory was identified for the constructionof a reservoir A prohibition on building work was therefore enforced andagricultural and other activities which could endanger local water qualitywere restricted Both municipalities were earmarked for either liquidationor relocation At first older residents were the ones who felt most threat-ened faced with losing their ancestral home but after 1989 the threatbegan to impinge also on younger generations who had begun to return tothe community as it offered them security which was often lacking else-where at home they at least had land and housing to inherit from parentsAs these prospects were now threatened by the plans to build thereservoir citizens began to fully register the acuteness of the threat and thenecessity for speedy reaction

The strength of both communities is paradoxically the very source oftheir acute insecurity ndash the pristine nature of their environment which isalmost untouched by civilisational influences and specifically their abund-ant supplies of clean water Today this also offers ideal conditions for thedevelopment of various forms of tourism but the natural beauty of the areais not matched by the standard of its technical and social infrastructure orby the quality of housing and other premises In view of the communitiesrsquoperipheral situation economic marginality and unbalanced age structure afurther decline in population can be expected unless the local authoritiestake the initiative barring some kind of external intervention

Communities 3 and 4 thus share two common social threats the chronicthreat of long-term population decline and the acute threat of liquidationeither complete or partial due to the construction of a reservoir on theirterritory Neither officials nor ordinary residents in these communitiesregarded the coexistence of the majority population with the small Romanyminority as a serious problem They are apt to differentiate between whatthey call lsquoourrsquo Romanies ndash those families with whom they have learned tocoexist over many years ndash and those who do not come from the community


The latter are considered a latent threat insofar as inhabitants fear apossible influx and the resulting destabilisation of communal life Thisfear is the result of a residual mode of rationalising ndash the suspicion thatsomeone in authority could decide to relocate Romany families to theirmunicipality as was the practice during the communist regime Apprehen-sions of this kind were frequently encountered when gathering responsesto our questionnaires (people were even afraid that the research couldserve such a purpose)

Community responses to social threats

Our concern was to see how the selected communities responded to thethreats they faced Our attention focused on how the representatives oflocal government perceive the events and processes which pose a threat totheir community what solutions they have proposed and what practicalsteps they have taken

Community 1

The present mayor has been in office since the first free local elections inNovember 1990 His staff comprises twenty-five council employees whomhe manages in an autocratic style The mayor makes decisions strictly at hisown discretion and when he consults others it is only to obtain theinformation he needs There are no non-governmental organisations activein the community and we were not able to identify any other (informal)power centres

The two sets of problems facing the community ndash the threat of unemploy-ment and the coexistence of majority and Romany populations ndash areclosely linked The unemployment rate in the community as a whole is 35per cent but among Romanies unemployment can be almost 100 per centdropping to 50 per cent due to seasonal employment opportunities Due tomeasures adopted by the council the situation has at least not worsened inrecent years 115 permanent jobs have been created mainly in the forestryindustry and a further 200 villagers can be employed in seasonal jobs Jobcreation on this scale was possible thanks to high revenues from sales oftrees felled in village-owned forests However incomes are expected todecrease in the foreseeable future due to logging quotas thus bringing thethreat of unemployment back on to the agenda A priority for the counciland especially the mayor is therefore the establishment of other forms ofbusiness able to provide an adequate number of jobs

Their other main concern is to encourage changes in the lifestyle of theRomany minority in the community Profits from forestry are being investedin measures to foster peaceful coexistence the mayor said that the councilhad approved plans for re-education programmes having accepted that therelocation of one or another ethnic group is not a solution There is a


common desire to improve living standards for the Roma and tackle theiremployment and educational difficulties The mayor commissioned a hous-ing project which would respect the special needs of the Roma in housedesign Houses will be built by the authority along with the familyconcerned such that the authority provides a loan whose repayment is acondition for eventual ownership However the council will have the rightto repossess the house in the event of failure to keep up with instalmentsor if the behaviour of the family does not match lsquocommunity standardsrsquoThe houses are being built on the outskirts of the town reinforcing thetraditional exclusion of the Roma from Slovak communities

So-called lsquore-educationrsquo of the Roma is taking place via the adoption ofa council policy of employing each and every Romany willing to work Inaddition the authority has set up a nursery for Romany children as well asa school for special-needs children (mainly Romany) Indeed it alsosubsidises the local state secondary school Three years ago the mayorturned down a proposal by the (Catholic) Charity organisation to set up anoffice in the community arguing that the Roma would abuse the servicesand that he is concerned primarily with their re-education

A third area in which proceeds from logging have been invested aremeasures to prevent further demographic decline There has been somesuccess in encouraging young people to remain in or return to thecommunity reversing the trend of urban drift as for many it represents asolution to their housing problems and for some at least the prospect ofemployment The authority buys up vacant houses in the community torent to young families (these houses are not offered to Romany families)

Community 2

Here the mayor has also been in office since 1990 His immediate workingteam comprises a group of friends and former colleagues from the minewith whom he consults He operates in an autocratic style but there areelements of a restricted participative approach to decision-making in asmuch as he consults the people he trusts before formulating his owndecision Within the council he says that the situation has become morecomplicated since the 1994 election whereas he consulted councillorsthroughout his first term of office the new council is (in his view) faction-alised by political affiliation such that communication with and amongcouncillors is increasingly difficult It could be that a sense of existentialthreat which fostered unity up to 1994 is starting to recede and competingcollective interests emerge Besides the local government and the mayorthere are several competing power centres in the community ndash the Catholicpriest the HZDS party organisation (of former Prime Minister Mečiar)and the management of the now bankrupt iron ore mine They are notmutually cooperative with each looking first to their partial interests Aforeign foundation for assistance to the Roma and a charity are active in


the community but other non-governmental organisations including thosedating from the communist era (such as the Womenrsquos Union) have notsurvived or re-emerged The mayor is attempting to stimulate the develop-ment of civic life using his position to charter new civic organisations (hefounded a community sports club and a cultural organisation)

Community representatives see unemployment and worsening inter-ethnic relations as the main threats to the community When the iron oremines were closed in 1992 the community lost its primary resource forfuture development which had hitherto sustained most inhabitants Thenew management of the mines (following bankruptcy and administration)refused to continue to assist the community which therefore found itselfwith an acute shortage of resources The mayor in cooperation withcouncillors sought to replace these with support from government institu-tions Some councillors were able to exploit significant lsquosocial capitalrsquo in theform of personal connections with politicians in Bratislava The sheerenergy of the mayor was also important in this respect

The mayor commissioned a series of projects to try to find solutions tovarious community problems including the question of housing forRomany families None of these projects was submitted for public discus-sion He succeeded in raising finance for the repair and completion of gassupply piping a water tank and water supply system an electricity supplysystem for the repair of roads in the municipality and for the reconstruc-tion of the church the vicarage the cemetery the town hall the post officeand the main square thus maintaining living standards at or above theirlevel before the closure of the mines His ultimate goal is to attractinvestment into the community and with it a sufficient number of jobsBetween 1996 and 1999 he managed to secure 120 jobs seventy in publicinstitutions and fifty in the private sector The municipal authority alsoprovides cheap services to its inhabitants enabling them to save money(for example offering a bus for hire and opening a subsidised canteen forold-age pensioners) It wants to build up the capital to start municipalenterprises and thereby increase its developmental potential

Another of the mayorrsquos aims is to finance the construction of a newRomany colony in the hope of improving the sub-standard living condi-tions of the Roma As in Community 1 it is planned to build the colonyoutside the village itself since the majority population remains unwilling tocontemplate physical integration with the Roma minority

Community 3

The mayor was first elected in 1990 and was in the middle of his secondterm when the research took place Conversations with community repre-sentatives and a survey among villagers confirmed that he has greatauthority in the community ndash greater still than the parish priest Accordingto villagers the mayor bases decisions on his own judgment but discusses


things with other people and listens to their opinions His style formallyresembles that of the mayor of Community 2 except that he does not onlyconsult members of his own lsquoclanrsquo but tries to garner information andadvice from the whole community

There is a very active folklore song and dance group in the communitywhich is the pride of the village To locals it embodies the communityrsquostradition and identity Some residents are members of a regional civicassociation demanding the restitution of forests and land that were con-fiscated by the communist state for the military training area There are noother civic organisations active in the community but two external interestgroups have tried to influence the attitude and activities of the locals ndashrepresentatives of companies lobbying for the reservoir plan and ecologistswho want to prevent its construction Subjected to the arguments of bothsides inhabitants have been torn from the quiet life of a geographicallyisolated community These interest groups are mediators through which thevillagers are exposed to the confrontation of values and attitudes inherentin a modern society

In the mayorrsquos view which is shared by other representatives the mainthreats to the community are the planned dam construction and thepotential outmigration of young people These two threats are relatedPopulation decline abated in the early 1990s when housing shortages insurrounding towns prompted young people to begin to return to themunicipality whereas in 1990 there were thirteen uninhabited housestoday all are occupied and new houses are planned But if the reservoirgoes ahead in spite of the combined resistance of locals ecologists andenvironmental campaigning groups the departure of the young and middlegenerations seems inevitable

Community representatives do not acknowledge any social problemsother than unemployment which is actually lower than the district averageTheir feelings of vulerability are due to the fact that the community has nocontrol over the extent of unemployment among its inhabitants (since theymostly commute to work) which is why the mayor wants to increase thenumber of jobs in the municipality itself at present the only such jobs arein the farming cooperative and the military forestry company At thebeginning of the 1990s the local authority founded a company producingwooden window frames It failed but council representatives say at leastthey know now what mistakes to avoid in the future However all economicdevelopment is conditional on their ability to lobby the government to stoppreliminary work on the dam and lift the ban on construction in the locality

The mayor regards the lsquohuman potentialrsquo of the village as its greateststrength citing peoplersquos openness independence and gratitude People areself-sufficient he says up to now they have always been able to helpthemselves whether by cultivating their own land or by finding workoutside the community ndash approximately three-quarters of the economicallyactive population work elsewhere including forty who work in the Czech


Republic However the dam scheme is blocking the realisation of a projectfor the development of agrotourism which was put together in 1992ndash3 incollaboration with neighbouring villages and with the assistance of staff atthe former district authority Other projects such as the construction of awater supply system sewage treatment plant and gas supply piping arealso on hold The mayorrsquos vision of the future is for lsquourban living standardsin a clean environmentrsquo

The tradition of voluntary work for the benefit of the whole communityis still alive among villagers council representatives maintain that it isroutine for villagers to take part in organised work brigades In the early1970s they built their own funeral parlour and cultural centre with financialassistance from the state but also thanks to a collection in the village Atthe beginning of the 1980s they constructed a water supply system thistime financed entirely from a collection In 1986 it was taken over by thestate and the community has recently filed a legal action for restitution In1990 the villagers paid for and built a vicarage and each year in May theyorganise a brigade to clean the stream running through the municipalityThis traditional willingness to work together for the common good under-scores the faith of the mayor and council in community development

The mayor himself had an active part in the foundation of an associa-tion of villages along the Upper Torysa which aims to attain economicprosperity for every community while preserving the environmentalequilibrium and natural beauty of the area in practical terms this meansdevelopment of the micro-region without large dams which would meanthe liquidation of such communities

Community 4

The citizens of Community 4 elected a young woman as mayor in 1994This was noteworthy as an expression of faith in the young generation by acommunity with a high percentage of old-age pensioners who apparentlyhope that young people can succeed in bringing the community back tolife Her style of work is neither autocratic nor participatory She does notdelegate decision-making in any area to the people themselves nor attemptto embody their commonly expressed will Rather she tries to be helpful topeople to find out their needs and to administer affairs to their satisfaction

As in Community 3 there is a folklore song and dance group in thevillage and a branch of the regional association for the restitution of landconfiscated for military use Many social activities are organised by thevoluntary fire brigade together with the mayor A tradition of voluntarycollective work exists which has a longer history than in Community 3 Inthe 1940s the inhabitants established an agricultural cooperative Jednotawhich enabled them to purchase agricultural machines for common useThe cooperative farm was forcibly disbanded after 1948 by the communistregime After 1990 the church was renovated with money raised from a


collection among the villagers They plan to reopen a school which wasclosed down in the past attract a resident priest to the parish renovate thecemetery repair local roads and install street lighting Currently the mayoris pushing for the construction of a canteen for old people and childrenThese plans are not altogether realistic as people are actually not veryactive expecting all the executive work to be done by the mayor Likeneighbouring villages Community 4 also has projects prepared fordeveloping agrotourism and for the revival of local crafts and traditionalvillage life But unlike Community 3 it has not been the local council orcommunity which have initiated these projects ndash instead they are externallyleveraged Community representatives are merely concerned to maintainthose traditional aspects of village life which have endured to ensuresurvival There is little emphasis on developmental projects

As in Community 3 the villagers are under pressure from represent-atives of construction companies and environmental organisations alikeThis has led to a change in attitudes Previously in the mayorrsquos words lsquoitwas always the unwritten rule here to ldquoObey those who give you ordersrdquorsquoTheir initial response to discussions with the representatives of bothinterest groups was to say lsquoItrsquos up to you to reach an agreement ndash wersquoll justgo along with itrsquo According to the mayor people gradually began tochange their attitudes from the moment when environmentalists came tothe community and explained that it is lsquopermissiblersquo to object to thereservoir ndash that ordinary people are allowed to voice their opinion andfight for it nowadays As a result people are lsquodifferent from beforersquo nolonger so easily influenced

At the end of this section we can make the following geneneralisationsThe solutions implemented by local self-government in the four munici-

palities differed in terms of the resources they drew on and the extent towhich they were able to be mobilised At first strategies invariably followedrules and models inherited from the days of the communist regime Actualdevelopments however have forced a change of strategy (with differingdegrees of success) entailing a shift from dependence on external stateresources to the use of resources from a multitude of sources and inparticular to the rebuilding of internal resources

Opinions of inhabitants

Towards the end of 1996 we carried out questionnaire-based opinionsurveys in all four municipalities In Community 2 there were two separatesurveys ndash one looked at relations between the Romany and non-Romanysections of the community and the other which was repeated in allcommunities examined the opinions of people on the main threats to thecommunity The size of Communities 3 and 4 enabled us to distributequestionnaires to all households whereas in Communities 1 and 2 a samplewas used Questionnaires were distributed and collected by helpers within


the communities and this was done with the knowledge of the mayors InCommunities 3 and 4 the research raised some concerns ndash people neededreassuring that it was not inspired by companies with an interest in thedam project Some also suspected its hidden aim might be to supportgovernment plans to lsquorelocatersquo Romanies to the area

Evaluations of communitiesrsquo problems and prospects

Respondents were invited to name the problem(s) they consider mosturgent in their community and say whether these problems are beingsolved at present For each of a number of problem areas (unemploymenthousing the threat of poverty criminality coexistence of the majority andRomany populations) they were asked to state whether they perceive anegative influence on life in the community Respondents were also askedhow they view the future of their community ndash where they see its strongand weak points They were asked whether they consider themselvessatisfactorily informed about community issues and state what sourcesthey get such information from

The inhabitants of Community 2 see the situation of their community inthe worst light they identified the greatest number of problems evaluatedthe impact of general social problems most negatively were least likely tobelieve that the future of the community will be better than the presentmost likely to point out weak points rather than strong points and hadgreatest difficulty identifying any opportunities for community development

Respondents from Community 1 were almost as pessimistic whereas inCommunity 3 by contrast residents had a generally positive vision of thepresent and future of the community in all spheres Community 4inhabitants also saw their community in a positive light but theirconception was far less clearly focused than in Community 3 The surveyfindings are illustrated by Tables 91 and 922

Communities 1 and 2 were threatened with mass unemployment in theearly 1990s and (especially in Community 2) this threat has hardlyreceded In spite of that respondents cite the lsquoRomany problemrsquo as themost severe in Community 1 689 per cent of respondents named it as aproblem and it accounts for 468 per cent of all problems named by thesample population In Community 2 as many as 850 per cent of respond-ents cited the lsquoRomany problemrsquo although it lsquoonlyrsquo makes up 360 per centof all problems named in the survey (reflecting the fact that on averageeach respondent in Community 2 named more problems) In both com-munities formulations were vague without any effort to differentiatespecific aspects of the issue (people most often wrote lsquothe Romany questionrsquolsquoRomaniesrsquo only exceptionally expanding further as in lsquobehaviour of theRomaniesrsquo or lsquothere are too many Romaniesrsquo) This implies that respond-ents do not reflect on the problem but perceive it in stereotypical termsincreasing the danger that it becomes a surrogate problem Such a danger



Table 91 Evaluations of community problems and prospects at the end of 1996

Community

1 2 3 4

Average number of problems named as lsquovery severersquo by one respondent 15 24 18 20

Respondents judging influence of selected social problems on community as unfavourable 726 777 439 363

Respondents viewing selected characteristics as strong points of community 377 527 725 634

Respondents viewing selected characteristics as weak points of community 369 410 196 265

Respondents viewing selected potentials as opportunities for community 652 512 680 563

Respondents believing communityrsquos future will be better than present 257 165 371 183

Table 92 Informedness about community problems and about the work of itsrepresentatives

Community

1 2 3 4

Respondents who think they are sufficiently informed about community problems and solutions 527 592 816 414

Respondents who think they are sufficiently informed about work and intentions of mayor 457 582 781 364

Respondents who think they are sufficiently informed about opinions of councillors 549 412 587 303

Respondents who think they are sufficiently informed about opinions of other inhabitants 324 235 711 414

seems especially great in Community 2 where the respondents are mostdespondent about the future of their community and see the fewestpossibilities for any solutions

Communities 3 and 4 have been threatened since the early 1990s by theproposed construction of a reservoir In spite of this respondents tend tostress as their primary concern problems connected with the inadequateinfrastructure of their community while problems that fall into the generalcategory lsquoapprehensions about the communityrsquos futurersquo make up only 25per cent of responses in Community 4 and still less in Community 3 It is asif the inhabitants especially in Community 3 are unwilling to acknowledgethe extent of the existential threat hanging over them This may reflect theincreased activity of their representativesrsquo and their own participation inaction to prevent the construction and in the preparation of alternativeprogrammes to secure sufficient water supplies This participation may bethe source of strength and hope which in turn influences their perspectiveson reality

Evaluations of community resources

Our initial assumption was that successful collective responses to theproblems of a community will depend not only on peoplersquos desire to find asolution and on their knowledge-based resources the success or otherwiseof an adopted strategy will also depend on a communityrsquos potential Bypotential we do not in this case mean such factors as the levels ofeducation or health of a population we mean peoplersquos capacity forassociation and communication where they have shared interests theirtrust in other people the social relations that connect people mutually aswell as to public institutions and the dominant norms of public activity

The capacity for association was most evident among the respondentsfrom Community 3 and least evident among respondents in Community 1as Table 93 illustrates


Table 93 Levels of participation in tackling community problems (respondentsrsquoself-evaluations)

Community

1 2 3 4

Respondents who participate in tackling community problems lsquoin various waysrsquo 375 440 597 497

Respondents who are prepared to participate if it is necessary 225 328 317 219

Respondents who would be prepared to participate if requested to do so 375 453 483 437

The lowest levels of trust in nearly all the institutions and actors aboutwhich we inquired were found among respondents in Communities 1 and2 In Communities 3 and especially 4 high levels of trust were recorded(see Table 94)

Collective action to tackle community problems also presupposes theexistence of generally accepted norms of activity We therefore askedrespondents how they would react and who they could turn to if theirfamily got into financial difficulty we then asked how the mayor shouldproceed if the community got into difficulties A summary of responses ispresented in Table 95

In Community 1 where economic activities are dominated by municipalservices and enterprise the state is accorded lower prestige as a source ofpossible assistance compared with the other communities There is also agreater preference for the participation of citizens in decision-makingabout community affairs and a correspondingly lower willingness todelegate community management to councillors It is difficult to saywhether inhabitantsrsquo opinions are influenced by prevailing norms in the


Table 94 Trust towards actors in the community authoritative institutions andfellow citizens

Community

1 2 3 4

Respondents who trust the elected representatives of their community 680 724 785 591

Respondents who trust state organs and institutions 237 169 196 152

Respondents who trust social and civil organisationsfoundations 275 454 405 685

Respondents who think that community problems should be solved by the inhabitant themselves 667 604 643 493

Respondents who think that solutions to their problems require intervention by competent institutions 300 698 170 181

Respondents who feel they can express their opinion about community problems without fear 465 536 869 757

Respondents who feel the problems they see as urgent are being tackled at present 310 296 571 252

Respondents who would like to leave the community 324 303 176 245

community or whether they have established such norms by their actionsand expressed intentions The dominant model of individual behavioursupposes an active individual willing to take risks but not rejectingcollaboration with others

In Community 2 the public ascribes councillors an almost insignificantrole but the idea of direct citizen participation is not advocated stronglyeither The preferred mode of local community governance insteadinvolves an authoritative mayor as community representative negotiatingwith the state All other actors are peripheral This paternalistic model isalso reproduced in ideas about individual activity the ideal individualshould assert their interests in conjunction with others and chiefly in thesphere of their primary employment (a view which overlooks the fact thatthere is no primary employment for most people in the community)


Table 95 Preferred responses to financial or material difficulties of communityand individuals (late 1996)

Community

1 2 3 4

How should the mayor proceed

Turn to councillors and follow their advice 76 42 158 124

Turn to citizens and follow their opinions 212 94 131 165

Make decision himself after consulting councillors and citizens 227 292 228 186

Appeal to state organs and institutions for help 333 552 439 412

Turn to various non-governmental organisations and associations 45 10 49 62

How should an individual proceed

Mobilise resources in sphere of primary employment and in household 354 403 395 516

Increase work-load work harder or do without 250 284 184 145

Adopt strategies involving greater activity responsibility and risk 396 313 421 339

Join forces with others and pursue interests collectively 384 519 421 438

Look after oneself whilst also cooperating with others 308 210 304 192

Respondents in Community 3 accorded much greater trust to council-lors and were less inclined to turn to the state This matches the prevailingstyle of teamwork in the community leadership Respondents neverthelessexpect collaboration from the state In Community 4 people likewiseexpect collaboration from the state but it is unclear who should representthe community in this dialogue ndash the mayor the councillors or the citizensthemselves It is an open question whether this indecision reflects thepresent situation in which the mayorrsquos power is (self-)limited or whetherthere is a traditional cultural preference in the community for a diffusionof power

Conclusion

According to Chandler (1972) we can differentiate three types of strategicactivities ndash budgeting strategic adaptation and strategic discontinuityAdapting this typology for our case studies we can differentiate strategiesof survival self-defence and elimination of threats Initially all communitiesadopted a strategy of survival (budgeting) which entailed changes in theallocation of local resources When this proved unsuccessful defensivestrategies (strategic adaptation) were adopted which differed in individualcommunities In Community 1 for example it was a transitory strategy andwas later succeeded by attempts to eliminate the threat to the communityalthough the strategic discontinuity involved does not essentially disruptlocal cultural preferences In Community 2 by contrast the earlier adop-tion of a discontinuous strategy ran into resistance because of itsdisharmony with the cultural preferences of some inhabitants

According to Ansoff (1985) the key variables conditioning the choiceand realisation of a strategy for collective action are perceptions ofchanges in both the internal and external conditions for action culturalpreferences the structure of power and strategic leadership In terms ofthese variables what conditions prevailed in individual communitiesHow did they differ

Perceptions of changes in internal and external conditions for action

Assuming that the success of any collective action depends on the ability ofstrategic leadership to harmonise a strategy with opportunities and threatsthat exist in its environment such a harmonisation clearly depends first ofall on information acquired and processed by the group In this respect wecan conclude that

1 The information which the leadership of all these communities workswith is drawn mainly from their experience and everyday knowledgeof the social environment3


2 There is a disparity between processes which inhabitants themselvesperceive as the most problematic for community development andprocesses which from an external perspective appear to be the mostreal and immediate threats The measures which community leader-ships have adopted to limit such threats reflect this disparity as doesthe fact that Communities 1 and 2 have found a surrogate problem inthe lsquoRomany questionrsquo

3 Local government representatives organisations and associationswhich operate at the level of villages or towns and ordinary inhabi-tants continually evaluate threats and form opinions about them It isonly at the moment when a local community attributes significance tothem in the above sense that such threats become social threats

Cultural preferences

Each pair of neighbouring communities comprised two settlements compar-able in their size in the type of threat they faced in the social compositionof their populations and to a certain extent even in their history In spite ofthat communities chose different strategies Our assumption is that thechoice of strategy depended not on the type of threat but on the continuityof specific modes of activity pertaining to given local communities Thisassumption is apparently confirmed by the differences between individualand collective strategies of action favoured by respondents in differentcommunities It is further indicated by resistance towards discontinuousstrategies where these have been adopted (Communities 1 and 2)whether in the political realm (Community 2) or the organisational realm(Community 1)

The structure of power

Power is deployed in local communities4 by external actors5 by the mayorand hisher team by local councillors by citizens themselves mainly throughorganisations they form (especially political parties) and by representativesof churches in the community In terms of the distribution of power all fourcommunities are characterised by a decentralised institutional arrange-ment However the actual execution of power pushes individual casestowards either autocratic practices (Community 1)6 dispersed powercentres (Communities 2 and 4)7 or a permanent tension between decentral-ising tendencies and a continually re-asserted consensus (Community 3) Inall four cases most internal actors ndash councillors political parties and churchrepresentatives ndash originally abandoned any attempt to realise partialinterests and adopted strateges of survival or more occasionally self-defence Only as the threat began to recede (in Communities 1 and 2) didparticular actors begin to reassert their position and challenge the


realisation of discontinuous strategies (above all in Community 2) InCommunities 3 and 4 the various actors of community life remain more orless unified around a single community strategy which can be explained bythe immediacy of the threat facing them as well as the postponement of adiscontinuous strategy

Strategic leadership

Strategic leadership implies a clear vision of a common aim a conceptionof how to reach it and effective control of individual steps In all fourcommunities these capacities and responsibilities were not fully containedby the relationship between the primary formal actors of local democracy(the mayor the councillors and the citizens) ndash strategic leadership was alsoexercised by external actors (including NGOs and state institutions) andby other internal actors (including influential local interest groups) In eachcommunity the elected leadership is thus continually faced with theproblem of legitimising its strategic leadership

Notes

1 An unusually strong self-distancing from the Roma was observed in all fourmunicipalities (ranging from Community 4 where 62 per cent of respondentswould prefer not to live in the vicinity of Romanies to Community 1 where theproportion was 85 per cent)

2 With the exception of Table 95 these are not complete tables of survey resultsbut rather illustrative synopses of the most relevant data

3 Even though each mayor has access to various studies and analyses in theirdecision-making these lack systematic elaboration of the strong and weakpoints of the community and their compilation involves little or no collectivereflection We came across attempts to predict the development of threats andopportunities in all communities but they were not founded on an analysis ofthe internal potential of the local community Mayors rely above all on theirexperience which may be insufficient in the case of threats requiring discon-tinuous responses

4 Power in the community is understood here as the capacity of a group orindividual to influence any aspect of community activity

5 Including branches of the civil service local councils in neighbouring commun-ities economic organisations with interests in the community and non-indigenous NGOs

6 In Community 1 the mayor exercises power by means of pressure based on hisuse of the expert knowledge generated within the apparatus of the municipalcouncil on his near complete control of work relations for a significant sectionof the community who work in municipal enterprises and services and on hispersonal charisma

7 In Community 2 conflict between competing power centres is always present orlatent whilst in Community 4 the weak position of the mayor allows suchrivalries to surface occasionally


Bibliography

Ansoff H (1985) Zarządzanie strategiczne Warszawa Państwowe WydawnictwoEkonomiczne

Bodnar A (1985) Decyzje polityczne Elementy teorii Warszawa PaństwoweWydawnictwo Naukowe

Chandler A (1972) Strategy and Structure Cambridge MA MIT PressFaltrsquoan Lrsquo Gajdoš P and Pašiak J (1995) Sociaacutelna marginalita uacutezemiacute Slovenska

Bratislava SPACEIllner M (1992) lsquoK sociologickyacutem otaacutezkaacutem miacutestniacute samospraacutevyrsquo Sociologickyacute

časopis vol 28 no 4 480ndash92Jałowiecki B (1990) lsquoLokalizm a rozwoacutej Szkic z socjologii układoacutew lokalnychrsquo in

Firlit E Rola parafii rzymsko-katolickiej w organizacji życia społecznego naszczeblu lokalnym Warszawa Pallottinum 15

Katz D and Kahn R (1966) The Social Psychology of Organizations New YorkLondon and Sydney John Wiley and Sons

Rybicki P (1979) Struktura społecznego świata Struktura z teorii społecznejWarszawa Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe

Turowski J (1994) Socjologia Wielkie struktury społeczne Lublin TowarzystwoNaukowe KUL 211ndash39

Vajdovaacute Z (1992) lsquoSituačniacute zpraacuteva o komunitniacutech studiiacutechrsquo Sociologickyacute časopisvol 28 no 4 493ndash507


10 ConclusionThe narrativisation of socialtransformation

Simon Smith

Modernisation

Most early studies of democratic transition in post-communist Europestressed that a system change was involved incorporating three keyinstitutional changes (the so-called lsquotriple transitionrsquo) ndash from authoritarianor totalitarian to democratic governance from a planned to a free-marketeconomy and from quasi-colonial status to full nation- and state-hoodPartially dissenting from the institutional school of thought other authorsemphasised the lsquopath-dependentrsquo nature of the process and the inevitableconditioning of strategic choices by the inherited social economic andcultural resources of a given society These critics advocated the termtransformation in place of transition to capture the sense of change as aprocess of recombinations of existing sub-systems or fractions of capital

Few western theorists have used the concept of modernisation inconnection with post-communist developments (Machonin 1997 108) Ifso then only a conceptually narrow version has been invoked such aswhen discussing Lipsetrsquos notion of a relationship between socio-economicdevelopment and democratisation (Nagle and Mahr 1999 55 Przeworski etal 1995 62ndash3) or the impact of the scientific-technological revolution onthe social and power structures of communist states (Nagle and Mahr 1999212) Such reductionist understandings ndash perhaps taking their lead fromearlier lsquoconvergence theoriesrsquo which saw capitalist and state socialist socie-ties as members of a common family of modernities ndash have led tomisinterpretations of what a strategy of modernisation would mean in apost-communist context Przeworski et al contrast lsquopostwar attempts atmodernisationrsquo which lsquoasserted the importance of national cultures called for political institutions consistent with national traditions andenvisaged growth led by national industriesrsquo with later Latin American andEastern European strategies which they call lsquomodernisation by inter-nationalisationrsquo based on lsquoimitationrsquo in the political cultural and economicrealms lsquotodayrsquo they conclude lsquomodernisation means liberal democracyconsumption-oriented culture and capitalismrsquo (1995 4) Yet notwithstand-ing the condition of international dependency in which post-communist

206 Author

development is occurring the immediate result of the collapse of com-munist power has been increasingly sharp social stratification accompaniedby an unplanned and often disorienting diversification in lifestyles lifestrategies economic interests and bases for collective identification withinthese societies It would be perverse to try to reduce this spontaneoussocial differentiation to a process of convergence with let alone sub-mergence by western stereotypes If it is to be understood as westernis-ation in any sense then a more pertinent image would be the spread of theindividualising processes which the condition of late modernity had letloose twenty or thirty years previously in Western Europe and NorthAmerica As such it was viewed by one early Slovak commentator as awelcome source of dynamism within previously lsquomonolithicrsquo social struc-tures (Turčan 1992 47)

Essentially modernisation theory is an account of socio-cultural trans-formation (Kabele 1998 331) and taken as such it presents a number ofadvantages for understanding post-communist developments in terms ofhow it handles the subtle relationship between institutionalisation andevolutionary cultural change A more obvious advantage however is aconceptual linkage to the vast body of social scientific theory reflecting onthe complex civilisational changes undergone by advanced societies fromthe time of the Enlightenment Modernisation does not presuppose anydevelopmental logic in terms of transition from one economic or politicalsystem to another but at a higher level of abstraction it is a teleologicalconcept which attempts to explain the observable and often alarmingprocess whereby the potentiality and reflexivity of human activity haveexpanded continually for several centuries What in particular has expandedat an accelerating pace since the industrial revolution is the capacity ofsocieties ndash generally through coordinated action by the state ndash to transformthemselves lsquoeven to the point of self-destructionrsquo (Melucci 1989 176) andthe corresponding capacity of individuals and societal sub-groups to handle(increasingly rapid and disruptive) change Modernisation produces asimultaneous heightening of both control and emancipation (Giddens1985 11) intervention and individuation (Melucci 1989 59 112ndash17) andintegration and differentiation (Melucci 1996 254)1 For the individual orcollective actor caught up in it modernisation fundamentally alters therelevant structure of opportunities and constraints upon action Modernis-ation theory thus has the advantage of being able to conceptualise changeas an instance of actor-driven intervention in social reality (either aslsquoenlightenedrsquo social engineering or in the more diffused form of politicaldemands which provoke successive de- and re-institutionalisation) but whichcan nevertheless be seen (and subjectively interpreted or lsquonarrativisedrsquo) asthe logical outcome of a preceding reconfiguration of social and culturalcapital within a given society It appeals ultimately to profound cultural-civilisational changes in which institutionalising processes play a mostlysupporting role formalising the new (temporary) status quo Thus lsquopolitical

Narrativising social transformation 207

modernisationrsquo according to Melucci (1966 242) entails increasing theelasticity of the filtering of demands incorporating previously excludedsocial groups stepping up the mobilisation of resources and increasing theflow of information These are constant challenges for complex societiesand organisations which would cease to be capable of managing competinginterests without an ability to innovate in order to contain social pressureswithin the broad confines of the existing regime In other words themodernity of a political system is given by its capacity to process andimplement normative decisions which reduce the uncertainty of socialaction a function which both increases the effectiveness of social controland creates an opening for non-dominant interests to intervene in thereproduction of social norms and regulations (ibid 229ndash42) Modernpolitical systems need to be able to translate even anti-systemic challenges(including lsquoanti-modernrsquo social movements) into decision-making processeswhich enhance the functional integration of an organisation or society thishas been one of the most difficult challenges for post-communist politicalsystems as they extricate themselves from a very different logic of politicaldecision-making

Modernisation is a normative discourse Social and cultural modernis-ation holds out the prospect of a more open society capable of meeting theneeds of diverse interests and providing individuals and groups with thepossibility of self-realisation and self-regulation in many spheres of life Ina specifically post-communist context the emphasis in modernisationtheory on individualisation and subjectivisation is particularly relevantwhen totalitarian or authoritarian regimes had suppressed these processesand cultivated communitarian and paternalistic structures of feeling(Turčan 1992 51ndash2) Similarly universalisation (the establishment oftransparent procedures and societyrsquos adjustment to them) was at leastpartially displaced and an atomised society instead thrown back on pre-modern principles of interaction and socialisation in which trust andreciprocity were found primarily in localised affective groups (Kabele1998 17 Možnyacute 1999a) Thus one important aspect of post-communisttransformation can usefully be interpreted as a replay of subjectivisationand universalisation as pivotal components of modernisation Such apowerful normative theory is a useful analytical tool the potential ofsocieties for achieving a set of goals on which at a certain level ofabstraction everyone can broadly agree can be interrogated in relation tothe stocks of social and cultural capital inherited and reproduced at thelevel of everyday life To put this another way we can identify individualand collective actorsrsquo potential for modernisation based on their capacity tofulfil a series of roles associated with a normative definition of modernityspecifically a modern democratic citizenship

Finally modernisation involves a myriad of small-scale processes ofevolutionary change in social and cultural sub-systems ndash in technology theorganisation of the work process in settlement patterns and the conditions

208 Simon Smith

of human interaction in lifestyle and habits of consumption in beliefsystems systems of symbolic representation and modes of communicativeaction These processes are not contained by the boundaries of politicaland ideological systems but particularly since the later twentieth centuryhave been driven by such processes as the globalisation of trade andcommunication and the intensification of cultural exchange If post-communist societies are undergoing a process of transformation then wecan hardly avoid discussing the influence of global civilisational shiftstowards post-industrial post-materialist or post-modern social and culturalconfigurations Thus for example the voicing of ethnic nationalist andother minority demands for political representation or participation inmany East Central European states is not to be understood as a reaction tothe ideological vacuum created by the collapse of communism but in thecontext of the lsquonew politicsrsquo emphasising local community and post-materialist values which empower such demands within the lsquonewEuropean public orderrsquo (Aacutegh 1998 79ndash80) This is not to presume that theoutcomes will be the same as in established capitalist democracies Use ofthe modernisation approach to lsquogive the scientific seal of approval [to]the total institutional transfer from the west to the eastrsquo is rightly rejectedby the editors of a Polish volume on social change in Central and EasternEurope (Baethge 1997 11) but only an impoverished version of modern-isation theory could be thus misused

On the contrary an understanding of the dynamics of modernisationoffers a note of caution against over-optimistic predictions about the futureof post-communist Europe which abounded in the first few years after 1989especially in the western literature on transition Since modernisation is anholistic process it is not reducible to institutional reform ndash the error whichmore than one western policy-adviser academic and their Central Europeanclients made in the early 1990s Even in the late 1990s as it became obviousthat initial expectations had generally been over-optimistic revisionistaccounts have typically only qualified earlier interpretations concedingthat everything will take longer and outcomes be more differentiated dueto the emergence of conflicts around particular institutional transitions andto growing social costs which make reform more politically lsquodifficultrsquo Amore perceptive approach needs first to distinguish between institutionaland socio-cultural changes processes which operate on completelydifferent timescales and second to consider more closely the legacy of thestate socialist system and in particular to identify elements of society andculture which developed under its influence that had a de-modernising oranti-modernising impact Because modernisation is not a one-way street atheory of modernisation implies also a theory of demodernisation (Možnyacute1999a 85) At that point it can shed light on the causes of the suddencollapse of communist regimes as well as on the reasons why post-com-munist transformation has been more problematic than many anticipatedIt can help explain how well-designed institutional reforms are frequently


frustrated by the persistence of residual anti-modernising practices andcollective identities and why modernisation strategies which at the macro-level have often entailed little more than institutional transfer from func-tioning capitalist democracies have not produced a matching westernis-ation of cultural practice at the micro-level

Local communities as sites for the construction of narratives

As certain authors have argued from as early as 1993 the burden of thedemocratic transformation in post-communist states is shifting frominstitutional reform towards the longer-term processes taking place at themicro-level and connected with the social and cultural adaptive responsesof a variety of social actors (Rychard 1993 Machonin 1997 126ndash7 Matějů2000 44) It is ironic to note how this turn to micro-sociology in the Czechand Slovak contexts actually involves a return to the applied sociologicalapproaches developed prior to 1989 described in Chapter 1 as lsquoactivistrsquoThis is less surprising than it seems among other things they constituted anentry into reflexive modernity by taking on board the lsquothoroughly socio-logisedrsquo nature of contemporary societies and therefore reconceptualisingsociological research as the exploration of lsquoparticular cases of the possiblersquo(Bourdieu 1998 2 13) or as lsquothat particular kind of social action wherechances or opportunities for self-reflexivity are higherrsquo (Melucci 1996390) In both the pre- and post-1989 periods capacity for action isfundamentally limited by differential access to discursive resources andsociological knowledge itself is an increasingly valuable resource Thespecific conditions of rapid social transformation only heighten thelsquoreflexivity of modernityrsquo

Whereas lsquoin unproblematic periods social worlds seem to reproduce andmodify themselves almost exclusively by the power of institutionalisation in crises and revolutionary eras narrativisation comes to the fore as ameans of managing these exceptional periodsrsquo (Kabele 1998 159) Peopleneed more than ever to see themselves as part of an historical narrative amyth or story a process of becoming The institutions and procedureswhich normally order their worlds no longer seem so reliable and perma-nent and thus young people in particular must manage the transition toadulthood through improvisation rather than imitation of role-models oradherence to established norms (Heitlingerovaacute and Trnkovaacute 1999 56) Thisapplies even after the lsquoempty shellsrsquo of new institutions have been installedrelatively quickly at the macro-level because they are still not sociallygrounded maladapted to the more spontaneous institutionalising pro-cesses occurring through trial and error in everyday practice (Kabele 199430) In such situations successful narrativisation becomes the most essentialprerequisite for actorsrsquo participation in events ndash without narratives toprovide meaning to their actions events will seem to by-pass their socialworlds and their interests and they will be more likely to retreat to the

210 Simon Smith

position of disinterested observer unable to manage or even envisagetransition as a shift from the old order through a period of disorder to anew order2 The very concept of modernisation carries significant narrativepower although it may seem too abstracted from reality during lsquonormalrsquoperiods of history But in the institutional flux of the post-communistlsquoorderrsquo the generalised myth of progress through humanisation the recur-ring theme of the post-enlightenment era made a strong return at leastduring the initial period of euphoria More specifically the myths of areturn to Europe of the liberating energy of market forces of the magicpower of democratic procedures (especially elections) or of the release ofthe pent-up energies of civil society or individual agency were narrativeswhich succeeded for a time in partially unifying the contradictory identitiesinvoked by the breakdown of established social structures and macro-social institutions They secured support for the initiation of macro-levelinstitutional reforms even when many localised institutional systemscontinued to function ndash often out of sheer necessity ndash more or less alongthe old lines

Eventually lsquothe architecture of everyday lifersquo must also undergo recon-struction in accordance with the demands of a modern democratic civilsociety (assuming this becomes a societal goal) Such changes howevercannot be enforced from above they must be lsquolivedrsquo by the actors affectedthe largely demobilised majority which has not participated in the post-communist transformation since its initial days and weeks by the informalgroups and communities which must become in the long run the primarysite for the internalisation and propagation of democratic and humanistvalues (Fibich 1996 271) The myths of Europe the market and electionsno longer move people at the grassroots whose attempts to cope withchange have predictably involved the restoration of a cyclical narrative ofeveryday life founded on the continuity of traditional social relations andcultural practices (Kabele 1998 185 337) ndash often simply because copingstrategies honed during the communist era based for instance aroundmobilising resources within the domestic economy continue to be effec-tive albeit often laborious ways of dealing with the failure of formalmarkets (Mikovaacute 1992) Indeed democratisation actually enhanced oppor-tunities for small-scale subsistence cultivation and other elements of aninformal economy in the countryside practices which had persisted despitepressures towards lsquoclass convergencersquo and lsquourbanndashrural equalisationrsquo duenot only to the strength of tradition but also to the poor quality of freshproduce available on the market and the poverty of consumer services inmost villages (Krůček et al 1984) factors which are still present todayTransformation as a cultural process cannot be reduced to unlearning whatwas once taken for granted the discourses and life strategies whicharticulated the symbiosis of formal and informal economies under statesocialism remain relevant to post-communist social actors (Možnyacute 1999b)In the sphere of housing for example a free and transparent market would


disable established means of reproducing social capital based on thedispositional rights (formally or informally) bestowed on families ndash isolatedindividuals are in a much more vulnerable situation The hybridised housingpolicies pursued by each post-communist Czech and Slovak government area pragmatic recognition of this fact and the unwillingness of any majorpolitical force to grasp the nettle of housing market deregulation is givenonly partly by fear of the price shock this would trigger Rather it reflectsthe way that the entire system of housing distribution (quasi-)ownershipand transfer is so closely tied up with established patterns of socialisationsocial support and social value systems in which the extended family plays acrucial role that it is likely to resist all but the most resolute macro-economic reform initiatives On the contrary housing is a sphere where apractical discourse ndash the grassroots reproduction of social networks andtheir associated strategies resources interests and value systems ndash is todaymore determining of than determined by the meta-narratives of macro-economic and macro-social transformation (Šmiacutedovaacute 1999)

In many spheres institutional reforms have amounted to lsquomimesesenabling old practices to surviversquo (Kabele 1998 339) This is very obviousfor example in systems of enterprise regulation or in the banking sectorMotivation to change a well-entrenched organisational culture cannot beengendered by institutional design alone especially in periods of radicalsocial change when narrativisation is the primary means by which socialactors manage their own identities Kabele uses the example of easternGermany to make the point

The entire transformation of eastern Germany was founded on theadoption of western blueprints on lsquoan institutional xeroxrsquo [This]created little space for people to adapt They are not [involved in]deciding about the transformation and therefore are not naturallyintegrating it into their own biographies and histories

(Ibid 245)

lsquoMythsrsquo are thus necessary not only to secure loyalty to the principaltransformation goals ndash to linearise the historical drama ndash but also to renderthem assimilable within individual autobiographies and the discursiverituals of everyday life Small-scale myths are needed to enable people totranscend the instinctive conservatism of most (localised) lifeworlds(Možnyacute 1999b 34) and yet feel as though they are acting consistently andwithin the limits of acceptable risk Individuals and basic social groupsalways seek to assimilate the unknown using tried and tested proceduresand are reluctant to participate in institutional change with its hightransaction costs Processes of de- and re-institutionalisation will thereforebe more acceptable to local actors if they are assimilable in the terms of afamiliar discourse ndash if it is possible to incorporate lsquoa lsquomodernrsquo solution intoonersquos own repertoire of coping mechanisms (Kabele 1998 205ndash7)3

212 Simon Smith

In such cases narrativisation can facilitate surprisingly smooth adapt-ation to institutional change according to the findings of the study lsquoTheLives of Young Prague Womenrsquo a discourse of individualism which formeda central component of their general outlook apparently enabled membersof a 1989 cohort of nursing college graduates to rationalise and endorse thedissolution of communist-era institutions which previously structured thelife paths of women such as secure employment or lsquocareer-friendlyrsquochildcare facilities An intuitive individualism involving a clear rejection ofall collective dependencies above the nuclear family seems to be the modeof narrativisation which facilitates this generationrsquos adaptation to institu-tional transfer (Heitlingovaacute and Trnkovaacute 1999) What is noteworthyhowever is that it involves a recombination rather than a rejection of pastpractices and outlooks Generalised across other social groups thisexample suggests that the success or otherwise of post-communisttransformation will increasingly be negotiated between lsquoactually existingrsquosocial and cultural discourse and practice and the modernising narrativesput forward by competing political and social movements and elitesHitherto these have remained largely separate discursive universes andany accommodation between them has been more intuitive than reflexiveThis in turn has been an important factor in the weakness of collectiveaction and identification during the social transformation As I sought todemonstrate in Chapter 3 the success of community mobilisation initi-atives beginning with local Civic Fora and Publics Against Violence hasbeen strongly correlated with their ability to facilitate such a dialoguebetween lsquopopularrsquo and lsquointellectualrsquo local and global discursive universes

One process which in this context merits a lot more investigation thanit has received is the reconstruction of social organisations which belongedto the communist-era National Front following the regime collapse(Hubarsquos chapter in this volume on the Slovak Union of Nature andLandscape Conservationists represents one of the rare attempts to writesuch an organisational monograph) Many of them including trade unionssports associations youth organisations and a multitude of societiesinvolved in self-educative or leisure-time activities did not disappear butunderwent more or less radical internal structural reforms initiated frombelow and generally characterisable in terms of decentralisation entrustingsubstantial powers and legal subjectivity to territorial or sectoral affiliatesof what had typically been highly centralised organisations Studies thusindicate a strong continuity in the types of voluntary activity and associ-ative behaviour Czechs and Slovaks are involved in (Wolekovaacute et al 200017ndash18) but a certain discontinuity in its institutionalisation (Turčan 199249) representing a shift from a principle of regulation (surveillance) to oneof self-regulation Can the relatively successful restructuring of the NGOsector be read as an instance of successful narrativisation enabling institu-tional reconstruction Were actors better able to embrace the principle ofself-organisation and thereby re-institutionalise a significant part of their


social worlds because the practices and discourses involved were familiarand valued Does the tradition of an affective community or communica-tive network embolden actors to envisage and construct a new institutionalarrangement better able to express their collective identity or pursue theirshared interests and goals

These are difficult questions the reconstruction of some such socialorganisations followed pragmatic or purely personal interests surroundingthe distribution of often substantial property funds or the creation of newoffices many experienced a prolonged period of organisational chaos alack of professional responsibility among functionaries and a lack ofinitiative from their grassroots4 But experiences gained by individualsinvolved in such hands-on processes of micro-level transformation couldbe invaluable For there is a strong case to be made that processes oflsquorepresentative bargainingrsquo within social formations or collective actors(normalising relations between organisation and membershipconstitu-ency) are substantially autonomous from and in the context of socialtransformation logically prior to the bargaining processes whereby thoseformations and actors become involved (in cooperation or competitionwith other actors) in macro-level institutionalisation As Przeworski et alpoint out lsquomany of the practices of trade unions business and professionalassociations social movements and public-interest groups emerge frominformal interactions within civil society only loosely and indirectlyaffected by the provisions of the civil and criminal codes [and otherlegislation]rsquo (1995 55)5 Here we need to know more about what capacitiespredispose actors social formations or societies to lsquodiscoverrsquo and success-fully deploy myths in order to manage radical change Mythologisationmay be a natural human capability in part acquired during childhood inpart honed through experience such that the effective mythologisation ofone transformation leaves an actor or society better disposed to overcomethe next crisis (Kabele 1998 317) however this sheds little light on theobservation that despite a common initial approach to the construction ofa legal and institutional framework the main macro-level transformationmyths (particularly that of the free market) were significantly less potent inSlovakia than in the Czech Republic and competing anti-myths6 about alsquostolen revolutionrsquo were on the contrary more persuasive there (Kabele1994 31ndash2) Was the depth of the transformatory crisis greater in Slovakiato the extent that it rendered the process of mythologising a new order toodifficult Or were there certain resources in Czech political and civicculture which were weaker in Slovakia How crucial was the role ofpolitical actors in constructing and popularising different myths in eithercountry How important were differences in social and economic struc-ture7 One way of answering these kinds of question begins with investiga-tions into the ways in which distinct communities and organisations havedealt with change given that they are the principal sites where thereception of discourses is tested and contested

214 Simon Smith

The contention here is that acknowledging the centrality of narrativisingprocesses to post-communist transformation within local communities andinstitutions opens up an important new line of inquiry about the mechanicsof the process Transitologists have held that the shift from lsquotransitionrsquo tolsquoconsolidationrsquo is defined by lsquothe moment when things become boring we are moving from an epistemology founded on underdetermination toan epistemology founded on overdetermination [in which] various factorsfavour the reproduction of a newly-consolidating systemrsquo (Schmitter andDvořaacutekovaacute 2000 132) This distinction is a useful one However althoughSchmitter refuses to delimit the length of the transition phase as a generalrule he insists that it could last just lsquofifteen or twenty minutesrsquo if by thenlsquothe actors who are making the founding choice know that there is alreadyno chance of return to the previous regimersquo (ibid) Unfortunately for thisoptimistic reading narratives especially popular narratives take longer toclose than institutions or the rules of the game for political elites Socialactors ndash who are not necessarily directly interested in the social transform-ation or did not start out defining themselves as interested parties ndash needto find in the new historical era not just regularity and predictability (whichis related to the progress of political bargaining institutional innovationand social structuration) but a deeper sense of meaning and motivationfor action which is only possible through constructivist communicativeaction It is therefore inevitable that a new order governing socialinteraction at the level of everyday life takes longer to embed than themere establishment of a consensus of no return For these reasons theunder-determination of social relations in most spheres of life is anongoing feature of post-communist societies even though there areapparently no threats to the democracy of the regimes themselves Themost serious weakness of the transition approach is its underestimation ofthe extent to which down to the lowest level transformation (if it is to besuccessful) is a creative participative and self-reflexive process This is sofor two sets of reasons First when a society enters a new historical epochthere is a need to establish and legitimise lsquofoundingrsquo myths redefining itscollective origin and destiny whose acceptance cannot take place via thelsquonon-decision-makingrsquo processes which ordinarily govern the socialisationof populations to collective norms and institutions Indeed resistance tonew regulatory modes is often most deep-seated within local bureaucraticapparatuses impervious to instructions issuing from a new politicalconsensus lsquoat the toprsquo and innovation at this level must therefore bestruggled for among actors at the grassroots Second the new mode ofregulation which post-communist countries are attempting to join has beencharacterised as one demanding greater participation on the part ofindividual and collective actors with high information-handling capacitiesIn an open society the success of economic enterprises towns and regionsdepends increasingly on their ability to innovate and their ability to mobi-lise the creative energies of their own members The unique conditions of


social transformation ndash the breakdown of social order ndash could paradoxic-ally prove advantageous in one sense if an initially forced narrativisation isadopted by specific collective actors as a way of life

Although the studies in this volume have not explicitly adopted anarrativist approach a common theme is an attempt to describe patterns ofbehaviour within a certain social sub-system with reference both to theintrinsic discursive logic of the relevant communities and practices and to adiscourse of modernisation either constructed in a normative fashion bythe author (as in the case of Slosiarikrsquos study which invokes concepts suchas self-regulation and civic responsibility as basic and desirable principlesof lsquomodernrsquo territorial community development) or imputed to externalpolitical or economic actors and institutions (as in the case of the studies ofwork collectives which appeal to the logic of necessary innovations in thework process connected with the transition to a new mode of economicintegration and driven by the action of foreign owners or the competitivepressures of an international division of labour) This approach enabledthem to comment on the intrinsic functionality or meaningfulness ofexisting practices and evaluate the modernising potential of social andcultural capital the take-up of lsquomodernrsquo values the capacity of actors tostep into lsquomodernrsquo social roles or the compatibility of micro- and macro-level norms and practices Contradictions between these discourses areoften more apparent than real a matter of misunderstanding or mistransl-ation rather than incompatibility By facilitating a dialogue betweenlsquodiscursive universesrsquo sociological studies of local communities such asthose presented in this volume can themselves contribute towards theestablishment of a modern democratic civil society

Notes

1 This ambivalence is very clear in the modernisation of the work process whichhas been characterised by increasing degrees of intervention in the autonomyof the worker and even the psychological conditions of the work environmentat the same time as by the transformation of organisations into networks ofsocial relations equipped with an initiative and an independence which are notcompletely reducible to domination by class power or manipulation by socialengineering The survey findings presented in this volume by Čambaacutelikovaacute andby Kroupa and Mansfeldovaacute which uncover some intricate contradictions inworkersrsquo attitudes (encapsulated in the title of Čambaacutelikovaacutersquos chapter lsquoDualidentity andor ldquobread and butterrdquorsquo) describe the rapid modernisation of workprocesses in electronics factories as a process interpretable in these terms

2 To understand the role of myths in social transformation Kabele returns to thecultural anthropology of Levi-Strauss and others Myths it is suggested replaceinstitutions when the latter no longer adequately render life predictable andlsquoorderedrsquo Life is thus temporarily construed not as lsquoorderrsquo but as lsquodramarsquo(Kabele 1994 22) Myths enable social actors to overcome the hardships andthe sense of disorientation associated with the lsquodisorderrsquo of transformation byinterpreting it as a series of lsquotestsrsquo on the road to the restoration of (a different)

216 Simon Smith

order (ibid 25) they energise actors to adopt an active approach to reality andfacilitate actor-formation and collective identification because they constructand internalise relations of conflict cooperation and empathy (ibid 28)

3 Naturally art is one of the sites of this kind of constructive myth-making Anoverview of contemporary Czech and Slovak cultural production is obviouslynot possible here but a brief illustrative example may elucidate how theprocess can work Petr Zelenkarsquos 1997 feature film Knofliacutekaacuteři deals with thedisconnections between several individual biographies and broader historicalchanges in the setting of 1990s Prague A tribute to human lsquouniquenessrsquo itportrays in several loosely overlapping fragments of narratives the clumsyattempts of various social actors (all misfits in one sense or another) to return asense of meaning and direction to their own lives The filmrsquos main leitmotif isperhaps supplied by the chorus of the Už jsme doma song lsquoJoacute nebo neborsquofeatured in the soundtrack lsquoI like those who are beginning to differentiatethose who inquire those who are not satisfied with a single answerrsquo (a kind ofanthem for a new age which Miroslav Wanek actually composed shortly afterNovember 1989) The narrativisations that are being attempted by thecharacters amount in Bourdieursquos terminology to the deployment of symboliccapital so as lsquoto occupy a point or to be an individual within a social space [ie]to differ to be differentrsquo As a life strategy however this is only effective lsquoif it isperceived by someone who is capable of making the distinctionrsquo (Bourdieu1998 9) In other words it is only effective in an integrated social space ndash hencethe struggle to make narratives interconnect which is inscribed into the veryformal structure of the film A secondary leitmotif is also invoked swearing ndashthe failsafe mechanism of coping with crises adopted by an actor unable toovercome an obstacle who can only relieve his or her frustration by cursing thevagaries of fate Although short on happy endings Knofliacutekaacuteři can be read as agenerally optimistic account of the resourcefulness of people in not succumbingto fatalism but finding their own idiosyncratic ways to differ at the same time itrepresents a warning about the lack of progress in reconstructing a legiblesocial space where differentiation is possible and of the tragic consequences ofmisunderstanding

4 Thus until a new leadership was installed and new statutes adopted in 1995 theCzech Cycling Union (ČSC) for example laboured under substantial debtsuffered from a culture of cronyism and diletantism among its staff and lackedany conception about its organisational priorities according to the new directorof the secretariat Slavomiacuter Svobodnyacute Since the shakeup debts have been paidoff more independence has been devolved to specialist sections and funds aredistributed in a more transparent way based on incentives for results andrecruitment however the director complains of a continued lack of initiativefrom most of ČSCrsquos member clubs (Peloton no 5 2000 59ndash61)

5 Interestingly the Czecho-Slovak trade union movement represents a partialexception to this principle The post-revolutionary environment within which itoperated was relatively quickly institutionalised lsquofrom aboversquo ndash arguably beforethe movement had chance to resolve its identity via internal lsquorepresentativebargainingrsquo It thus found itself ushered into a position of influence (albeitsubstantially circumscribed) via the tripartite council and new union legislationbefore any consistent notion of a labour interest had been worked out throughthe communicative practices which it as a collective actor is supposed to


facilitate and structure (see Čambaacutelikovaacute 1992 71) This lsquoback-to-frontrsquo develop-ment in which a tripartite council emerged not as an historic compromisefollowing a period of conflict between unions and capital or the state but as alsquopreventiversquo institution in anticipation of possible future conflict (Mansfeldovaacute1997 104) produced for unions a temporary imbalance between influence andlegitimacy which was subsequently slowly restored ČMKOS and KOZ SR thetwo countriesrsquo main union confederations are now possibly stronger asorganisations than they might have been if they had been forced to secureinfluence from the start by demonstrating their strength through mobilising alabour interest but trade unions as lsquointersubjective communitiesrsquo are un-doubtedly different due to their unorthodox post-revolutionary regeneration afact which is evident from a comparision with Polish experience where thepost-communist state has not embraced corporatist solutions to the sameextent (Smith 2000) Which of them produces a more lsquorepresentativersquo pattern ofinterest organisation Przeworski et al argue that the preservation of someaspects of a lsquostate corporatistrsquo format following a regime transition may bebeneficial if the alternative of lsquoa sudden shift to a purely voluntaristic formatcould jeopardise the very existence of some organised interestsrsquo (1995 56) Thehigher rates of unionisation in the Czech and Slovak Republics compared withother post-communist countries offer some support to this argument but therelative long-term strength of different organisations is hard to predict

6 Anti-myths are also narrative devices enabling actors to reconcile themselveswith disorder but on a different basis Instead of stimulating the vision of a neworder they rationalise the irreversibility of the fall into chaos They thuslegitimise a fatalistic approach to social reality an orientation on short-termgains and an unwillingness to bear sacrifices which are irrational if the lsquomythrsquo ofan eventual restoration of order is incredible (Kabele 1998 317ndash18)

7 It is obvious that agricultural or certain types of industrial communities havegreatest difficulty adapting to macro-economic transformation because its insti-tutional consequences (above all unemployment) are particularly destructivefor them But is their low adaptive capacity linked also to an inability tonarrativise change Majerovaacute identified as a characteristic attitude amongmanual agricultural workers lsquoa rejection of any kind of changes and ademand for the preservation of the same work in the same enterprise under thesame conditionsrsquo (1999 245) This intransigence could be related she suggeststo low levels of educational attainment a deficit in civic organisational skillsand also to the strong social control mechanisms which prevail in a villagesetting and which render more visible illegitimacies and inequities in theprivatisation process For these reasons agricultural communities constitute acultural milieu which is resistant to the heroic mythologisation of privatisationand marketisation and at the same time poorly equipped with the communic-ation skills necessary to express alternative transformation narratives

Bibliography

Aacutegh A (1998) The Politics of Central Europe London SageBaethge M (1997) lsquoIntroductionrsquo in Baethge M Adamski W and Greskovits B

(eds) Social Structures in the Making Sisyphus Social Studies vol X WarsawIFiS 7ndash13

218 Simon Smith

Bourdieu P (1998) Practical Reason On the Theory of Action Stanford StanfordUniversity Press



Fibich J (1996) lsquoProbleacutemy transformace a demokratizace mentality člověkarsquo inŠafařiacutekovaacute and kol 1996 249ndash89

Giddens A (1985) A Contemporary Critique of Historical Materialism Vol 2 TheNation-State and Violence London Polity

Heitlingerovaacute A and Trnkovaacute Z (1999) lsquoFormuje se novaacute generaceVyacutesledky studie ldquoŽivoty mladyacutech pražskyacutech ženrdquorsquo in Potůček (ed) 1999 vol2 55ndash72

Kabele J (1994) lsquoMyacutetus realita a transformacersquo Sociologickyacute časopis vol 30 no 121ndash34

Kabele J (1998) Přerody ndash principy sociaacutelniacuteho konstruovaacuteniacute Prague KarolinumKonopaacutesek Z (ed) (1999) Otevřenaacute minulost Autobiografickaacute sociologie staacutetniacuteho

socialismu Prague KarolinumKrůček Z Kohn P Hudečkovaacute H and Majerovaacute-Charitonovaacute V (1984) lsquoRozvoj

socialistickeacuteho způsobu života pracovniacuteků v zemědělstviacutersquo Sociologickyacute časopisvol 20 no 6 580ndash97

Machonin P (1997) Social transformation and modernization Sociaacutelniacute transfor-mace a modernizace Prague SLON

Majerovaacute V (1999) lsquoMěniacuteciacute se role zemědělstviacute v trvale udržitelneacutem rozvojivenkovarsquo in Potůček (ed) 1999 vol 2 237ndash49

Mansfeldovaacute Z (1997) lsquoSociaacutelniacute partnerstviacute v Českeacute republicersquo in Brokl and kol1997 99ndash150

Matějů M (2000) lsquoTransformace kulturniacute identity v souvislosti s procesy evropskeacuteintegracersquo Socioloacutegia vol 32 no 1 43ndash56


Cambridge Cambridge University PressMikovaacute Z (1992) lsquoLidskyacute kapitaacutel a strategie chovaacuteniacute ve sfeacuteře praacutecersquo Sociologickyacute

časopis vol 28 no 3 337ndash50Možnyacute I (1999a) Proč tak snadno Prague SLON (second edition)Možnyacute I (1999b) lsquoČeskaacute rodina v době pozdniacute modernityrsquo in Potůček (ed) 1999

vol 1 27ndash35Nagle J and Mahr A (1999) Democracy and Democratization Post-Communist

Europe in Comparative Perspective London SagePotůček M (ed) (1999) Českaacute společnost na konci tisiacuteciletiacute (2 volumes) Prague

KarolinumPrzeworski A et al (1995) Sustainable Democracy Cambridge Cambridge Uni-

versity PressRychard A (1993) Reforms Adaptation and Breakthrough The Sources of and

Limits to Institutional Changes in Poland Warsaw IFiSŠafařiacutekovaacute V a kol (1996) Transformace českeacute společnosti 1989ndash1995 Brno

DoplněkSchmitter P and Dvořaacutekovaacute V (2000) lsquoRozhovorrsquo Politologickaacute revue vol 6 no 2

130ndash6


Slosiarik M (2000) lsquoObčianskyacute potenciaacutel ako diferencujuacuteci faktor rozvoja siacutedlarsquoSocioloacutegia vol 32 no 2 153ndash79

Šmiacutedovaacute O (1999) lsquoCo vypraacutevějiacute naše bytyrsquo in Konopaacutesek (ed) 1999 171ndash203Smith S (2000) Collective action and institutional transformation a comparative

review of Polish Czech and Slovak trade union experience University of PaisleyPBSCCES Working Paper


Turčan Lrsquo (1992) lsquoObčianska spoločnos a aspekt jednotlivcarsquo in Sopoacuteci (ed) 199246ndash54

Wolekovaacute H Petraacutešovaacute A Toepler S and Salamon L (2000) Neziskovyacute sektor naSlovensku ndash ekonomickaacute analyacuteza Bratislava Social Policy Analysis Centre(SPACE)

220 Simon Smith

Index

Chapter Title 221

agriculture see rural communities

Blatnaacute 154ndash7Bratislavanahlas 94Brezina D 58Budaj J 95

Českyacute Krumlov 154ndash7Christian Democrats (Czech) see

Peoplersquos PartyChristian Democrats (Slovak) 52 58 61citizenship 107ndash8 168 see also civic

potentialCivic Democratic Alliance 29 35 76Civic Democratic Party 20 28 29ndash38 in

local elections 74ndash6 localorganisations 65ndash6 74

Civic Forum 6 11 23ndash8 42ndash4 143 213and 1990 general elections 148ndash9and 1990 local elections 65 74 143149ndash50 and environmentalism 102in Humenneacute 49 and localgovernment 47ndash8 64 68ndash70 andlocal identity 70ndash1 localorganisations 63ndash78 146ndash8 andNGOs 72 74 79 as a socialmovement 44ndash7 79ndash84

Civic Movement 28 67civic potential 9ndash10 161ndash2 166ndash9 182

as action potential 170ndash2 178ndash9 asassociative potential 173ndash4 180 asinformation-handling potential174ndash5 181 as legal awareness 170177ndash8 as local democratic potential169ndash70 177 as value systems 175ndash6181

civil society 11ndash13 20ndash3 37ndash9 44collective bargaining 110 122 136ndash7

Communist Party (Czech) 25 29ndash3067 and 1990 general election 148ndash9

Communist Party (Slovak) 52communitarianism 176community coalitions and foundations

62ndash3 80 82 162 180cooperability 152ndash3Countryside Renewal Czech 70ndash3 78

82 88 Slovak 87ČSSD see Social Democratic Party

dam construction Torysa 190 194ndash6199

Dejmal I 72Děkujeme odejděte 39Demeš P 62Democratic Party 52 61Dzivjaacutekovaacute Z 53 58

Ekoforum 97 101election campaign 1990 148ndash9electronics industry Czech 128ndash41

Slovak 115ndash23environmental movement campaigns

98ndash9 under communism 93ndash5 146conservation activities 100ndash2 andEarth Summit 97ndash8 in Humenneacute 51public education 101 and velvetrevolution 95ndash6 103

EU LEADER programme 83

Fedorko A 93Flamik J 95foreign direct investment 111ndash12foreign ownership employee

perceptions of 135ndash6Freedom Party 52Friedman M 20 22ndash3 27 36

222 Index

Gabčiacutekovo-Nagymaros dam 98ndash9Gaacutel F 3 45ndash6 89Gindl E 96Green Party (Slovak) 52 95ndash6

Havel V 4ndash5 8 13 19ndash23 26 33ndash8 4277

Hayek F 22ndash3housing 192 211ndash12human potential 9 48 158 194human resource management 126ndash7 141Humenneacute 1990 local elections in

56ndash60 economic development plan63 growth of 46ndash7 NGOs in 63velvet revolution in 49ndash52

Hungary political parties 78HZDS see Movement for a Democratic

Slovakia

Impuls 99 9industrial relations 116ndash23 126ndash8

136ndash40inflation 112interest representation 119ndash21 136ndash9Italy political system 12 78

KDUndashČSL see Peoplersquos PartyKlaus V 13 14 19ndash23 26ndash37 78Konrad G 42Korba M 51 61Kremnica 88Kresaacutenek P 96

Labour Code 54 109ndash10 127 136labour market policies 114Learning Democracy project 49 81 85

144local elections 58ndash60 74ndash6 149ndash51local government 43 1990 restoration

of 164ndash6 and civic culture 154ndash7 andextensive local autonomy 47ndash8 82ndash4and forestry 188 190 191 194 andlocal community 143ndash4184ndash5municipalities 87 88 and NGOs62ndash3 153 and political culture149ndash53 strategic leadership 191ndash6202ndash4

lustration 27ndash8 34Lux J 33 35ndash6

Macek M 32Masaryk TG 23Mazuacuter E 93Mečiar V 59 78 102ndash3

Medzilaborce 51 59ndash61 63 86Mesiacutek J 95micro-regions 73 153migration post-WWII 186ndash7modernisation transformation as 6ndash13

206ndash10Movement for a Democratic Slovakia

59ndash60 192

narrativisation 210ndash16national committees reconstruction of

52 68 143ndash4 147NGOs see non-governmental

organisationsnon-governmental organisations Czech

72 80ndash3 post-communist renewal of24 213ndash4 Slovak 62ndash3 80ndash3 92 96103 173ndash4 180 193ndash6

non-political politics 23 42ndash3 77

ODA see Civic Democratic AllianceODS see Civic Democratic PartyOF see Civic ForumOndruš V 95opposition pact 38outsider syndrome 154

Palouš M 26Peoplersquos Party 29 33 35ndash7 65ndash6 76147Permanent Conference of the Civic

Initiative 61ndash2 82Pithart P 25ndash6 35Polaacutek M 51 56Prešov Civic Forum 62privatisation 106ndash7Public Against Violence 11 26 42ndash4

213 and environmental movement95ndash6 102 in Humenneacute 49ndash64 andlocal government 47ndash8organisational structure 57 inPezinok 85 86 and religious issues49ndash50 as a social movement 44ndash779ndash84 and trade unions 61workplace branches 54ndash6

regional government 36ndash8 143 159resource mobilisation theory 44ndash5RomaRomany 187ndash93 197round tables see national committees

reconstruction ofRuml Jan 34rural communities 76ndash7 157ndash8 218Ruthenians 49 61 86 189Rynda I 72 79

Index 223

Schumpeter J 22self-government see local governmentself-regulation of social systems 3 10

71ndash3 163ndash5SKOI see Permanent Conference of the

Civic InitiativeSlovak Sociological Society 1989

congress 1Snina 56 59ndash61 63Social Democratic Party (Czech) 30 38

76 147social dialogue see tripartitesocial ecology 4social heritage 144ndash8 157ndash8social movements 44ndash7Socialist Youth Union 52Society for Sustainable Living 96ndash7Sociological Forum 6sociological intervention see activist

sociologysociology activist 1ndash3 210 under

communism 1ndash10 enterprise 2 5urban 5 7ndash8

Solidarity 11Spiš 185 189Šremer P 95

Tataacuter P 95

territorial community 162ndash3trade unions 21ndash22 24 37 108ndash10

119ndash22 128 136ndash41 217ndash18transition theories 206 215 see also

modernisationtripartite 25 38 108ndash10 218

unemployment 113ndash14urbanisation 7ndash8 46ndash7

Vavroušek J 95Velkeacute Meziřiacutečiacute 154ndash7Vištuk 100 102voluntary activity see non-

governmental organisationsVPN see Public Against Violence

wages 112Wolekovaacute H 2ndash3 62work organisation of 117ndash19 128ndash35

141 team work 126ndash7 128ndash9141

Zajac P 57Zelenka P 217Zempliacuten 46ndash7Žiar nad Hronom 99Zieleniec J 32ndash3

Book Cover

Title

Contents

List of tables

Notes on contributors

Preface

Acknowledgements

Transformation as modernisation sociological readings of post-communist lifeworlds

Civil society and political parties in the Czech Republic

Civic Forum and Public Against Violence agents for community self-determination Experiences of local actors

The development of the environmental non-governmental movement in Slovakia the Slovak Union of Nature and Landscape Conservationists

Dual identity andor bread and butter electronics industry workers in Slovakia 1995 2000

The democratisation of industrial relations in the Czech Republic work organisation and employee representation case studies from the electronics industry

Local community transformation the Czech Republic 1990 2000

Civic potential as a differentiating factor in the development of local communities

Group strategies of local communities in Slovakia facing social threats

Conclusion the narrativisation of social transformation

Index

Local Communities and Post-Communist Transformation

Post-communist transformation in the former Soviet bloc has had aprofound effect not just in the political and economic sphere but on allaspects of life Although a great deal has been written about transformationmuch of it has been about transformation viewed from the top and littlehas been written about how things have changed for ordinary people at thelocal level

This book based on extensive original research examines the changesresulting from transformation at the local level in the formerCzechoslovakia It considers especially local democracy social movementsand work collectives and paints a picture of people gradually growing inself-confidence and taking more control of their communities having livedfor decades in a framework where so much was directed from the top

Simon Smith is a research lecturer in the Centre for ContemporaryEuropean Studies at the University of Paisley His current researchinterests cover civil society collective action local culture and local andregional government in Central and Eastern Europe






















ISBN 0-415-29718-4




Contents












Index 221

vi Contents

Tables










viii Tables









Contributors










x Contributors

Preface





Chapter Title xi






xii Preface





Preface xiii



xiv Preface

Acknowledgements


Preface xv

xvi Preface


Simon Smith











2 Simon Smith














4 Simon Smith








6 Simon Smith








8 Simon Smith











10 Simon Smith







12 Simon Smith


Notes











Bibliography





14 Simon Smith




















University Press

























16 Simon Smith























1 115ndash20




18 Simon Smith


Martin Myant





Introduction


Chapter Title 19







20 Martin Myant











22 Martin Myant













24 Martin Myant














26 Martin Myant










28 Martin Myant










30 Martin Myant


1992 1996 1998













32 Martin Myant










34 Martin Myant










36 Martin Myant




The aftermath








38 Martin Myant


Bibliography













Affairs





















40 Martin Myant


Simon Smith









Chapter Title 41

Introduction





42 Simon Smith












(1995 162)

44 Simon Smith







46 Simon Smith















Sources


48 Simon Smith










50 Simon Smith








52 Simon Smith







(Interview)


54 Simon Smith
















56 Simon Smith











58 Simon Smith














60 Simon Smith


















62 Simon Smith



Civic Forum




Case studies

Positive cases





64 Simon Smith




Mixed cases



66 Simon Smith

Negative cases






Representation



68 Simon Smith






Self-representation




70 Simon Smith



Self-regulation





72 Simon Smith








74 Simon Smith

Chapter Title 75

Tabl

e 3

519

90 lo

cal e

lect

ion

resu

lts

in fi

ve C

zech

mun

icip

alit

ies

(all

figur

es a

re p

erce

ntag

es)

Par

tyJ

SP

Ř

L

Z

Cz

Rep

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

OF

6267

2927

4647

4644

5756

3732

KSČ

1010

2327

77

ndash16

1117

14Č

SL13

13ndash

1213

ndash0

011

12Č

SSD

ndash24

273

311

1118

225

2Č

SSndash

ndashndash

ndash9

114

2In

d13

1023

2711

1343

44ndash

1027

Not

eA

das

h in

dica

tes

that

the

par

ty d

id n

ot s

tand

A z

ero

indi

cate

s a

nil r

esul

t

Tabl

e 3

619

94 lo

cal e

lect

ion

resu

lts

in fi

ve C

zech

mun

icip

alit

ies

(all

figur

es a

re p

erce

ntag

es)

Par

tyJ

SP

Ř

L

Z

Cz

Rep

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

OD

S58

6016

20ndash

ndashndash

2912

OD

A

ndashndash

1414

ndash7

147

1SD

(OH

)ndash

ndashndash

ndash24

142

1K

SČM

1820

1413

1210

ndashndash

1511

KD

UndashČ

SL19

13ndash

1510

ndash44

439

13Č

SSD

ndash17

20ndash

ndashndash

93

Ind

57

53

47

31

33

100

100

25

29

1253

Not

eO

F s

ucce

ssor

par

ties

Key

to p

artie

s(T

able

s 3

5ndash3

6)

OF

Civ

ic F

orum

ČSS

Soc

ialis

t P

arty

KSČ

KSČ

M C

omm

unis

t P

arty

OD

S C

ivic

Dem

ocra

tic

Par

tyČ

SLK

DU

ndashČSL

Peo

plersquo

s P

arty

OD

A C

ivic

Dem

ocra

tic

Alli

ance

ČSS

D S

ocia

l Dem

ocra

tic

Par

tySD

(OH

) Fr

ee D

emoc

rats

(C

ivic

Mov

emen

t)




76 Simon Smith





Conclusion


78 Simon Smith






80 Simon Smith







82 Simon Smith





Interviews

Civic Forum







84 Simon Smith





Notes













86 Simon Smith











88 Simon Smith




Bibliography




























90 Simon Smith















Mikulaacutes Huba

Introduction


92 Author



















































Notes









Introduction





Chapter Title 105






























Wages


Prices





capita (US$)1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1998



Employment



Unemployment







Working time


















1995 151 125 101 3932000 402 107 126 98















1995 83 390 348 141 152000 52 592 314 42 0



1995 2000










1995 742 912 543 645 2922000 543 250 344 512 447




1995 20 263 405 141 1712000 56 580 305 19 38




1995 75 28 82000 67 64 18




1995 12 230 447 171 1392000 09 437 432 70 52













1995 22 38 20 22 34 102000 7 5 6 8 18 6




1995 63 17 5 8 16 32000 75 26 48 24 2 1




Conclusions






Notes














Bibliography





























Introduction


126 Author



















Firm A Firm B1995 2000 2000











1995 2000 1995 2000 1995 2000 1995 2000


B 607 304 54 36


B 182 273 509 36


B 327 218 436 18


B 696 268 ndash 36


B 429 375 143 54


B 582 327 55 36


B 163 345 436 55


B 418 273 236 73


B 364 164 309 164


B 181 291 491 36


B 291 491 127 91





Firm A Firm B1995 2000 2000

1 2 3 1 2 3 1 2 3
















Firm B Firm A




































Firm A Firm B





Earnings 139 154 500 207 130 220 370 270(136) (76) (565) (223)












140 Author

Tabl

e 6

6P

rior

itie

s fo

r un

ion

acti

vity

in t

he fi

rm (

per

cent

)

Fir

m A

Fir

m B

12

34

5A

v1

23

45

Av

Job

secu

rity

and

em

ploy

men

t pr

otec

tion

370

125

139

260

87

129

520

280

80

50

70

163

Wor

k ti

me

redu

ctio

n9

626

029

817

315

42

6629

032

024

06

08

02

07

Wor

k lo

ads

and

job

desi

gn12

523

122

623

113

02

696

022

034

027

08

02

92

Hol

iday

s an

d le

ave

442

394

101

14

38

167

470

400

90

30

10

168

Wag

e in

crea

ses

538

183

139

82

48

175

560

200

170

40

20

168

Ent

erpr

ise

wel

fare

fac

iliti

es a

nd

serv

ices

341

346

154

82

67

197

370

420

150

30

20

183

Edu

cati

on a

nd t

rain

ing

144

226

370

135

96

256

100

300

320

210

70

269

Wor

k or

gan

d pr

oduc

tion

te

chno

logy

159

135

279

260

154

277

40

230

250

350

130

304

Wor

k en

viro

nmen

t (h

azar

ds

and

dise

ases

)28

830

315

49

114

42

0633

043

09

03

012

01

79

Per

sonn

el t

rans

fers

115

250

279

202

144

267

190

390

270

50

100

220

Influ

ence

ove

r m

anag

emen

t po

licie

s18

319

222

119

220

72

5414

028

022

020

015

02

57

Not

es

1ve

ry im

port

ant

2fa

irly

impo

rtan

t3

not

so im

port

ant

4no

t im

port

ant

5un

clea

rE

xclu

ding

lsquounc

lear

rsquo

Conclusions



Notes









Bibliography








Zdenka Vajdovaacute





Chapter Title 143







































Example 1




Example 2










Party Votes Seats

1994 1998 1994 1998





























Town Agreement Year

1992 1994 1996 1998
















Conclusion




Notes















Bibliography


















Martin Slosiarik

Introduction




Chapter Title 161

















(Schenk 1993 72)




















(Ibid 346)


Civic potential












(Illner 1989 295)

























(Ibid 31)




















(Stena 1991 10)










(Gajdoš 1994 454)










(Ibid 235)







Research findings





Legal awareness





Action potential





Kvačany




















Value orientations










Conclusion


Bibliography




























Imrich Vašečka

Introduction









184 Author

















































Community 1








Community 2







Community 3












Community 4




















Community

1 2 3 4








Community

1 2 3 4












Community

1 2 3 4









Community

1 2 3 4













Community

1 2 3 4














Conclusion

















Notes









Bibliography













Simon Smith

Modernisation



206 Author







208 Simon Smith








210 Simon Smith







(Ibid 245)


212 Simon Smith






214 Simon Smith





Notes



216 Simon Smith









Bibliography



218 Simon Smith
























130ndash6








220 Simon Smith

Index

Chapter Title 221























222 Index






Slovakia











59ndash60 192












Index 223









Tataacuter P 95










Book Cover

Title

Contents

List of tables


Preface

Acknowledgements











Index






















ISBN 0-415-29718-4




Contents












Index 221

vi Contents

Tables










viii Tables









Contributors










x Contributors

Preface





Chapter Title xi






xii Preface





Preface xiii



xiv Preface

Acknowledgements


Preface xv

xvi Preface


Simon Smith











2 Simon Smith














4 Simon Smith








6 Simon Smith








8 Simon Smith











10 Simon Smith







12 Simon Smith


Notes











Bibliography





14 Simon Smith




















University Press

























16 Simon Smith























1 115ndash20




18 Simon Smith


Martin Myant





Introduction


Chapter Title 19







20 Martin Myant











22 Martin Myant













24 Martin Myant














26 Martin Myant










28 Martin Myant










30 Martin Myant


1992 1996 1998













32 Martin Myant










34 Martin Myant










36 Martin Myant




The aftermath








38 Martin Myant


Bibliography













Affairs





















40 Martin Myant


Simon Smith









Chapter Title 41

Introduction





42 Simon Smith












(1995 162)

44 Simon Smith







46 Simon Smith















Sources


48 Simon Smith










50 Simon Smith








52 Simon Smith







(Interview)


54 Simon Smith
















56 Simon Smith











58 Simon Smith














60 Simon Smith


















62 Simon Smith



Civic Forum




Case studies

Positive cases





64 Simon Smith




Mixed cases



66 Simon Smith

Negative cases






Representation



68 Simon Smith






Self-representation




70 Simon Smith



Self-regulation





72 Simon Smith








74 Simon Smith

Chapter Title 75

Tabl

e 3

519

90 lo

cal e

lect

ion

resu

lts

in fi

ve C

zech

mun

icip

alit

ies

(all

figur

es a

re p

erce

ntag

es)

Par

tyJ

SP

Ř

L

Z

Cz

Rep

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

OF

6267

2927

4647

4644

5756

3732

KSČ

1010

2327

77

ndash16

1117

14Č

SL13

13ndash

1213

ndash0

011

12Č

SSD

ndash24

273

311

1118

225

2Č

SSndash

ndashndash

ndash9

114

2In

d13

1023

2711

1343

44ndash

1027

Not

eA

das

h in

dica

tes

that

the

par

ty d

id n

ot s

tand

A z

ero

indi

cate

s a

nil r

esul

t

Tabl

e 3

619

94 lo

cal e

lect

ion

resu

lts

in fi

ve C

zech

mun

icip

alit

ies

(all

figur

es a

re p

erce

ntag

es)

Par

tyJ

SP

Ř

L

Z

Cz

Rep

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

Vot

esSe

ats

OD

S58

6016

20ndash

ndashndash

2912

OD

A

ndashndash

1414

ndash7

147

1SD

(OH

)ndash

ndashndash

ndash24

142

1K

SČM

1820

1413

1210

ndashndash

1511

KD

UndashČ

SL19

13ndash

1510

ndash44

439

13Č

SSD

ndash17

20ndash

ndashndash

93

Ind

57

53

47

31

33

100

100

25

29

1253

Not

eO

F s

ucce

ssor

par

ties

Key

to p

artie

s(T

able

s 3

5ndash3

6)

OF

Civ

ic F

orum

ČSS

Soc

ialis

t P

arty

KSČ

KSČ

M C

omm

unis

t P

arty

OD

S C

ivic

Dem

ocra

tic

Par

tyČ

SLK

DU

ndashČSL

Peo

plersquo

s P

arty

OD

A C

ivic

Dem

ocra

tic

Alli

ance

ČSS

D S

ocia

l Dem

ocra

tic

Par

tySD

(OH

) Fr

ee D

emoc

rats

(C

ivic

Mov

emen

t)




76 Simon Smith





Conclusion


78 Simon Smith






80 Simon Smith







82 Simon Smith





Interviews

Civic Forum







84 Simon Smith





Notes













86 Simon Smith











88 Simon Smith




Bibliography




























90 Simon Smith















Mikulaacutes Huba

Introduction


92 Author



















































Notes









Introduction





Chapter Title 105






























Wages


Prices





capita (US$)1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1998



Employment



Unemployment







Working time


















1995 151 125 101 3932000 402 107 126 98















1995 83 390 348 141 152000 52 592 314 42 0



1995 2000










1995 742 912 543 645 2922000 543 250 344 512 447




1995 20 263 405 141 1712000 56 580 305 19 38




1995 75 28 82000 67 64 18




1995 12 230 447 171 1392000 09 437 432 70 52













1995 22 38 20 22 34 102000 7 5 6 8 18 6




1995 63 17 5 8 16 32000 75 26 48 24 2 1




Conclusions






Notes














Bibliography





























Introduction


126 Author



















Firm A Firm B1995 2000 2000











1995 2000 1995 2000 1995 2000 1995 2000


B 607 304 54 36


B 182 273 509 36


B 327 218 436 18


B 696 268 ndash 36


B 429 375 143 54


B 582 327 55 36


B 163 345 436 55


B 418 273 236 73


B 364 164 309 164


B 181 291 491 36


B 291 491 127 91





Firm A Firm B1995 2000 2000

1 2 3 1 2 3 1 2 3
















Firm B Firm A




































Firm A Firm B





Earnings 139 154 500 207 130 220 370 270(136) (76) (565) (223)












140 Author

Tabl

e 6

6P

rior

itie

s fo

r un

ion

acti

vity

in t

he fi

rm (

per

cent

)

Fir

m A

Fir

m B

12

34

5A

v1

23

45

Av

Job

secu

rity

and

em

ploy

men

t pr

otec

tion

370

125

139

260

87

129

520

280

80

50

70

163

Wor

k ti

me

redu

ctio

n9

626

029

817

315

42

6629

032

024

06

08

02

07

Wor

k lo

ads

and

job

desi

gn12

523

122

623

113

02

696

022

034

027

08

02

92

Hol

iday

s an

d le

ave

442

394

101

14

38

167

470

400

90

30

10

168

Wag

e in

crea

ses

538

183

139

82

48

175

560

200

170

40

20

168

Ent

erpr

ise

wel

fare

fac

iliti

es a

nd

serv

ices

341

346

154

82

67

197

370

420

150

30

20

183

Edu

cati

on a

nd t

rain

ing

144

226

370

135

96

256

100

300

320

210

70

269

Wor

k or

gan

d pr

oduc

tion

te

chno

logy

159

135

279

260

154

277

40

230

250

350

130

304

Wor

k en

viro

nmen

t (h

azar

ds

and

dise

ases

)28

830

315

49

114

42

0633

043

09

03

012

01

79

Per

sonn

el t

rans

fers

115

250

279

202

144

267

190

390

270

50

100

220

Influ

ence

ove

r m

anag

emen

t po

licie

s18

319

222

119

220

72

5414

028

022

020

015

02

57

Not

es

1ve

ry im

port

ant

2fa

irly

impo

rtan

t3

not

so im

port

ant

4no

t im

port

ant

5un

clea

rE

xclu

ding

lsquounc

lear

rsquo

Conclusions



Notes









Bibliography








Zdenka Vajdovaacute





Chapter Title 143







































Example 1




Example 2










Party Votes Seats

1994 1998 1994 1998





























Town Agreement Year

1992 1994 1996 1998
















Conclusion




Notes















Bibliography


















Martin Slosiarik

Introduction




Chapter Title 161

















(Schenk 1993 72)




















(Ibid 346)


Civic potential












(Illner 1989 295)

























(Ibid 31)




















(Stena 1991 10)










(Gajdoš 1994 454)










(Ibid 235)







Research findings





Legal awareness





Action potential





Kvačany




















Value orientations










Conclusion


Bibliography




























Imrich Vašečka

Introduction









184 Author

















































Community 1








Community 2







Community 3












Community 4




















Community

1 2 3 4








Community

1 2 3 4












Community

1 2 3 4









Community

1 2 3 4













Community

1 2 3 4














Conclusion

















Notes









Bibliography













Simon Smith

Modernisation



206 Author







208 Simon Smith








210 Simon Smith







(Ibid 245)


212 Simon Smith






214 Simon Smith





Notes



216 Simon Smith









Bibliography



218 Simon Smith
























130ndash6








220 Simon Smith

Index

Chapter Title 221























222 Index






Slovakia











59ndash60 192












Index 223









Tataacuter P 95










Book Cover

Title

Contents

List of tables


Preface

Acknowledgements











Index

local communities and post-communist transformation (basees curzon series on russian & east...

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