rss_2.0Sciendo RSS Feed for Politics in Central Europehttps://sciendo.com/journal/PCEhttps://www.sciendo.comhttps://sciendo-parsed.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/64726c02215d2f6c89dc7574/cover-image.jpghttps://sciendo.com/journal/PCE140216https://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-0009<abstract> <title style='display:none'>Abstract</title> <p>The legacies of former partitions are still visible in today’s Poland in the economy, society and politics. Our article integrates the historical and geographical perspective into the study of electoral behaviour in Poland. We conduct a geographical description of electoral results in the 2023 parliamentary elections and determine how economic and cultural attributes related to different paths of development associated with the former partitions are reflected in the apparent spatial differences. We distinguish between direct and indirect influence. It is indirect when differences in economic development (e.g. changes in agrarian structures) or cultural transformations (e.g. secularisation) resulting from former policies are reflected in different electoral choices. The influence is direct if belonging to a former empire determines electoral behaviour regardless of the economic and cultural determinants of the vote. We found that the influence concerns primarily the former Russian and Austrian regions. The analysis is conducted at the county (powiat) level.</p> </abstract>ARTICLEtruehttps://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-00092024-07-23T00:00:00.000+00:00https://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-0013<abstract> <title style='display:none'>Abstract</title> <p>The paper deals with the political aspects of the perception of science. The relevance of the topic is underpinned, among other things, by the public policy significance of trust in science and the links between national science and national identity. The literature relates the perception of science to ideological positions on the one hand, and to partisan bias on the other. The research underlying the study investigated the relationship between respondents’ attitudes towards science and their political preferences using a representative questionnaire sample of 1000 Hungarian respondents. In Hungary, characterised by a high degree of partisan polarisation, we expected the influence of party preference rather than ideological position on the perception of science. A detailed exploration of attitudes yielded more nuanced results than assumed: those who identified themselves as right-wing were less pro-science in general, but the utilitarian perception of science was influenced by party preference in addition to education, i.e. voters of the current government expected more utility and economic returns from science. The perception of science was also influenced by the level of political information. The study also relates the impact of partisan bias to the reception of science policy measures of the Orbán governments.</p> </abstract>ARTICLEtruehttps://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-00132024-07-23T00:00:00.000+00:00https://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-0014ARTICLEtruehttps://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-00142024-07-23T00:00:00.000+00:00https://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-0011<abstract> <title style='display:none'>Abstract</title> <p>Research in Slovenia shows a low level of expression of patriotism among young people, which points to the fact that we are unable to express this value because we are not convinced of its quality and necessity. The belief that we will love and respect our homeland, which has also been a state since 1991, is based on completely false assumptions. Those who were emotionally present at the founding of our country naturally have a keener sense of patriotism, but the younger generations see the emergence of an independent and sovereign Slovenia as a historical fact, and therefore without any emotional overtones. Therefore, the results on the poor knowledge of the facts related to the establishment of an independent and sovereign Slovenian state, analysed in this article, are not really surprising.</p> </abstract>ARTICLEtruehttps://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-00112024-07-23T00:00:00.000+00:00https://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-0010<abstract> <title style='display:none'>Abstract</title> <p>The 2021 elections to the Chamber of Deputies of the Parliament of the Czech Republic brought a shift in populist political communication. While previous research has shown that the emphasis is on accentuating the theme of migration, the 2020 Senate elections have indicated that attention is shifting to patriotic themes. This was confirmed by the 2021 elections to the Chamber of Deputies, when nativism became a key element of populist political communication in the Czech Republic. The research included data from the hot phase of the campaign and two election days (8 and 10 October 2021) and focused on the populist political communication of the Freedom and Direct Democracy movement on Facebook.</p> </abstract>ARTICLEtruehttps://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-00102024-07-23T00:00:00.000+00:00https://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-0012<abstract> <title style='display:none'>Abstract</title> <p>International business research is usually focused on various aspects of foreign direct investment (FDI) by non<italic>-</italic>European emerging<italic>-</italic>market multinational enterprises (EMNEs) without attention to non<italic>-</italic>traditional factors pulling them into host countries. The objective of this paper is to examine the investments of EMNEs from two source countries, China and Russia, within the Visegrad Four (V4) economies. Based on interviews and a qualitative document analysis, it explores the main characteristics of their investments into the V4, including host<italic>-</italic>country determinants by focusing on macroeconomic, institutional and political factors. The paper finds that these factors do influence EMNEs’ investment practices, and that they correlate with the changing quality of political relations, but this influence needs to be assessed on a case<italic>-</italic>by<italic>-</italic>case basis.</p> </abstract>ARTICLEtruehttps://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-00122024-07-23T00:00:00.000+00:00https://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-0007<abstract> <title style='display:none'>Abstract</title> <p>Although Poland’s energy mix is becoming ‘greener’ each year, the coun‑ try’s energy production is still dominated by coal. This affects several important spheres: financial, socioeconomic and political. Therefore, the aim of the article is to explain Poland’s response to adaptational pressure stemming from the European Green Deal (EGD) by reconstructing discursive strategies related to the topics of decarbonisa‑ tion and green transformation. We perceive the EGD as a regulatory initiative, whose purpose is to incorporate formal rules and European norms in the domestic discourse and public policies. In order to induce such a change, the European Commission influ‑ ences the ‘utility calculations’ used by member states. However, at the same time, some member states need to deal with problems caused by misfits between their energy sector’s capabilities and expectations of the EGD. In Poland’s case, the significant fields of misfits refer to national emission targets, obligations resulting from the EU Emis‑ sion Trading System and the Fit for 55 reform package. Using discourse analysis, we have reconstructed a governmental narrative on the transformation based on elec‑ tion manifestos, selected ministerial documents and social media posts from the years 2019–2021. As the government aims to present itself as defenders of Polish national interests, climate‑related policies are seen as a threat. There is a clear focus on energy sovereignty and security issues, while challenges related to global warming are absent from the political communication. As the situation at the Belarussian border developed and the danger connected with Russian politics became clearer, the concept of being a defender acquired more meanings.</p> </abstract>ARTICLEtruehttps://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-00072024-05-09T00:00:00.000+00:00https://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-0005<abstract> <title style='display:none'>Abstract</title> <p>The successes of right -wing populist parties in Central and Eastern Europe, as well as a repeated distancing from the European Union, raise the question of whether there is such a thing as European citizenship at all. Citizenship is not understood as formal nationality, but as a sense of belonging. This ties in with the considerations of political cultural research. This article uses representative surveys to address the question: What about European Citizenship in Central and Eastern Europe? The results show that the feeling of belonging to the European Union in Eastern and Central Europe is better than its reputation and not lower than in Western Europe. However, there are differences in the recognition of plurality between the majority (not all) of Eastern European states compared to the majority of Western European states. In particular, the integration of Muslims is more strongly rejected. The same applies to the social acceptance of homosexuality. This partly explains the success of right -wing populists in Central and Eastern Europe and marks a certain cultural difference, which is primarily directed against a wet model of democracy that is considered too open to plurality. In short: Central and Eastern Europeans also see themselves as Europeans and EU members, but their ideas of a European democracy differ from Western ideas – especially in peripheral regions.</p> </abstract>ARTICLEtruehttps://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-00052024-05-09T00:00:00.000+00:00https://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-0006<abstract> <title style='display:none'>Abstract</title> <p>In the early 2020s we live in the transition period between two world systems, the Old World Order (OWO) and the New World Order (NWO), in a deep ‘polycrisis’. Therefore, the term transformation has recently appeared in official EU documents as well as in political science literature. The transition to the NWO has begun with this crisis management and it will produce a radical transformation of the entire global architecture in the 2020s. In its conceptual framework this paper focuses on the contrast between ‘de‑coupling’ and ‘de ‑risking’, as it has been explained very markedly in the recent speeches of the president of the European Commission, Ursula van der Leyen (EC 2023a), and the national security adviser, Jake Sullivan (The White House 2023). This contrast symbolises the US policy, concentrating more on cutting or reducing connectivity among the various policy fields, versus the EU policy turning them safe and interdependent. These approaches represent the US and EU attitude in the emerging New World Order, and primarily in their relationships to China.</p> </abstract>ARTICLEtruehttps://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-00062024-05-09T00:00:00.000+00:00https://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-0001ARTICLEtruehttps://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-00012024-05-09T00:00:00.000+00:00https://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-0004<abstract> <title style='display:none'>Abstract</title> <p>Peripheralisation is determined in socio ‑demographic, economic, political and identitarian factors. It is, many say, by definition, characterised by a willingness to migrate, in particular among the younger generations. European citizenship comes with the right to migrate – to relocate, to work and to be treated as equals in many respects to the local citizenry. In this research paper, I explicate the results of twenty interviews in six CEE countries with 7 ^th ‑graders who were asked what they thought of European citizenship. Those who knew what this is give widely divergent answers, but there are two dominant themes running through their perspectives: they do not feel great affection for the EU, and whilst willing to migrate, they do not appreciate the need to do so. Thus, they feel the EU does not live up to its promises to deliver equality for all Europeans. One explanation they give for this is that ‘the Iron Curtain did not dissolve very well’: the burden of history is acutely experienced.</p> </abstract>ARTICLEtruehttps://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-00042024-05-09T00:00:00.000+00:00https://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-0002<abstract> <title style='display:none'>Abstract</title> <p>The question of whether there is increasing social integration among EU citizens in Europe as a spill ‑over effect of the ongoing process of system integration, as expected by utilitarian perspectives on integration, has been discussed in many contri‑ butions so far. In particular, the question of how the economic strength and develop‑ ment of macro ‑units affects European social integration has gained new momentum after the 2004 enlargement, when economically weaker ECE countries became part of the EU. In this contribution, I focus on the impact of regional economic strength and development on European social integration. I analyse the relationship between the economic situation and development of NUTS‑1 regions and individual European identity using Eurobarometer data for the years 2004, 2010 and 2015. Using descrip‑ tive and multivariate quantitative approaches, I show that regional economic strength is weakly correlated with European identity, although not significant in multivariate models. However, citizens who believe that the EU is an economic advantage are more likely to identify as Europeans and are more prevalent in regions with higher economic growth. I conclude that convincing citizens of the economic benefits of EU membership could result in increased European social integration in the long run.</p> </abstract>ARTICLEtruehttps://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-00022024-05-09T00:00:00.000+00:00https://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-0003<abstract> <title style='display:none'>Abstract</title> <p>This paper examines how regional contextual factors influence Eurosceptic voting in Eastern Central and Western Europe. It employs a theoretical framework of multidimensional regional periphery and relative deprivation to explore how economic, spatial and demographic factors can generate collective feelings of deprivation among regional inhabitants. This relative deprivation is supposed to manifest as political discontent expressed at the EU level, either by attributing responsibility for regional peripherality to the EU or by blaming national institutions, potentially spilling over to the EU level. Based on an integrated dataset encompassing economic, spatial and demographic indicators as well as election data from the European election 2019 for 1169 NUTS 3 regions within the EU, the findings support the hypotheses. Poor economic performance in a region, relative to the national average and historical levels, increases Eurosceptic voting, and the impact of an ageing population is significant. Spatial infrastructure conditions have minimal direct but moderating effects: Eurosceptic parties benefit more from economic underperformance, if the infrastructure is also poorly developed. The paper further shows differences in cue -taking between Eastern Central Europe and Western Europe suggesting that citizens in Eastern Central Europe consider the EU more often as saviour than as creator of regional deprivation. The paper underscores the importance of regional contextual factors and infrastructural effects, and highlights the need to avoid one-size-fits-all explanations for Euroscepticism in Eastern Central and Western Europe.</p> </abstract>ARTICLEtruehttps://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-00032024-05-09T00:00:00.000+00:00https://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-0008<abstract> <title style='display:none'>Abstract</title> <p>The ‘liberal world order’ can be considered as an historic exception in the history of ‘realist anarchy’ of international relations. This exception is the result of many factors and it has been significantly influenced by the power of the United States. Thus, the agenda of the world order can be analysed in the context of American foreign policy. The place of Central Europe – and in the Visegrad countries – can be analysed in this frame. This approach elaborates the basis for further inquiries also of the Central European-American relations but here the goal is to understand the place of the Visegrad countries in the context of the American led liberal world order. The goal of this study is to theorise the world order, and to identify the role of the United States and the place of the Visegrad countries in it. Furthermore, the study tries to draw theoretic conclusions in the light of the ‘Biden doctrine’ – which is theoretically coherent with the liberal characteristic of the order – to the Visegrad-US relations.</p> </abstract>ARTICLEtruehttps://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2024-00082024-05-09T00:00:00.000+00:00https://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2023-0030<abstract> <title style='display:none'>Abstract</title> <p>In a democratic environment, political equality implies proportionality. Achieving this in an electoral setting can be complicated and unrealistic. The aim of this article is to investigate the logic, approach and method of creating constituencies in the elections for Slovak self-governing regions in 2022. We track the key attributes related to proportionality: the legislation, the actual creation of constituencies, the mechanisms used for the redistribution of mandates and the achievement of proportionality in individual constituencies within particular regions. Our results indicate considerable disproportionality within the constituencies of particular self-governing regions, which is mainly caused by the lack of effective legislation, the different approaches of authorities in creating constituencies and the absence of limits to the violation of electoral and thus political equality.</p> </abstract>ARTICLEtruehttps://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2023-00302023-12-18T00:00:00.000+00:00https://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2023-0031<abstract> <title style='display:none'>Abstract</title> <p>The article analyses the Russian neo-imperialist strategy in the gas trade in Southeast Europe (SEE) and the reactions of the EU and the region’s countries to this. The first argument in the article is that the existence of favourable political, social and economic preconditions is necessary for the application of a neo-imperialist strategy. The second argument is that an individual country’s geographical position determines Russian interest in building transit pipelines on its territory. Because the gas trade exists in the framework of the conflict-cooperation perpetuum between the interested parties, the third argument is that this provokes a reaction from the EU and the affected countries in the form of soft balancing. This approach is intended to curb Russia’s power, but not to completely break a gas trade with this country. As the EU has been making efforts to counteract Russian geo-economic power by promoting diversification of the gas supply and funding new gas infrastructure projects, Russian influence in the region has been decreasing in recent years.</p> </abstract>ARTICLEtruehttps://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2023-00312023-12-18T00:00:00.000+00:00https://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2023-0033<abstract> <title style='display:none'>Abstract</title> <p>The article demonstrates that the rules and practices of cabinet formation and investitures should be taken into account to better grasp the variety of semi-presidentialism in Europe. This is extremely important, since semi-presidentialism as a constitutional system of government (primarily according to a minimalist approach to the definition) is the most common form of inter-institutional and political relations in European countries. The former is most often understood as a constitutional design of inter-institutional relations with a president popularly elected for a fixed term, as well as with a cabinet headed by a prime minister who are collectively responsible to parliament. Thus, not only presidents and parliaments, but cabinets too play a crucial role in the constitutional and political practice of semi-presidentialism, since the latter are collectively responsible to parliaments (or simultaneously to presidents), but are characterised by distinctive parameters of formation. The assumption and hypothesis are that options of cabinet formation and inter-institutional relations in this regard can structure European semi-presidentialism, even without affecting the definition of this constitutional design, but probably depending on the roles and powers of presidents and parliaments in cabinet formation, as well as types of semi-presidentialism regarding the consideration of who can dismiss the cabinet. Based on comparison and systematisation of the cases of European semi-presidentialism, it is justified that cabinet formation (including within various types and consequences of parliamentary votes of investiture in cabinets, as well as their absence) is typically focused on a junction of relations between presidents and parliaments, and are likely to serve as a classification indicator of semi-presidentialism. This is important for constitutional engineering, since detailing the optionality of semi-presidentialism as a constitutional design and system of government, particularly regarding cabinet formation, should extend the horizons, as well as systematise the idea of the options and effects of various institutional designs (in addition to presidentialism and parliamentarism) and political regimes (including democratic, autocratic and hybrid).</p> </abstract>ARTICLEtruehttps://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2023-00332023-12-18T00:00:00.000+00:00https://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2023-0032<abstract> <title style='display:none'>Abstract</title> <p>This article analyses the use of powers by Czech presidents Václav Havel (1993–2003), Václav Klaus (2003–2013) and Miloš Zeman (2013–2023). The text is based on the concept of presidential activism, empirically examining mainly their interactions with governments and legislative vetoes. The results show that important incentives for presidential activism are non-cohesive coalition governments, minority governments, slim government majorities in parliament, the collapse of governments and a chaotic parliament. On the other hand, the internal cohesion of a government acts as a constraint on presidential activism. Popularly elected Zeman interpreted his powers much more widely in appointing and removing governments and ministers than Havel or Klaus, who were elected by parliament. By contrast, Zeman used his legislative powers less than his two predecessors, which was apparently influenced by their low success (with some exceptions) in this area. The president’s political proximity to the government was found to only sometimes limit his agility. Czech presidents have rarely been passive. A specific factor that affected activism, albeit only to a limited extent, was the poor health of Havel and Zeman at certain moments. To reduce systemic risks in the future, it would be useful to define more precisely the rules for appointing and dismissing a government and individual ministers.</p> </abstract>ARTICLEtruehttps://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2023-00322023-12-18T00:00:00.000+00:00https://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2023-0035<abstract> <title style='display:none'>Abstract</title> <p>The aim of this article is to propose the term ‘illiberal neo-intergovernmentalism’ (IN) to describe and explain Poland’s EU concept promoted by the government and some scholars after 2015. The methodology, based on decision, factor and comparative analyses, is of qualitative nature. The main idea is the assumption that Polish vision can be treated as a concept contributing to theory building. The research question relates to the positioning of the Polish concept against the background of other approaches: due to its significant distance from the functionalist trend, a connection with the intergovernmentalist theories is assumed. Two hypotheses are presented, and their verification shows that the main weakness of the Polish concept is the lack of paradigmatic rooting. The ‘Eurorealist’ illiberal neo-intergovernmentalism has not been created as a result of the evolutionary development of well-founded views typical of the intergovernmental trend and seems to disregard all previous theoretical achievements. Referring to realism alone, without defining the continuity of thought, is not enough to recognise the concept as a realist one. Therefore, this vision does not have explanatory values, while its normative character is the result of the adoption of Eurosceptic and ultraconservative ideology.</p> </abstract>ARTICLEtruehttps://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2023-00352023-12-18T00:00:00.000+00:00https://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2023-0034<abstract> <title style='display:none'>Abstract</title> <p>Although representing half of the world population, women remain largely excluded from political power and government structures. Various strategies have been introduced to increase women’s political representation, including electoral gender quotas. This paper explores the impact of electoral gender quotas on women’s quantitative participation in politics of Bosnia and Herzegovina, analysing quota impact in combination with other related factors, such as the quota design, implementation and broader political context. A diversity of techniques has been used to collect a combination of quantitative and qualitative data, including academic resources collection and analysis, desk research, statistical data analysis and online questionnaire. The paper argues that electoral gender quotas have generally had a positive impact on getting women elected in BiH, though their efficacy depends on their formulation and other aspects of electoral law. Still, quantitative representation of women is not sufficient to facilitate their agency in politics. Social attitudes also continue to affect the electoral success of women once they secure a spot on the candidate list. Therefore, quotas must be implemented within a broader democratic, accountable and gender-sensitive political context to deliver qualitative representation of women in politics. Finally, the paper offers concrete recommendations to promote women’s political participation in BiH.</p> </abstract>ARTICLEtruehttps://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/pce-2023-00342023-12-18T00:00:00.000+00:00en-us-1