Social Research- Volume 58 No. 4

NATIONALISM
Volume 58 No. 4 (Winter 1991)
Arien Mack, Editor

Table of Contents Notes on Contributors Ordering information

Editor's Introduction

This is the third special Central and Eastern Europe issue of Social Research. The first appeared in 1988, when authoritarian regimes were still in power and optimism about rapid change seemed delusional. The second appeared in 1990 during the flush of excitement following their precipitous collapse. The present issue comes at a time which is as different from those occasions as they are from each other. If the mood at the time of the first issue was static and grim and at the time of the second tumultuous and euphoric, the current mood is anxious and pessimistic. Although the manifestations differ from country to country, each country is struggling to find a way to endure the harsh consequences that seem inevitably to follow in the wake of the changes and the turn toward an idealized "market economy." One of the consequences which all these countries are now confronting, although to different degrees, is a clamorous and sometimes bloody bid for autonomy from long-repressed ethnic minorities and from groups of citizens from countries which earlier had been annexed or absorbed. Many of the papers describe this situation and attempt to explain it. The principal subject of the issue is nationalism in Central and Eastern Europe.

As the papers in this issue make clear, the current surge of nationalism, which not only shows no signs of abating but rather seems to be intensifying, seriously threatens the fragile attempts at democracy. Moreover, as some of the authors point out, even if nationalist demands are construed as legitimate bids for democratic self determination, and some surely are, their realization is likely to have unwanted consequences. If it is true, as several of the authors assert, that the hope for the future of democracy in Central and Eastern Europe lies in integration with the West, then nationalist demands are likely to be counterproductive since they come at a time when the West is moving away from strong nation-states toward common markets and relaxed borders. For this reason and others detailed in the papers in this issue, it is difficult not to join in the pessimism of the majority of the authors. The one hope is that we are wrong again. Since in 1988 no one predicted the quick downfall of the authoritarian regimes, perhaps again no one in 1991 is correctly predicting the course of future events.

This issue, like those that preceded it, could not have been done without the generous support of the Central and East European Publishing Project. Again I would like to thank them for their assistance. I would also like to acknowledge the Mellon Foundation's support of the New School's East and Central Europe Program under whose auspices I traveled to Poland and Romania during the period in which I was gathering material for this issue. Finally I would like to thank Elzbieta Matynia, the director of the Program, whose advice and efforts in behalf of this issue were invaluable. She was the source of many of the articles, the translator of the paper by Michnik, and was always graciously prepared to read papers and offer informed advice.