GEOG 420 Lecture Notes - Lecture 13: French Revolution, Planned Economy, Monument To Soviet Tank Crews
5 Jun 2018
School
Department
Course
Professor
20. Monday March 12th: Post-Communist Memory Politics
Announcements: Essays
- Research discussion on paper #2 tomorrow
- Essay #1 will be returned shortly, hopefully this evening
- Re-weighting of essays:
- Essay #1= 10% and essay #2= 30% (depends on which mark was better for you)
I. Post Communism
A. Locating Post-Communism
- Subregions: east/central europe
- Poland, hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Eastern Germany,
- Balkans:
- Romania, bulgaria, albania,
- Daughter states of Yugoslavia
- Serbia, Montenegro, Bosnia, Croatia, Slovenia, Macedonia,
- States that were formerly part of SU:
- Russia: constitutes majority of former soviet territory and population
- Baltic states: estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania
- Independent states between world wars but then incorporated into soviet
union
- European/USSR/East Europe
- Belarus, Ukraine, Moldova
- Caucasus:
- Azerbaijan, Georgia, Armenia
- Central Asia/The Stands
- Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan
B. Defining Post-Communism (concrete blonde)
- When did communism end?
- Most people would say fall of Berlin wall
- Symbolized divide between east and west, free market and communism, Soviet
centralized politics and western liberal democracies
- When wall came down (1989),
- Berlin Wall East Side (1990)
- Possible to express political opinions openly since WWII
- Gorby you’re magic (graffiti
Cold War remnants
- Checkpoint charlie, crossing between american and soviet sector, multilingual
warnings
- Rapid change, communist regimes fell very quickly but a process that went over a year
- End of 1989: end of communist regimes in east/central europe, and fall in other areas
- For about 2 years, east and central europe were no longer communist but SU still
existed but broke up in 1991
The USSR Breaks Up (1991)
- Boris Yeltsin, president of russian federation
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
- Attempt a coup by kidnapping Gorbachev and putting him under house arrest and
announced they were in charge of the SU
- Yeltsin and other leaders rallied to the defence of the Gorbachev government
- His photo of them is all of them rallying on top of a tank in front of the Russian
whitehouse
- Defending Gorbachev government as legitimate government of Soviet Union
- Yeltsin gets credit for stopping the coup
- This meant that the Soviet government and Gorbachev really lost power,
eventually broke up
- Russian federation → state of Russia
- 1991: statue of head of KGB police is removed from the front of KGB headquarters
What is post-communism?
- Absence of something rather than the presence, something that happened after
communism
- Doesn’t describe what took its place (i.e. democracy)
- Holmes: the rejection of the communist system rather than a clear cut adoption of an
alternative system
- “Double rejective revolution” of 1989 and 1991
- 1. Rejection of external domination (by USSR, Serbia)
- 2. Rejection of communism as a system of power
- Legacy: 1 party rule, not a market economy, but centralized economy that is
directed from above
- All post-communist states had 3 kinds fo transitions
Triple Transition from Post-Communism
- Political: from communist ruler to ?
- Assumption at time that it would be transitioning to multi-party democracy
- Economic: from a command economy (top-down) to ?
- Assumption at time that it would be transitioning to market based economy or
capitalist system
- National: from “communist bloc” to ?
- assumptions:
- To a state that was independent
- New borders
- Figuring out their national and personal identity and relationship to others
- Many states had to figure out what their relationship was to russia,
- Also to the western world and central europe
Conventional Wisdom
- Expectation to Transition to liberal democrat market based societies
- Kukiyomo: history has ended, with the trying of the west. Liberal democratic based
values had triumphed and there will be no future historical change
C. Critical Junctures
- Existing political, economic, and social arrangements into question
- Short, intense period
- “Rules of the game” are subject to change
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
Essay #1 will be returned shortly, hopefully this evening. Essay #1= 10% and essay #2= 30% (depends on which mark was better for you: post communism, locating post-communism. Poland, hungary, czech republic, slovakia, eastern germany, States that were formerly part of su: Russia: constitutes majority of former soviet territory and population. Independent states between world wars but then incorporated into soviet union. Turkmenistan, kazakhstan, uzbekistan, kyrgyzstan, tajikistan: defining post-communism (concrete blonde) Most people would say fall of berlin wall. Symbolized divide between east and west, free market and communism, soviet centralized politics and western liberal democracies. Possible to express political opinions openly since wwii. Checkpoint charlie, crossing between american and soviet sector, multilingual warnings. Rapid change, communist regimes fell very quickly but a process that went over a year. End of 1989: end of communist regimes in east/central europe, and fall in other areas.
