Jacques Rupnik

Eastern Europe: The International Context

The democratic revolutions of 1989 in Central and Eastern Europe have been described as the culmination of the “third wave” of global democratization that began in Spain and Portugal in the mid-1970s. It is indeed tempting to see the disintegration of the Soviet empire as part of a worldwide crumbling of dictatorships. This view certainly influenced how the democratic transition in East-Central Europe has been perceived in the West (as the “end of history”) as well as by some of its protagonists. Ten years later, however, despite extensive Western efforts at democracy promotion, the democratic tide has somewhat retreated, leaving a picture of successes in Central Europe (as well as in Latin America and parts of Asia) offset by setbacks in the former Soviet Union and the Balkans (but also in China and most of Africa). In no other region of the world has the impact of international factors on democratization been as apparent as in Central and Eastern Europe. The revolutions of 1989 were characterized by two important features: First, they were made possible by the lifting of the Soviet imperial constraint. The Soviet bloc imploded, rapidly and peacefully. The falling dominoes of Soviet hegemony in East-Central Europe seemed to complete the triumph of the periphery over the center of the empire. To be sure, the roots of the ideological, political, and economic decay of Jacques Rupnik, senior fellow and professor at the Fondation Nationale des Sciences Politiques in Paris, is author of The Other Europe: The Rise and Fall of Communism in East-Central Europe (1989) and Le Déchirement des nations (1995) and editor of International Perspectives on the Balkans (forthcoming). He was executive director of the International Commission on the Balkans, whose report, Unfinished Peace, was published by the Carnegie Endowment in 1996. An earlier version of this essay was presented at a June 1998 conference in Warsaw cosponsored by the International Forum for Democratic Studies, the Stefan Batory Foundation (Warsaw), and the Institute for National Policy Research (Taipei).

Introduction: The State of Democracy 20 Years on Domestic and External Factors

The countries of East-Central Europe (ECE) embarked on a democratic transition in 1989 were proclaimed consolidated democracies when they joined the European Union (EU) in 2004. Today most of the new democracies are experiencing “democratic fatigue” and some seem vulnerable to an authoritarian turn. The EU, seen as the guarantor of the post-1989 democratic changes, is experiencing an unprecedented economic, financial, and democratic crisis with the combined challenges of technocracy and populism. The article explores the different approaches to the study of democracies in ECE, their specific features and vulnerabilities, and tries to provide an interpretation of the premature crisis of democracy in ECE in a broader transeuropean context.

The rise and fall of anti-Americanism : a century of French perception

Introduction: France bewitched by America, Denis Lacorne and Jacques Rupnik. Part 1 The origins of anti-Americanism - history and hysteria: the pathology of anti-Americanism, Theodore Zeldin from Baudelaire to Duhamel - an unlikely antipathy, Pascal Ory anti-Americanism in the years of Collaboration and resistance, Robert O.Paxton the Cold War, Michel Winock. Part 2 The behaviour of the intelligentsia and their influence on public opinion: images of the United States in Public Opinion, Jacques Rupnik and Muriel Humbertjean the French intelligentsia rediscovers America, Diana Pinto anti-Americanism and the elite, Ezra N.Suleiman Sartre, Beauvoir, Aron - an ambigious affair, Marie-Christine Granjon. Part 3 Economy - dream of modernity: managerially yours, Richard Armand modernists and protectionists - the 1970s, Denis Lacorne the limits of the American model, Christian Stoffaes. Part 4 Rhetoric and reality of anti-Americanism in foreign politics: French anti-Americanism under the Fourth Republic and the Gaullist Solution, Michael M.Harrison unruly France, Alfred Grosser. Part 5 The US constitution - model or mimic?: the lawyers verdict, Marie-France Toinet. Part 6 Why anti-Americanism is not always quite what it seems, nor Americano-philes quite what they say: United States - model or bete noire?, Guy Sorman does anti-Americanism exist?, Marie-France Toinet by way of conclusion, Andre Kaspi.

Surging Illiberalism in the East

Abstract:Populist and nativist political parties have emerged throughout Europe, yet only in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) have these illiberal democratic parties gained power. This difference in political fortune can be traced to the countries’ divergent conceptions of nationhood. For CEE countries, nationhood is rooted in ethnic and cultural homogeneity; for Western European countries, it is defined by universalism and diversity. As market globalization and unchecked migration have spurred fear among CEE voters of a nationhood under threat, illiberal democratic leaders have gained power by pledging to defend it. While the return of CEE illiberalism has revived talk of an East-West split in Europe, the crisis of liberalism and rise of populist nationalism are assuredly pan-European phenomena. Can the EU, the last elitist project in the age of populism, overcome its internal divisions and contain the illiberal drift?

VOISINAGES: Démocratisation et géopolitique

L’Europe est aujourd’hui confrontée à une double crise: la crise de confiance interne dans son projet et la crise externe marquée par la déstabilisation simultanée des ses voisinages à l’Est comme au Sud. Répondre à la seconde dépendra de la capacité à surmonter la première. Dix ans après son grand l’élargissement à l’Est, l’Union européenne se trouve dans une situation paradoxale: une demande d’Europe dans sa périphérie orientale, de Kiev à Belgrade, au moment où le doute s’installe au centre même de l’Union. Les élections européennes du 25 mai 2014, marquées par le désenchantement voire la défiance envers l’Union européenne, contrastaient le même jour avec l’élection présidentielle à Kiev présentée et vécue comme un choix européen. L’Europe est décriée comme l’une des causes de la crise économique et identitaire à l’Ouest du continent, et perçue comme une réponse possible à la crise politique, économique et identitaire à l’Est. La crise de la zone euro a fait planer

Régression postdémocratique en Hongrie

La Hongrie, naguere consideree comme le « bon eleve » des democraties postsovietiques, laisse aujourd’hui de nombreux observateurs perplexes et provoque l’inquietude. Comment le Fidesz de Viktor Orban est-il devenu un parti souverainiste et nationaliste ? L’evolution de la Hongrie est-elle un cas isole, ou un symptome de la crise de la democratie en Europe ?

In Praise of Václav Havel

A tribute to Václav Havel, Czech playwright and former dissident, who became not only president but the symbol of the “velvet revolutions.”

L'autre 1968 vu aujourd'hui de Prague et de Varsovie

Pour la premiere fois dans les anciens pays de l’Est, 68 constitue un veritable objet de commemoration officielle. C’est une occasion pour ces pays de revenir sur l’interpretation de l’echec des tentatives de sortie du communisme a l’epoque mais aussi des conditions de la transition de 1989 qui s’est faite par un alignement sur l’Ouest plus que par une reinvention democratique.