Ondřej Císař

Externally sponsored contention: the channelling of environmental movement organisations in the Czech Republic after the fall of Communism

From an examination of the impact of international civil-society-building programmes on Czech environmental movement organisations (EMOs), it is clear that international influence left a deep imprint on eastern European civil societies. It did not however curb opportunities for environmental political activism, as supposed by an important part of the traditional scholarship, but instead helped create a particular form of activism based on advocacy organisations capable of staging political protest when necessary. While international donors have clearly channelled activist organisations towards professionalisation, this process has not necessarily been accompanied by de-politicisation and de-radicalisation of activist organisations. In fact, drawing on quantitative as well as qualitative data, employing protest event analysis and the small-N comparative method, it appears that activists dependent on foreign funding have often displayed a more assertive stance in political conflicts than their domestically embedded counterparts.

Transnational activism of social movement organizations: The effect of European Union funding on local groups in the Czech Republic

Focusing on social movement organizations (SMOs) in the Czech Republic, this article explores the level of transnational activism of these actors. Although knowledge exists on domestic interest groups’ choice of European Union (EU) venues for lobbying, the influence of EU funding on protest and public campaigning by actors such as SMOs remains under-studied. We show what the level of transnationalization of SMOs is, what types of transnational strategies SMOs employ, and what explains these choices. Specifically, the article examines the effect the EU has had on Czech SMOs. We are interested in whether EU funding contributed to their de-radicalization and co-optation by the political elite, or rather empowered them to engage in transnational protest. The results of our analysis support the empowerment hypothesis.

Polanyi, political-economic opportunity structure and protest: capitalism and contention in the post-communist Czech Republic

Abstract Drawing on Polanyian logic, we focus on the gradual institutionalization of capitalism in the Czech Republic and the protests accompanying this process. We hypothesize that different configurations of political economy, or what we term the political economic opportunity structure, trigger different popular responses and are a potent indicator of expected protest forms. To analyze this we chose to carry out a country case study, in which many variables commonly associated with political mobilization, in particular the state’s institutional structure, are kept constant. By contrast, models of political economy vary over time, as a function of the extent and form of the international integration of capitalism. We focus on three configurations of political economy – national, globalized and austerity models – and for each one, identify the characteristics and mechanisms, i.e. concrete policy measures, that shape particular protest patterns in the context of our case study. In theoretical terms, this paper seeks to present one possible response, in this case a Polanyian response, to recent complaints about the disappearance of capitalism from social movement studies. At the same time, given the focus of this special issue, our goal is to analyze the current wave of anti-austerity protest that emerged in relation to what has been labelled the Great Recession.

Promoting competition or cooperation? The impact of EU funding on Czech advocacy organizations

What impact does European Union (EU) funding of advocacy organizations have? To address this question our article turns to the post-communist Czech Republic, an ideal laboratory for studying externally dependent non-governmental organizations. Employing social network analysis, the main objective of this article is to analyse the effect of EU funding on the cooperation networks of Czech advocacy organizations. Our source of data is a survey of these organizations. We aim to figure out whether there is an association between the dependency of advocacy organizations on EU resources, and their cooperation with other organizations. Contrary to the prevailing interpretation based on the competition argument, our hypothesis is that the greater the dependency on EU funding, the greater the cooperation capacity on the part of advocacy organizations.

The diffusion of public interest mobilisation: a historical sociology perspective on advocates without members in the post-communist Czech Republic

The paper proposes an explanation for the boom in advocacy organisations in the Czech Republic after the collapse of the Communist regime in 1989. There has been a major increase in the number of professional advocacy organisations, accompanied by an influx of “post-materialist” issues. In the first half of 1990s, American and European state and non-state actors promoted these issues. Since the end of 1990s, European Union funds have taken over as the most important source of funding. Foreign funding has thus created conditions conducive to the emergence and development of advocacy-based activism in the Czech Republic. Moreover, advocacy organisations are presented in the paper as the locus of a new type of politically oriented activism, which is no longer based on mobilisation, but rather on transactions.

Le militantisme rom et pro-rom en République tchèque Évolution des cadres d’interprétation depuis 1989 1

Depuis 1989, la question rom a suscite d’abondants debats en Republique tcheque et donne lieu a de nombreuses publications. Fonde sur un depouillement systematique des periodiques roms et pro-roms pour les annees 1992, 1997, 2002 et 2007, cette recherche analyse l’evolution des cadres d’interpretation du mouvement rom et pro-rom durant cette periode. S’appuyant sur une analyse en termes d’interpretation des cadres (frame analysis), il montre comment les cadres de diagnostic, de pronostic et de motivation se sont transformes au cours des quatre annees etudiees en lien avec les changements de la politique d’integration de l’Etat, le degre de violence de l’extreme droite, les debats publics en cours et les possibilites de financer le mouvement. La recherche montre la predominance des conceptions civiles et politiques de la question rom en 1992 puis leur effacement progressif au profit d’une vision socio-economique des revendications.

LES ORGANISATIONS DE LA SOCIÉTÉ CIVILE ET L'ENGAGEMENT CIVIQUE EN RÉPUBLIQUE TCHÈQUE APRÈS 1989

Cet article propose un panorama de l’evolution de la mobilisation politique en Republique tcheque depuis la chute du communisme. L’approche retenue est bidimensionnelle puisque cette mobilisation releve a la fois du militantisme organise et de l’engagement individuel des citoyens, ce qu’illustrent des donnees empiriques tirees tant d’enquetes comparatives internationales que d’entretiens et d’etudes realises par les auteurs. Depuis 1989, le militantisme s’est developpe et ses differentes formes ont progressivement evolue. Afin de mieux saisir l’engagement politique et civique de la population tcheque, les formes d’action politique et sociale sont examinees a partir de donnees agregees puis a l’echelle individuelle. Enfin, la Republique tcheque est comparee a trois democraties plus anciennes : la Grande-Bretagne, la Suede et la France.