Central and Eastern Europe: Europeanization and Social Change (The Sciences Po Series in International Relations and Political Economy) - Hardcover

"Bafoil s book combines an empirically rich and theoretically valid analysis of the impact of the European Union on the Central and Eastern European states. A significant and stimulating contribution to understanding the process of Europeanization and social change in the new member states." - Wolfgang Wessels, Jean Monnet Chair, University of Cologne

"This ambitious attempt at analysis of today s Central and Eastern Europe covers a very broad area of issues concerning politics, economies and societies put in comparative perspective. The author, a well-known specialist on these problems, provides a theoretical framework which makes his arguments very convincing. The basis of François Bafoil s thinking is that history and local trajectories of development do matter. Only by taking them into account might we be able to understand how countries of Central and Eastern Europe confront modernization and "Europeanization". The interplay between past and present, between local and global, is fundamental here. This book is addressed to a broader audience willing to understand better today s enlarging Europe and to specialists who might learn how modern social sciences may help this understanding." - Andrzej Rychard, Professor of Sociology, Polish Academy of Sciences

The collapse of communism in 1989 paved the way for the reunification of the continent. For Eastern European countries, the reaffirmation of their political, economic and social independence took place simultaneously within a context marked by globabization and the rules of the European union. This book analyses the impact of the different dynamics of change since 1989 on public policy and on various economic and political sectors. The author's approach is elaborated in terms of strategies, conflicts, alliances and resources anchored in the communist period, sometimes even before, and revitalized by the new rules of the game. He studies the way in which national traditions of sovereignty within the new States combined with 21st century economic and political liberalism. By emphasizing the intensity and rapidity of the dynamics of change which have taken place since 1989, the author shows both the new States' ability to adopt global and European rules and their determination to subscribe fully to the Europe of today.