The Political Economy of Middle Class Politics and the Global Crisis in Eastern Europe: The case of Hungary and Romania (International Political Economy Series)

Contrary to dominant narratives which portray East European politics as a pendulum swing between democracy and authoritarianism, conventionally defined in terms of an ahistorical cultural geography of East vs. West, this book analyzes post-socialist transformation as part of the long downturn of the post-WWII global capitalist cycle. Based on an empirical comparison of two countries with significantly different political regimes throughout the period, Hungary and Romania, this study shows how different constellations of successive late socialist and post-socialist regimes have managed internal and external class relations throughout the same global crisis process, from very similar positions of semi-peripheral, post-socialist systemic integration. Within this context, the book follows the role of social movements since the 1970s, paying attention both to the level of differences between local integration regimes and to the level of structural similarities of global integration. The analysis maintains a special focus on movements' class composition and inter-class relationships and the specific position of middle-class politics in movements. Agnes Gagyi is a sociologist, working on East European politics and social movements in terms of the region's long-term integration into world-economic and geopolitical relations. She is Researcher at the Department of Sociology and Work Science, University of Gothenburg, where her current projects look at housing conflicts in Eastern Europe after 2008, and the social conditions of urban green infrastructures in face of the climate crisis. She is a founding member of the Working Group for Public Sociology "Helyzet" in Budapest Preface Contents 1 Social Movements in Eastern Europe: Problems of Understanding Non-Western Contexts A Time–Space Bias in Dominant Understandings of Social Movements The Return of the Question of Global Political Economy After 2008 The “Crisis of Democratic Capitalism” Narrative “Civil Society” and “Democratic Capitalism”: Two Dominant Concepts in Understanding East European Movements “Civil Society” and the “Rectifying Revolution” “Civil Society” and “Democratic Capitalism” in Post-2008 East European Mobilizations Understanding Social Movements as Part of Global Capitalism Labor Struggles in Global Product Cycles Antisystemic Movements in a World-Systems Perspective What is Crisis in a Global Sense? Conclusion References 2 External Integration as Internal Force: Middle Class Politics and the “Politics of Backwardness” in Eastern Europe Dependent Development and the “Politics of Backwardness” Middle Classes and Democracy Outside the Western Core Middle Class Politics in Eastern Europe The Middle Class as Project: An Ideological Notion of Systemic Integration The Notion of the Middle Class in Postwar Developmental Debates Debates on the Middle Class in the Current Crisis Post-2008 Left Critique of the Middle Class Idea The Political Consciousness of a Knowledge Class Conclusion References 3 Crisis, Regime Change, Movement: Comparing Mobilization Cycles in Hungarian and Romanian Constellations of Global Integration After 1973 and 2008 Socialism, Postsocialism, European Integration: Situated Notions of Systemic Integration Late Socialist Regimes of Global Integration—Hungary and Romania After 1973 The Hungarian Environmental Movement and Romanian Workers’ Mobilizations in Late Socialism From Postsocialist Development to Middle Class Mobilizations After 2008 Conclusion References 4 Long-Term Middle Class Politics and Contemporary New Left Initiatives in Hungary and Romania A New Moment of Intellectual–Political Thought New Left Positions in Post-2008 Mobilization Waves Left Politics as the Experience of the Self Building Substance Political Substance in Party Politics New Expertise Material Self-Organization Conclusion References Conclusion Index