Interpreting East and Central Europe
Not offered in Semester 2, 1997
Marko Pavlyshyn
8 or 12 points
* 2 hours per week
* Second semester
*
Clayton
Objectives Students who complete this subject should have a knowledge of the demise of the Soviet system in the former USSR and the countries of East and Central Europe, and of the post-communist order that has replaced it. They should have developed an understanding of the economic, political and cultural dimensions of this transformation. They should have gained familiarity with the background and perspectives of the move to economic pluralism in these countries. They should have identified the main intellectual and cultural issues that confront ex-socialist societies, including the issue of national identity.
Synopsis This team-taught subject offers an interdisciplinary approach to understanding the changes that have occurred in the USSR and its successor states after 1985, as well as in East and Central Europe, especially the reform experiment of Mikhail Gorbachev, the fall of most of Europe's socialist regimes in 1989 and the disintegration of the USSR in 1991-92. There are three main themes: (1) contemporary political issues in Eastern and Central Europe and the states of the former USSR; (2) the move to economic pluralism; and (3) the cultural consequences of the collapse of centralised Soviet power. Substantial reading will be required, and a full reading list will be available at the start of the semester.
Assessment (8 points) Major essay (3000 words): 50%
* Two class
papers (1500 words each): 25% each
Assessment (12 points) Major essay (6000 words): 60%
* Two class
papers (1500 words each ): 20% each
Preliminary reading
Goldfail J Beyond glasnost: The post-totalitarian mind 1991
Hughes H Sophisticated rebels: The political culture of European dissent, 1968-87 1988
Simons T Eastern Europe in the postwar world 1991
Recommended texts
Burbank J and Rosenberg W (eds) Perestroika and Soviet culture (Michigan Quarterly Review 28: 4, 1989)
Gorbachev M Perestroika 1987
Havel V Living in truth 1986
Holmes L Politics in the communist world 1986
Konrad G and Szeleny I Intellectuals on the road to class power Harvester, 1979
Marangos J Europe in transition Monash U, 1992
Pavlyshyn M (ed.) Glasnost in context 1990
Tertz A `The trial begins' and `On socialist realism' 1982
Ward I The Soviet struggle for socialism 1992
White S After Gorbachev 4th edn, CUP, 1993
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