Geography and transition: Reconceptualizing systemic change in the former Soviet Union

Slavic Review

Volumn 58, Issue 4, 1999, Pages 824-840

  Lynn, Nicholas J ^a  

^a NONE

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 0242616754     PISSN: 00376779     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.2307/2697200     Document Type: Article

References (138)

1. Anne Gilbert, "The New Regional Geography in English and French-Speaking Countries," Progress in Human Geography 12, no. 2 (June 1988): 208.
2. The emphasis on "new" is to distinguish it from "traditional" regional geography, which is often caricatured as being isolationist, descriptive, conservative, and theoretically bankrupt. For a more accurate description of the "old," see John Patterson, "Writing Regional Geography," Progress in Human Geography 6, no. 1 (March 1974): 1-26.
3. On the "new" see Paul Cooke, "The Contested Terrain of Locality Studies," Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie 80, no. 1 (1989): 14-29;
4. Hans Holmen, "What's New and What's Regional in the 'New Regional Geography'?" Geografiska Annaler 77, no. 1 (1995): 47-64;
5. Andrew Jonas, "A New Regional Geography of Localities?" Area 20, no. 2 (1988): 101-10;
6. Doreen Massey, "Questions of Locality," Geography 78, no. 2 (April 1993): 142-49;
7. Alex B. Murphy, "Regions as Social Constructs: The Gap Between Theory and Practice," Progress in Human Geography 15, no. 1 (March 1991): 22-35;
8. Anssi Paasi, "The Institutionalization of Regions: A Theoretical Framework for Understanding the Emergence of Regions and the Constitution of Regional Identity," Fennia, no. 1 (1986): 105-46;
9. Allan Pred, Place, Practice and Structure: Social and Spatial Transformation in Southern Sweden 1750-1850 (Totowa, N.J., 1986);
10. Marie Pudup, "Arguments within Regional Geography," Progress in Human Geography 12, no. 3 (September 1988): 369-90;
11. Andrew Sayer, "The 'New' Regional Geography and Problems of Narrative," Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 7, no. 3 (1989): 253-76;
12. Nigel J. Thrift, "For a New Regional Geography 1," Progress in Human Geography 14, no. 2 (June 1990): 272-79,
13. "For a New Regional Geography 2," Progress in Human Geography 15, no. 4 (December 1991): 456-65,
14. "For a New Regional Geography 3," Progress in Human Geography 17, no. 1 (March 1993): 92-100.
15. Michael Bradshaw also made an excellent case for widening the scope of new regional geography so that it paid attention to events in the east, specifically the FSU, as well as the developed west, see Michael J. Bradshaw, "New Regional Geography, Foreign Area Studies and Perestroika," Area 22, no. 4 (1990): 315-22.
16. Pudup, "Arguments within Regional Geography," 369.
17. Allan Pred uses the term becoming in order to draw attention to the contingency of regional configurations. See Pred, Place, Practice and Structure.
18. Gilbert, "New Regional Geography," 217.
19. Good examples of dynamic readings of regional history include: Doreen Massey, Spatial Divisions of Labour: Social Structures and the Geography of Production (London, 1984);
20. David Harvey, Consciousness and the Urban Experience: Studies in the History and Theory of Capitalist Urbanization (Baltimore, 1985);
21. Paasi, "Institutionalization of Regions";
22. and Pred, Place, Practice and Structure.
23. For more focused forms of regional synthesis, see Nigel J. Thrift, "On the Determination of Social Action in Space and Time," Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 1, no. 1 (1983): 23-57.
24. Sayer, "'New' Regional Geography and Problems of Narrative." Particularly characteristic of the political economy approach is the work of the so-called Locality Studies of the 1980s in the United Kingdom.
25. See Paul Cooke, ed., Localities (London, 1989).
26. See Frederic J. Fleron, Jr., and Erik P. Hoffmann, eds., Post-Communist Studies and Political Science: Methodology and Empirical Theory in Sovietology (Boulder, Colo., 1993).
27. Fleron and Hoffmann, eds., Post-Communist Studies and Political Science;
28. cf. Aryeh Unger, "On the Meaning of Sovietology," Communist and Postcommunist Studies 31, no. 1 (March 1998): 17-27;
29. Stephen E. Hanson, "Social Theory and the Post-Soviet Crisis: Sovietology and the Problem of Regime Identity," Communist and Postcommunist Studies 28, no. 1 (March 1995): 119-30;
30. Susan G. Solomon, ed., Beyond Sovietology: Essays in Politics and History (London, 1993);
31. Roger Marwick, "A Discipline in Transition? From Sovietology to Transitology," Journal of of Communist Studies and Transition Politics 12, no. 3 (1996): 255-76.
32. Philippe C. Schmitter with Terry Lynn Karl, "The Conceptual Travels of Transitologists and Consolidologists: How Far to the East Should They Attempt to Go?" Slavic Review 53, no. 1 (Spring 1994): 173-85.
33. Philippe C. Schmitter with Terry Lynn Karl, "The Conceptual Travels of Transitologists and Consolidologists: How Far to the East Should They Attempt to Go?" Slavic Review 53, no. 1 1994): 173-85. Ibid.;
34. see also Philippe C. Schmitter, "Transitology: The Science or the Art of Democratization?" in Joseph S. Tulchin and Bernice Romero, eds., The Consolidation of Democracy in Latin America (Boulder, Colo., 1995), 11-44.
35. Terry Lynn Karl and Philippe C. Schmitter, "Modes of Transition in Latin America, Southern and Eastern Europe," International Social Science Journal, no. 43 (May 1991): 269-84.
36. Cf. Dietrich Rueschemeyer, Evelyne Huber Stephens, and John D. Stephens, Capitalist Development and Democracy (Chicago, 1992);
37. Barrington Moore, Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy: Lord and Peasant in the Making of the Modern World (Boston, 1966).
38. See also David Held, Models of Democracy (Cambridge, Eng., 1996);
39. Robert Dahl, A Preface to Economic Democracy, 2d ed. (Stanford, 1985);
40. David Potter et al., Democralizalion (Cambridge, Eng., 1997).
41. Although a number of studies of the first kind have been produced by regional specialists - see, for example, Karen Dawisha and Bruce Parrott, eds., Democratic Changes and Authoritarian Reactions in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and Moldova (Cambridge, Eng., 1997) - transitologists have focused on the second type of study -
42. see, for example, Guillermo O'Donnell, Philippe C. Schmitter, and Laurence Whitehead, eds., Transitions from Authoritarian Rule: Comparative Perspectives (Baltimore, 1986) -
43. and there have been relatively few attempts at the latter, although one of the exceptions is the valuable contribution of Juan Linz and Alfred Stepan, Problems of Democratic Transition and Consolidation: Southern Europe, South America, and Post-Communist Europe (Baltimore, 1996).
44. This issue is also commonly recognized by transitologists themselves; see Schmitter, "Transitology."
45. These terms come from Potter et al., Democratization.
46. See also Arend Lijphart, "Comparative Politics and the Comparative Method," American Political Science Review 65, no. 3 (September 1971): 682-93.
47. Samuel P. Huntington, The Third Wave: Democratization in the Late Twentieth Century (Norman, 1991).
48. On Huntington, see Gearóid Ó Tuathail, Critical Geopolitics (London, 1996), 240-49.
49. See the debate between Schmitter and Karl, "Conceptual Travels of Transitologists and Consolidologists,"
50. and Terry Lynn Karl and Philippe C. Schmitter, "From an Iron Curtain to a Paper Curtain: Grounding Transitologists or Students of Postcommunism?" Slavic Review 54, no. 4 (Winter 1995): 965-78;
51. Valerie Bunce, "Should Transitologists Be Grounded?" Slavic Review 54, no. 1 (Spring 1995): 111-27;
52. and Valerie Bunce, "Paper Curtains and Paper Tigers," Slavic Review 54, no. 4 (Winter 1995): 979-87.
53. Leslie Holmes, Post-Communism: An Introduction (Durham, N.C., 1997), 19 (emphasis in the original).
54. See Leslie Holmes, The End of Communist Power Anti-Corruption Campaigns and Legitimation Crisis (New York, 1993).
55. See Ernest Gellner, "Nationalism in the Vacuum," in Alexander J. Motyl, ed., Thinking Theoretically about Soviet Nationalities: History and Comparison in the Study of the USSR (New York, 1992), 243-45.
56. Mary McAuley, Russia's Politics of Uncertainty (Cambridge, Eng., 1997);
57. cf. James Alexander, "Uncertain Conditions in the Russian Transition: The Popular Drive towards Stability in a 'Stateless' Environment," Europe-Asia Studies 50, no. 3 (1998): 415-43;
58. Archie Brown, "The Russian Transition in Comparative and Russian Perspective," Social Research 63, no. 2 (Summer 1996): 403-15.
59. See Juan Antonio Morales and Gary McMahon, Economic Policy and the Transition to Democracy: The Latin American Experience (New York, 1996).
60. A fact recognized by both sides of the debate between Schmitter and Karl and Bunce.
61. Doreen Massey, "A Global Sense of Place," Marxism Today, June 1991, 26.
62. See Thrift, "For a New Regional Geography 1."
63. Nigel Thrift, "Taking Aim at the Heart of the Region," in Derek Gregory, Ron Martin, and Graham Smith, eds., Human Geography: Society, Space and Social Science (Minneapolis, 1994), 226.
64. For more detail, see Linz and Stepan, Problems of Democratic Transition and Consolidation;
65. Dawisha and Parrott, eds., Democratic Changes and Authoritarian Reactions in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and Moldova;
66. Grzegorz Ekiert, "Democratization Processes in East Central Europe: A Theoretical Reconsideration," British Journal of Political Science 21, no. 3 (July 1991): 285-313;
67. and also Joseph Rothschild, Return to Diversity: A Political History of East Central Europe since World War II, 2d ed. (New York, 1993).
68. See McAuley, Russia's Politics of Uncertainty.
69. Graham Smith, "Federation, Defederation and Refederation: From the Soviet Union to Russian Statehood," in Graham Smith, ed., Federalism: The Multiethnic Challenge (London, 1995), 157-79.
70. See also Nicholas J. Lynn, "The Republics of the Russian Federation," in Michael J. Bradshaw, ed., Geography and Transition in the Post-Soviet Republics (Chichester, Eng., 1997), 59-72.
71. See Beth Mitchneck, "An Assessment of the Growing Local Economic Development Function of Local Authorities in Russia," Economic Geography 71, no. 2 (April 1995): 150-70,
72. and Mitchneck, "The Emergence of Local Government in Russia," in Bradshaw, ed., Geography and Transition in the Post-Soviet Republics, 89-108;
73. and also Theodore H. Friedgut and Jeffrey W. Hahn, Local Power and Post-Soviet Politics (Armonk, N.Y., 1994).
74. See Rueschemeyer, Stephens, and Stephens, Capitalist Development and Democracy;
75. and also Dietrich Rueschemeyer, Marilyn Rueschemeyer, and Björn Wittrock, eds., Participation and Democracy East and West: Comparisons and Interpretations (Armonk, N.Y., 1998).
76. See Dahl, A Preface to Economic Democracy;
77. and also Moore, Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy.
78. For example, see David Lipton and Jeffrey D. Sachs, Creating a Market Economy in Eastern Europe: The Case for Poland (Washington, D.C., 1990),
79. and Lipton and Sachs, Prospects for Russia's Economic Reforms (Washington, D.C., 1992);
80. Anders Åslund, Post-Communist Economic Revolutions: How Big a Bang? (Washington, D.C., 1992).
81. For example, see Marshall I. Goldman, Lost Opportunity: Why Economic Reforms in Russia Have Not Worked (New York, 1994).
82. See John E. Elliott, "Contending Perspectives on Postcommunist Transition: Strategies for Economic Transformation," International Journal of Social Economics 22, no. 9-11 (1995): 28-42;
83. and also Marie Lavigne, "Russia and Eastern Europe: Is Transition Over?" Journal of Comparative Economics 23, no. 1 (August 1996): 92-102.
84. It is important not to underplay the significant role of domestic policy formation, since it is clear that Russian reformers, for example, also developed neoliberal models themselves. However, Peter Koenig in "Is Aid to Russia Academic," The Independent on Sunday, 5 October 1997, describes how 4.2 billion pounds has been spent on western consultants - often "cash starved" academics - for technical assistance.
85. See John Pickles and Adrian Smith, Theorising Transition: The Political Economy of Post-Communist Transformations (London, 1998).
86. See Elliott, "Contending Perspectives on Postcommunist Transition."
87. See David Stark, "The Great Transformation? Social Change in Eastern Europe," Contemporary Sociology 21, no. 3 (1992): 299-305;
88. cf. Anders Åslund, How Russia Became a Market Economy (Washington, D.C., 1995).
89. Holmes, Post-Communism.
90. See also McAuley, Russia's Politics of Uncertainty;
91. and Richard Sakwa, Russian Politics and Society (London, 1993).
92. Aslund, Post-Communist Economic Revolutions;
93. Anders Aslund and Richard Layard, Changing the Economic System in Russia (New York, 1993).
94. See Lipton and Sachs, Creating a Market Economy in Eastern Europe.
95. See Elliott, "Contending Perspectives on Post-Communist Transition,"
96. and Elliott, "The Sequencing of Post-Communist Transition," International Journal of Social Economics 22, no. 9 (1995): 55-78.
97. See Michael Burawoy, "The End of Sovietology and the Renaissance of Modernization Theory," Contemporary Sociology 21, no. 6 (1992): 774-85.
98. See Beverly Crawford and Arend Lijphart, "Explaining Political and Economic Change in Post-Communist Eastern Europe: Old Legacies, New Institutions, Hegemonic Norms, and International Pressures," Comparative Political Studies 28, no. 2 (July 1995): 171-99.
99. Åslund, How Russia Became a Market Economy.
100. See Douglas Sutherland and Philip Hanson, "Structural Change in the Economies of Russia's Regions," Europe-Asia Studies 48, no. 3 (1996): 367-92;
101. Alison Stenning, "Economic Restructuring and Local Change in the Russian Federation," in Bradshaw, ed., Geography and Transition in the Post-Soviet Republics, 145-62.
102. Michael Burawoy, "The State and Economic Involution: Russia through a China Lens," World Development 24, no. 6 (June 1996): 1110.
103. For example, see Goldman, Lost Opportunity.
104. Noam Chomsky, World Orders, Old and New (New York, 1994);
105. after Michel Chossudovsky, "Russia under IMF Rule," Economic and Political Weekly 28, no. 15 (1993): 623-26.
106. For example, see Thomas A. Mroz and Barry M. Popkin, "Poverty and the Economic Transition in the Russian Federation," Economic Development and Cultural Change 44, no. 1 (October 1995): 1-31.
107. Elena Bashkirova and Andrei Melville, "Russian Public Opinion between Elections," International Social Science Journal, no. 47 (December 1995): 553-65.
108. Boris Kagarlitsky, The Disintegration of the Monolith (London, 1992), ix.
109. For political-economy perspectives, for example, see Adrian Smith and Adam Swain, "Critical Political-Economy Approaches to Regional Restructuring in East-Central Europe" (paper presented at the Geographies of Transformation seminar, Birmingham, England, 1995).
110. For institutionalist theories, see Christopher Clague and Gordon C. Hausser, eds., The Emergence of Market Economies in Eastern Europe (Cambridge, Mass., 1992);
111. Paul Aligica, "The Institutionalists Take on Transition," Transition (March 1997): 46-49.
112. Michael Burawoy, "The Soviet Descent into Capitalism," American Journal of Sociology 102, no. 5 (March 1997): 1430-44;
113. Michael Burawoy and Pavel Krotov, "The Soviet Transition from Socialism to Capitalism: Worker Control and Economic Bargaining in the Wood Industry," American Sociological Review 57 (February 1992): 16-38;
114. Burawoy and Krotov, "The Economic Base of Russia's Political Crisis," New Left Review, no. 198 (March 1993): 49-70.
115. Burawoy calls involution the opposite of accumulation, the process by which an economy feeds upon itself - a profound economic degeneration. See Burawoy, "State and Economic Involution."
116. Burawoy, "The Soviet Descent into Capitalism," 1442.
117. See Burawoy, "State and Economic Involution";
118. Michael Burawoy and Pavel Krotov, "Russian Miners Bow to the Angel of History," Antipode 27, no. 2 (1995): 115-36.
119. See also Stark, "Great Transformation?";
120. Gernot Grabher and David Stark, "Organizing Diversity: Evolutionary Theory, Network Analysis and Post-Socialism," Regional Studies 31, no. 5 (1997): 533-45;
121. Gernot Grabber and David Stark, eds., Restructuring Networks in Post-Socialism: Legacies, Linkages and Localities (Oxford, 1997);
122. Anna Seleny, "The Long Transformation and the Point of No Return: The Socio-Political Impact of Hungarian Reforms," in Andrew G. Walder, ed., The Political Consequences of Departures from Central Planning in Hungary and China (Stanford, 1994).
123. For a range of very different examples, see Adrian Smith and Adam Swain, "Critical Political-Economy Approaches to Regional Restructuring in East-Central Europe"; Ash Amin and Nigel Thrift, eds., Globalization, Institutions and Regional Development in Europe (Oxford, 1994);
124. Terry Marsden, Richard Munton, and Neil Ward, "Agricultural Geography and the Political-Economy Approach: A Review," Economic Geography 72, no. 3 (October 1996): 361-75;
125. Katharyne Mitchell, "Flexible Circulation in the Pacific Rim: Capitalisms in Cultural Context," Economic Geography 71, no. 3 (October 1995): 364-82;
126. Adrian Smith, "From Convergence to Fragmentation: Uneven Regional Development, Industrial Restructuring and the 'Transition to Capitalism' in Slovakia," Environment and Planning A 28, no. 3 (1996): 135-56;
127. Roger Waldinger, "The 'Other Side' of Embeddedness: A Case-Study of the Interplay of Economy and Ethnicity," Ethnic and Racial Studies 18 (July 1995): 555-80.
128. After Sharon Zukin and Paul DiMaggio, "Introduction," in Sharon Zukin and Paul DiMaggio, eds., Structures of Capital: The Social Organization of the Economy (Cambridge, Eng., 1990), 1-36.
129. Linda McDowell, "A Tale of Two Cities? Embedded Organizations and Embodied Workers in the City of London," in Roger Lee and Jane Wills, eds., Geographies of Economies (London, 1997), 120;
130. see also Linda McDowell, Capital Culture: Gender at Work in the City (Oxford, 1997).
131. See Michael J. Bradshaw, "Introduction: Transition and Geographical Change," in Bradshaw, ed., Geography and Transition in the Post-Soviet Republics, 1-8.
132. Stenning, "Economic Restructuring and Local Change in the Russian Federation."
133. See also Simon Clarke, What About the Workers? Workers and the Transition to Capitalism in Russia (London, 1993).
134. Smith, "From Convergence to Fragmentation";
135. Adrian Smith, "Uneven Development and the Restructuring of the Armaments Industry in Slovakia," Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers 19, no. 4 (1994): 404-24;
136. and Adrian Smith, Reconstructing the Regional Economy: Industrial Transformation and Regional Development in Slovakia (Cheltenham, 1998).
137. On the social and cultural construction of economic landscapes, for example, see Doreen Massey, Space, Place and Gender (Cambridge, Eng., 1994).
138. On the reordering of political space, see Peter Taylor et al., "On the Nation-State, the Global and Social Science," Environment and Planning A 28, no. 11 (1996): 1917-92.