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Class inequality and the formation of political interests in Eastern Europe

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2009

Geoffrey Evans
Geoffrey Evans
Affiliation:
Nuffield College, (Oxford).
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Extract

Class inequality provides fertile ground for the development of class divisions in political interests. Post-communist societies display evidence of such inequality and — despite expectations to the contrary — of its correlates: high levels of class identification, perceived relative deprivation between classes, and links between class position and economic expectations. These aspects of class formation are in turn accompanied by the endorsement of divergent political programmes by social classes. Marketisation is thus providing the conditions under which classrelated, ‘left-right’ divisions reminiscent of those in Western democracies, structure politics in Eastern Europe.

L'inégalité de classe offre un terrain fertile au développement d'une division des intérêts politiques parallèle à la division de classes. Les sociétés postcommunistes présentent une belle illustration de cette inégalité et, en dépit d'attentes contraires, de ses corrélats: des niveaux élevés d'identité de classe ainsi que de frustration relative de classe à classe ; des liens entre position de classe et attentes économiques, le tout accompagné de soutiens à des programmes politiques qui divergent selon le clivage de la division de classes. L'ouverture au marché mondial semble créer les conditions grâce auxquelles des divisions enracinées de classe, « droite contre gauche », qui rappellent celles des démocraties occidentales, structurent la politique en Europe de l'Est.

Die Ungleichheit der Klassen stellt eine wichtige Voraussetzung fär die Entwicklung von Gesellschaftsunterschieden dar, ganz im Interesse der Politik. Spätkommunistische Gesellschaften sind gezeichnet von sozialer Ungleichheit und—trotz gegensätzlicher Erwartungen – den Folgeerscheinungen : ein hohes Maß an klassenspezifischem Denken, Auseinandertreiben der Gesellschaftsschichten und Zusammenhang zwischen politischer Einstellung und wirtschaftlicher Erwartung. Diese Aspekte der Klassenbildung gehen mit der Übernahme unterschiedlicher politischer Programme der jeweiligen Gesellschaftsschichten einher. Die Markterschließung schafft die Bedingungen für eine klassenspezifische rechts-links Teilung westlicher Prägung der politischen Strukturen OstEuropas.

Type
Research Article
Information
European Journal of Sociology / Archives Européennes de Sociologie , Volume 38 , Issue 2 , November 1997 , pp. 207 - 234
Copyright
Copyright © Archives Européenes de Sociology 1997

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