Introduction
| Autor: | AMIR WEINER, JOHN CONNELLY |
|---|---|
| Rok vydání: | 2009 |
| Předmět: | |
| Zdroj: | Contemporary European History. 18:247-251 |
| ISSN: | 1469-2171 0960-7773 |
| DOI: | 10.1017/s0960777309005025 |
| Popis: | The question today is the same as that of twenty years ago: what do we call the events that transformed eastern Europe in 1989? Our improved perspective has not necessarily generated better answers. The most popular term is ‘revolution’, but many observers still hesitate to apply it to largely non-violent change. Can there be a ‘liberal revolution’? Timothy Garton-Ash's evocative neologism ‘refolution’ (meaning ‘revolution’ and ‘reform’) captures well the ambivalence many feel about describing a gradual transition to democracy as ‘revolutionary’. The processes of civil society formation he observed in the 1980s by no means concluded with 1989; in south-eastern Europe in particular the transition to democracy has not been revolutionary but slow and painful. Perhaps ‘democracy’ is not even the right word. |
| Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
| Externí odkaz: |
|