CIAO DATE: 1/99

Rival Views Of Postcommunist Market Society

Béla Greskovits

November 1998

The Institute for European Studies

 

Abstract

While reviewing various interpretations of the postcommunist transformation it is demonstrated that the manner social scientists think about postcommunism has much in common with the ideas of their predecessors who faced the emergence of capitalism over the past centuries. What explains the continuity of the major views? Why did the debate on the perspectives of capitalism and on the nature of its strengths and weaknesses reappear in the new historical case of postcommunist market society? This author argues that neither the specific historical nor the systemic context of capitalist expansion can account for the prevalence of competing interpretations. Rather the latter is the standard way social scientists think about systems and systemic change in general. But the trench-war between rival views of postcommunist market society also reflects the impact of new psychological, political, and institutional factors specific to the mass-production of social science ideas towards the end of the XXth century.

 

Introduction ₁

This is an essay in the short history of social thought on East European transformations. I shall present the structure of the discourse on the likely economic, social and political dynamics under postcommunism. I shall also also point to the historical and theoretical roots of the competing concepts and assess the contribution of transitology to our understanding of social change. ₂ While reviewing various interpretations of Eastern Europe's transformation I identified two important axes of the debate: the political consequences of capitalist expansion and the impact of the communist legacy on the viability and specificity of East European democratic market societies. I shall use these axes as a simple framework to analyze the nature of the discourse. Specifically, I shall structure the transformation debate according to the participants' answers to the following questions. (1) Is economic liberalism a prerequisite of, or a threat to political freedom and democracy? (2) Is the communist legacy a liability, or an asset from the viewpoint of the emerging market society?

In section 2, I shall introduce four frequently advocated but mutually contradicting theses on the perspectives and the sources of viability of the post-communist market society. Studying the origins of rival views I argue that they are not entirely new, rather in essence each of them had been advocated earlier in different historical contexts. Based on Albert O. Hirschman's tableau of theories ₃ in section 3 I shall demonstrate that the manner social scientists think about postcommunism has much in common with the ideas of their predecessors who faced the emergence of capitalism over the past centuries.

This observation invites further inquiry: what explains the continuity of the major views? Even more puzzling, what accounts for the continuity of conceptualizing capitalism in antinomies? Why did the debate on the perspectives of capitalism and on the nature of its strengths and weaknesses remain open over the past centuries? Why did the rivalry with no less vigour reappear in the new historical case of postcommunist market society? Is it the systemic context, the contradictory systemic identity of capitalism which is responsible for the lack of consensus on some of its core attributes? I do not think so. Instead in section 4, I shall show that socialism in its time was no less controversial for social scientists. One conclusion is that neither the specific historical nor the specific systemic context of capitalist expansion can account for the prevalence of competing interpretations. Rather the latter is the standard way social scientists think about systems and systemic change in general. A second conclusion of my forthcoming analysis is that the irreconcilable antinomies allegedly characterizing various systems and specifically the market society may be exaggerated and magnified by the theoretical lenses through which scholars study their material. The last thing I ask is why social scientists prefer to stick to sharply conflicting concepts rather than seek for reconciliation with their opponents? Partly, one can view this as unproblematic, as a normal standard of intellectual accumulation. However, my argument developed in section 5 asserts that the trench-war between rival views of postcommunist market society also reflects the impact of new psychological, political, and institutional factors specific to the mass-production of social science ideas towards the end of the XXth century. In section 6, I conclude and mention some questions for further research.

 

Four Conflicting Interpretations Of Postcommunism

Social science discourse on the likely economic, social and political dynamics under postcommunism, the viability of postcommunist market democracy, and the nature of the obstacles it encounters has been divided from its birth. For mapping the discourse I chose four influential, frequently asserted but mutually contradicting theses, which I call the "free market road to freedom thesis", the "impossibility theorem", the "Leninist legacy thesis", and the "communist assets thesis", respectively. Below I shall present the four theses, take a closer look at the logic of each argument and compare their assessment of the main obstacles to successful economic and political transformation and their suggestions for overcoming the difficulties.

The Free Market Road To Freedom Thesis

The free market road to freedom thesis shares the widely held belief that under capitalism democratization of polity goes hand in hand with the marketization of the economy. While it is a commonplace of western political discourse to see democracy and capitalism as virtually identical (Rueschemeyer, Stephens, and Stephens 1992: 1), this thesis in the context of postcommunist transformation puts the stress on only one of the possible causal links involved: the causality between successful marketization and successful democratization. Advocates of the thesis,—mainly economists, East European top economic policy makers and their Western advisers—, assert that political freedom and democracy under postcommunism is the outgrowth of economic freedom. In other words economic liberalism breeds political liberalism.

The logic of the argument goes as the following: the durability of the new democracies will depend to a large extent on their economic performance. Both increasing material welfare and declining inequalities are seen as important factors of democratic stability. Economic growth generates higher living standards and reduces inequalities, hence "the economic model most conducive to economic growth also creates the best economic conditions (i.e. relatively modest inequalities) for democracy" (Balcerowicz 1995: 134-5). Since free market capitalism is supposed to have better growth performance than other models, this way economic liberalism is presented as the best strategy for political liberalism.

However, not all forms of marketization are viewed as equally conducive to democratic stability: radical and comprehensive reforms are superior to gradualist and less comprehensive strategies. This is made clear in the inverse formulation of the thesis which asserts that the lack of economic radicalism or more specifically the absence of governments' commitment impairs democracy and results in regression to authoritarianism. As Jeffrey Sachs and David Lipton put it, "If the reform programs of the new democratic governments fail, the meagre living conditions in Eastern Europe will fall further, which could in turn provoke serious social conflict and even a breakdown of the new democratic institutions" (Sachs and Lipton 1990: 47-8). These authors proposed fast and decisive government action such as Poland's leap to the market economy to avoid the undesirable political outcome. ₄ In a similar vein, Yegor Gaidar, the acting Premier of Russia in 1992 in a speech delivered to the Congress of Peoples' Deputies said that if the economic reforms did not accelerate, but rather there would be further "criminal delays...then we will develop...according to African or Latin American patterns...[leading to] the chronic poverty and political instability, the populist politicians and dictatorships so common in Third World states" (Quoted by Jeffries 1993: 482-3). To side-step and neutralize the "Stalinist legacy" radical and comprehensive economic reforms are suggested (Sachs, and Lipton 1990: 49-50). ₅

The Impossibility Theorem

As a polar opposite to the free market road to freedom thesis, the impossibility theorem challenges both the view that democratization of polity goes hand in hand with the marketization of economy and in its more specific formulations, the causal link stressed by the economic strategists of political freedom. Jon Elster, the leading advocate of this theorem, identified the optimal system as brought about by its essential ingredients of constitutional democracy, competitive markets, and a welfare state, but made "a systematic case for the conclusion" that "one cannot get from here,"totalitarian communism, "to there", the optimal system. "All regimes that are minimally satisfactory when evaluated in light of the three basic goals are unattainable", or, at least one cannot identify ex ante "a feasible path to a minimally satisfactory regime" (Elster 1993: 267). In line with this general argument other analysts pointed out that it is exactly economic liberalism, proposed as the free market road to freedom, which poses the major threat to democracy. "In this view, the danger to political liberalism comes from the reliance on economic liberalism" (Ost 1995: 178, highlight—B.G.) ₆ .

But how does marketization undermine democracy? Just like the free market strategists of political freedom, their opponents assume that economic performance plays a central role in making democracies viable. However, their argument claims that radical marketization implies large losses for the majority of East Europeans "who become receptive to demagogues promising prosperity" and who will blame liberal democracy. Hence as a protest against economic hardship and the loss of the social guarantees of the past they will assist populist authoritarian leaders to come to power (Ost 1992: 49). ₇

Radical economic reform, the solution for believers in the free market road to freedom, constitutes the problem (or one of the problems) for proponents of the impossibility theorem. ₈ To avoid the threats economic radicalism poses to democracy some analysts suggest that "alternative economic policies, borrowing from populist and social democratic corporatist programs might be better able than neoliberalism to consolidate democracy in Eastern Europe" (Ost 1992: 48).

The Leninist Legacy Thesis

Just like the impossibility theorem the Leninist legacy thesis concludes that simultaneous economic and political reform under postcommunism is extremely difficult if not impossible. However, the reasoning in the latter case is entirely different. While the thesis considers marketization and political democratization as desirable and in principle mutually reconcilable, it also argues in all likelihood both desired outcomes are simultaneously impaired by the "cultural, political, and economic 'inheritance' of forty years of Leninist rule": the Leninist legacy (Jowitt 1992: 209).

What is the Leninist legacy, and how does it impair marketization and democratization? Different authors stress the reform-hampering impact of different elements of the past. Here is one example. Under communism, "power was vested in a single party that prohibited opposition". In the absence of established successor elite, one expects this legacy to undermine new institutions of power-sharing and perpetuate centralized structures of power that dominated Leninist regimes (Crawford and Lijphart 1997: 9). But "to the extent that centralized states remain in Eastern Europe elites who control the state will continue to monopolize political and economic activity. Political participation will be weak and economic competition will be thwarted. Thus economic reforms will also fail if the old elites remain in power (Jowitt 1992: 208-15, and Crawford, and Lijphart 1997: 9-11). According to another version of the "legacist" view presented by Amitai Etzioni, psychological, sociological, and political "friction" is strong during most changes. (Etzioni 1992: 28). However, the main source of friction slowing down or inhibiting the postcommunist transformation is the legacy of the past: personality traits and habits of working slowly without initiative and responsibility, featherbedding, using work time for other purposes; lack of management and entrepreneurial skills; the large share of untransferable capital assets; the shortage of proper infrastructure; high labor immobility; and, last but not least, "a variety of social values, not easily compatible with capitalism" (Etzioni 1992: 10-19). ₉

As far as the major obstacles to the democratic market society are concerned, Jowitt also stresses that "Eastern Europe consists largely—not exclusively—of fragmented, mutually suspicious, societies with little religiocultural support for tolerant and individually self-reliant behavior" (Jowitt 1992: 224). There is only one way of overcoming these obstacles: to begin to build a modern citizenry with the help of the sporadic civic, secular, and individual forces in the region. However, these forces might turn out to be too weak against their opponents. Therefore the suggested way of getting around the Leninist legacy is to mobilize a "critical mass of civic effort—political, cultural, and economic—that can add its weight to civic forces in Eastern Europe" through Eastern Europe's adoption by Western Europe, similar to what West Germany attempted in East Germany (Jowitt 1992: 224).

The Communist Assets Thesis

The communist assets thesis is also "legacist" in the sense that it asserts that the legacy of the outgoing system will inevitably shape the new institutional pattern of postcommunist society. Some of its advocates such as David Stark and László Bruszt "look to the variation in how communism fell apart and how these partial ruins provide institutional building blocks for political, economic, and social reconstruction" (Stark, and Bruszt 1998: 6). ₁₀ Hence unlike the Leninist legacy thesis the communist asset thesis emphasizes the positive impact of the inheritance.

Certain elements the outgoing system left behind can be useful, since they can become assets from the point of view of building the structures and institutions of the emerging new social formation. Various authors expect different elements of the communist inheritance to become assets under postcommunism. David Stark favors the informal and interfirm networks and the communist second economy, which "did not conform to officially prescribed hierarchical patterns" but "got the job done" of keeping afloat economic activity, under the old system. These properties did not collapse with the "formal structures of the socialist regime" (Stark 1996: 994-5). For Peter Murrell, even the formal structures of communism may turn out to be valuable assets under postcommunism. When asking "Do existing institutions have any value?" Murrel's answer is positive. He argues that existing state institutions of the centrally planned economy should be used to exert control over the macroeconomic situation and over state enterprises "in the period before privatization and creation of market institutions can take place...Old inefficient institutions may be better than ones that are planned, but which do not yet exist" (Murrell 1992a: 49-51). ₁₁ In a third political science application of the communist assets thesis Valerie Bunce showed how the post-communist left in Hungary and Poland combined their past reform-communist outlook with their recent capitalist ambitions and became assets for democratic stability, they are thus "less a threat to democracy than an investment to democracy" (Bunce 1997: 16).

For advocates of the communist assets thesis a major obstacle in the way of building a successful postcommunist market society is the destruction of communist assets. This destruction, attributed to radical reforms, implies large and unnecessary socioeconomic losses of organizational efficiency, knowledge, innovation, and diversity (Murrell 1992a: 39, Burawoy, 1996, Stark, and Bruszt 1998). However, if appropriately used in the context of a path-dependent economic development strategy, these elements of the legacy "can become assets, resources, and the basis for credible commitments and coordinated actions in the postsocialist period" (Stark 1996: 994-5)

All in all, we face, an intricate pattern of four, mutually contradicting theses about the likely economic, social and political dynamics of postcommunist market society. Following Hirschman, I have introduced them "in a sequence such that each successive thesis is in some respect the negation of the preceding one" (Hirschman 1992a: 135) According to the free market road to freedom thesis, marketization is going to create an environment of economic growth and income equality which is favourable to political participation and liberal democracy. This is a "possibilist" ₁₂ theory on the self-fulfilling properties of capitalist expansion. Advocates of one version of the impossibility theorem argue the opposite: economic liberalism is not the road to freedom, but the road to oppression and exclusion for labor and more broadly for the millions of people marginalized by the chosen strategy of economic transformation. In stark contradiction with the free market road to freedom thesis, this is a theory of (impossible, or) self-destructing capitalism. The political systemic feature attributed to capitalism—political freedom—is undermined by another feature of the same systemic core, the relentless quest for economic freedom. The impossibility theorem is "determinist" in the broader sense since it claims that the conflicting conditions of the various elements of its systemic core sentence capitalism under postcommunism to failure. However, both theses are economic determinist in the sense that they infer politics from economics. Finally, both accept that from the viewpoint of the future, the present (by its tensions) matters more than the past. Specifically, they both agree that capitalist expansion influences postcommunist dynamics more than does the communist legacy. But next to them, we have two theories focusing on the legacy. The Leninist legacy thesis demonstrates how the inheritance of Leninist rule impairs capitalism both in its economic and political dimensions. In this view it is not the capitalist expansion that is going to undermine democracy, the political manifestation of its own systemic identity, but it is rather the powerful remnants of the communist society that will successfully resist the consolidation of the new system. This again, is a determinist theory of the "spectre of communism" haunting, and resisting capitalism even after communism collapsed. However, it is contradicted by the possibilist thesis of communist assets pointing out the importance of inherited routines, practices, organizational forms and societal ties from the point of view of successful transformation. Finally, then, we end up with a theory of communism enhancing and facilitating capitalism. Both latter theories assert that, from the viewpoint of the future it is the past that matters more than (or at least as much as), the present. To put it differently, in one way or the other, the communist legacy has a stronger (or at least as strong), impact on postcommunist dynamics as the capitalist expansion does. In order to highlight the relation between the above theses it is helpful to present them schematically, in an ideology map. ₁₃

A closer look at the history of ideas reveals that the two pairs of rival accounts of the viability, and the identified sources of the strengths or weaknesses of the postcommunist market society, are not the conclusions of a new way of thinking developed specifically to explain these societies, rather the schemata applied have their own history. The proof of this claim will be presented below by a brief summary of the theories collected in Hirschman's "Rival views of market society".

 

3. Hirschman's "tableau idéologique"

What I "rediscovered" above is the continuity of old debates about market society in the new context of capitalism's expansion at the end of the twentieth century. What took me by surprise was how well the structure of the discourse on capitalism under postcommunism fitted Hirschman's original tableau idéologique. Let us see below how the comparison of the new and old views of capitalism reveals a centuries-old lineage of intellectual kinship sometimes of a peculiar nature.

Similar to recent architects of postcommunist market society, many observers of the early capitalist expansion,—including Montesquieu, Sir James Steuart, William Robertson, Condorcet, Thomas Paine, David Hume and Adam Smith—, expected that the spread of commerce and industry will restrain the sovereign from taking arbitrary actions and from enjoying excessive power. In addition the spread of commerce and industry will give rise to human beings of a more "polished type",—a citizenry that by its manners, morals and attitudes "will in turn greatly facilitate the smooth functioning of the market" (Hirschman 1992a: 106-9). Thus by asserting that all good things go together: economic development brings about beneficial effects in both the political and social realms, the possibilist "doux-commerce thesis" as Hirschman named it, can be viewed as the archetype of the free market road to freedom thesis.

However, advocates of what Hirschman calls the "self-destruction thesis", challenged the doux-commerce thesis, since they adopted the determinist view that capitalism "exhibits a pronounced proclivity to undermining the moral foundations on which any society, including its own, must rest" (Hirschman 1992a: 110). As pointed out by Hirschman, while the thesis on capitalism's self-destruction forms the cornerstone of Marxian thought, it also found advocates among the conservatives responding to the expansion of market society in the 1730s, and among the romantic and conservative critics of the Industrial Revolution later in the early XIXth century. For more recent formulations of this thesis Hirschman refers among others to Károly Polányi, Joseph Schumpeter, and Fred Hirsch (Hirschman 1992a: 109-17). Based on my essay, I add to this list the contemporary advocates of the impossibility theorem and among them the social scientists who argue that economic liberalism poses threat to political liberalism. Similar to their predecessors, a number of contemporary critics of capitalist expansion under postcommunism, seem to have become deeply disappointed with the initial brutal consequences of marketization, and expressed their fears that all bad things would go together. In other words, the political outcome will be no less frustrating than the economic one.

Next to the self-destruction thesis however, Marx himself, Schumpeter at the time of World War I, and more recently neo-marxist analysts of the capitalist periphery came up with the rival view of the "feudal-shackles thesis", which demonstrates "how capitalism is coming to grief, not because of its own excessive energies, but because of powerful residues of precapitalist values and institutions" (Hirschman 1992a: 135-6). The determinist theory of precapitalist formations successfully resisting the expansion of market society can thus be interpreted as the direct predecessor of the "Leninist legacy" thesis. Finally, from Hirschman's journey in the history of ideas we learn that contrary to the "feudal-shackles thesis", sometimes it may be beneficial to have a precapitalist past with all its inherited values and institutions. The possibilist "feudal-blessings thesis", represented in Hirschman's collection by Louis Hartz, stresses something essentially similar to the "communist assets thesis": "a feudal background is a favorable factor for subsequent democratic capitalist development" (Hirschman 1992a: 136). Specifically, according to Hartz, countries lacking a feudal past, such as the US, are "deprived of what Europe has in abundance: social and ideological diversity" (Hirschman 1992a: 133). The argument that remnants of the past social formation can form assets for the new system is shared by path-dependentist evolutionists regardless of whether the preceding formation was feudalism or communism.

In order to visually highlight the structural similarity of the discourse of market society across two (and more) distinct historical periods and a multitude of historical cases, let us finally recall Hirschman's tableau idéologique on the rival views of market society.

The similarity between the rival views of postcommunist market society and those of market society takes one by surprise. ₁₄ We might conclude, that, apparently, transitology has little original to contribute to our understanding of social change. At least in terms of theoretical agenda-setting, the "value-added" component of the postcommunism ideology map is modest, especially in the light of the original Hirschmannian tableau. We also should, however, ask the question: what explains the continuity of the major views? One explanation could justify the recent reincarnation of rival views of market society by asserting that postcommunism is no more than the latest Great Transformation ₁₅ to capitalism. This way the continuity of its conceptualization may stem from the same systemic core beneath changing appearances in distant periods of capitalist expansion. But before accepting this explanation one might wonder how the advocates of the different types of views knew exactly what they would have to conceptualize at a time when the perceived result of the process—democratic market economy—did not yet exist (Dobry 1992: 30)? ₁₆ Furthermore, even if the prevailing systemic core of capitalism explains the enduring validity of one or another conceptualization, how could it account for the evergreen applicability of any given view and its antithesis at the same time? As a last resort, one could still argue that the self-contradictory nature of the system under discussion justifies even a fundamental disagreement over its core attributes. However, this view would not take us far, and would simply be incorrect, since as I will show below evoking contradicting interpretations is a feature not at all distinctive to capitalism.

By a short excursion in a third realm of the history of social thought, I try to put the rivalry of views in a new light. In a third ideology map I shall demonstrate that conflicting theories adding up to a structure similar to both of the above presented tables have also been advocated by observers whose ambition was to predict the dynamics of an entirely different system: socialism. ₁₇

 

4. Rival Views Of Socialism

Just as it is a commonplace of western political discourse to see capitalism as a high road to democracy, until about the time prior to World War I, orthodox socialists "claimed to be the only true democrats, the exclusive sellers of the genuine stuff, never to be confused with the bourgeois fake" (Schumpeter, 1992: 235). Later in the century this and similar claims were repeatedly made by both the theorists and the political leaders of socialism, including Stalin, who in 1936 said, "We built a socialist society...in order that the human personality might feel really free" (Quoted by Heilbroner 1990: 1100, with reference to John Strachey). Similar to the economic strategists of freedom in the postcommunism debate, socialist thinkers developed a theory of the economic road to democracy, which I name "the collectivist road to true freedom" thesis. While the thesis had many formulations, I refer to the one originating from Oskar Lange's and Fred M. Taylor's contribution to the debate on the practicability of collectivist economy in the late 1930s. ₁₈ As formulated by Benjamin E. Lippincott in his introduction to Lange's and Taylor's essays, "The essays show, in contradiction to popular thought, that there is nothing inherent in a socialist economy that requires an autocratic system of government, nor that would impair democracy. On the contrary, a socialist economy is far more in harmony with democracy than is a capitalist" (Lange, and Taylor 1964: 31). Let me briefly recall the argument. Two elements central to democracy are equality, which involves the removal of privilege: "of artificial inequalities that cannot be justified in terms of common welfare", and liberty. Collectivist economy characterized by the public ownership of the major factors of production, and bycentral planning, facilitates the realization of the objectives of equality and liberty more than the capitalist economy does. As far as equality is concerned, socialist collectivization eliminates the privilege that stems from wealth and private ownership, and is at the base of a capitalist society. Moreover, collectivist socialism performs better in terms of liberty. "[W]ith a more equal distribution of income free consumer's choice will be still freer. Where many under a capitalist economy must choose between a coat and a pair of shoes, under a socialist many could choose between a radio and a telephone" (Lange and Taylor 1964: 32). It is interesting to see how those economic strategists of socialist democracy, just like the market reformers under postcommunism, argued that while radical reform,—namely radical collectivization—, is the way to success, "partial", "half-hearted" "gradualist" attempts are self-defeating. ₁₉ Lange teaches the same lesson about transformation: "Socialism is not an economic policy for the timid" (Lange, and Taylor 1964: 125) as do Sachs, Aslund and others about the transition to capitalism.

As we know, Lange's and Taylor's theses were a response provoked by Ludwig von Mises', Lionel Robbins', and Friedrich Hayek's impossibility, or impracticability thesis", which is the second item in my ideology map on rival views of socialism. ₂₀ From these authors von Mises advocated the view that, "Without economic calculation...there can be no economy. Hence, in a socialist state wherein the pursuit of economic calculation is impossible, there can be—in our sense of the term—no economy whatsoever" (Mises 1935: 105). While in the 1930s these thinkers questioned primarily the feasibility of the socialist and of the collectivist economy in general, they also elaborated on socialism's political consequences: the impossibility of democracy under socialism. This argument was then forcefully developed into an explanation about how collectivism results in fascist and communist totalitarianism in Hayek's 1944 "The Road to Serfdom". In the mid 1950s, Milton Friedman revisited the debate in a lecture series, and gave a new formulation to the argument: economic collectivism and freedom are incompatible, and a free collectivist society is impossible. ₂₁ Let me show how Friedman's argument on collectivism's self-destruction as a democratic system is constructed. A collectivist economy, first of all, eliminates one central element of freedom namely the freedom in economic arrangements, including the freedom of private property. "In the second place, economic freedom is also an indispensable means toward the achievement of political freedom" (Friedman 1962: 8). Why? Because a collectivist economy merges economic power with political authority thereby eliminating them as mutual checks on each other and facilitating the monopoly of power.

Up to this point the pattern of rival views of socialism compare well with the rival views of market society. I presented two conflicting theses, which essentially shared the perception of strength of collectivism: resulting either in beneficial, or in gloomy outcomes in terms of freedom and the quality of human life. But what about the other pair of theses evaluating the impact of the historical legacy on socialism? In this respect there is no perfect analogy. I did not find any influential theory arguing that socialism could not expand, since the powerful residues of capitalist values and institutions paralyzed it. Perhaps this is not by chance: it is well-known that Marx viewed capitalism as the precondition rather than an obstacle for socialism. Until Lenin, the socialist revolution was expected to occur first in the most developed capitalist countries. But even if we do not have a powerful "capitalist-shackles thesis", the "feudal-shackles thesis" is going to fit the ideology-map of rival views of market society, and also of socialism. ₂₂ By constraining capitalist development, the residues of feudalism (and other precapitalist legacies) are indirectly, the obstacles to socialism as well.

Finally, as pointed out above, Marxism provides us with an especially powerful formulation of the "possibilist" legacy-thesis: by creating highly developed "forces of production", and its own "gravedigger", the working class, capitalism facilitates and enables the formation of socialism. This way from the viewpoint of socialism, much of the capitalist legacy is an "asset".

All in all, I have collected a third set of rival views this time on socialism, yet these views add up to a logical structure similar to the previous ones.

What is the lesson we can draw? First and foremost, neither the specific historical, nor the specific systemic context of capitalist expansion alone can account for the prevalence of its similar but competing interpretations. Rather the latter is the standard way social scientists think about systems and systemic change in general. But what does this exactly mean?

Based on Joseph Schumpeter's concept of "visions" Robert Heilbroner offers a useful framework of interpretation (Heilbroner 1990, Schumpeter 1954). Consistently with Schumpeter's and Heilbroner's concept, I argue that the rival views of social systems,—both of the market society and its postcommunist version and of socialism—, are "visions". Visions are "preanalytic cognitive acts" that precede "the scenarist's work as author or stage designer" (Heilbroner 1990: 1109). Schumpeter's assertion of the motivation and purpose of visions as "ideological" helps us to understand why fundamental visions are conflicting, why they survive the centuries, and why there is only a limited choice of them. As far as the origin of the conflicting visions is concerned, Heilbroner wrote, "Such general preconceptions cannot be proved or disproved—or worse, can all too readily be 'proved' or 'disproved' by appeal to historical example or introspection. History or introspection will provide support for many such general assertions, but it will also yield evidence for the contrary kinds generalizations. This is because the human psyche is itself full of contradictions, all aspects of which are mirrored in historical experience" (Heilbroner 1988: 197, highlight—B. G). As to the limited choice of social system visions, "[T]he most common typification of visions is between those that lead to 'conservative' and those that imply 'radical' expectations, broadly meaning those that see the future as dominated by the past, and those that see the future as transcending it" (Heilbroner 1990: 1112).

Coming back to our review of ideas, on the one hand, we have seen the rivalry between radical, and conservative preconceptions of history. ₂₃ On the other, the review highlighted another useful dimension of classification: both radical and conservative visions can be "optimist" or "pessimist" depending upon the perceived quality of the past's effect on future, and vice versa. This way my schematic classification of rival views of social systems includes "radical optimist", "radical pessimist", "conservative pessimist", and "conservative optimist theses".

To highlight the ideological kinship of the rival views of postcommunism with earlier preconceptions and to indicate their place in the family-tree of social thought along one dimension let me present a final map of rival visions of history.

As Heilbroner put it, "Both sides of this polarization of views can be amply illustrated and refuted by historical example, and both still wield vast influence in establishing our understanding of the world" (Heilbroner 1990: 1112). This claim perfectly explains the vast influence of the presented old-new visions on the manner social scientists think about postcommunism. Does my argument also imply that in one of its dimensions the transitology debate is "visionary", "ideological", and "preanalytic"? Of course it does, but this is not what, I think, is wrong with the transformation debate. It is more worrisome that in terms of scientific inquiry as opposed to visions or of the analytic act as compared with the preanalytic cognitive orientations, transitology has not brought novel ideas to the surface. Instead, much of the discourse seems to have got stuck at the stage of rival archetypal preanalytic cognitive orientations which I described above. There are only a dissatisfactory number of exceptions from the rule that transitology as a whole is characterized by the exaggerated dominance of preconception, by the limited attention paid to evidence and details, and more generally, by the lost balance between the two equally important missions of social science: embracing complexity and having predictive power. This state-of-the-art, its causes, and consequences will be demonstrated in the next section.

 

5. Old And New Factors Of The Disequilibrium Between Embracing Complexity And Having Predictive Power

As a starting point one has to realize that there is one significant difference in the pattern of social science discourse on market society and on its postcommunist version. While Hirschman pointed out that the ideas he presented in his tableau had constituted a rivalry without actual debate ₂₅ , the controversy about the postcommunist market society seems to be a debate without reconciliation. In the latter case, the participants have frequently addressed and intriqued each others' views, but up till now there is no indication of an emerging consensus reconsideration of ideas or search for new evidence. Instead, the debate goes on.

What we have to understand, then is what makes social scientists stick to sharply conflicting concepts either by not taking cognizance of their opponents or by not seeking reconciliation with them. The two versions of the conceptual trench-war may have partly common explanations. Let us examine first Hirschman's reasoning in the context of the original rivalry in order to see how far his arguments take us in understanding the discused feature of the postcommunism debate.

Paying attention to diversity and complexity facilitates reconciliation among the rival views. Rivals are to accept that, "however incompatible the various theories might be, each might still have its 'hour of truth' and/or its 'country of truth' as it applies in a given country or group of countries during some stretch of time" (Hirschman 1992a: 137). Embracing complexity in the postcommunism debate would, for instance, lead to the realization that while radical marketization may result in freedom in one group of countries, it may prove to be the road to serfdom in another, or that the communist legacy resists capitalism in a given country while it is a lever of successful marketization in another. Why do advocates of most though not all rival views seem dismiss such perspectives?

According to Hirschman older interpretations of market society developed in isolation essentially for three reasons: (1) the difficulty of perception of diversity and of dialectic processes; (2) the psychological temptation to predict "inevitable" outcomes and; (3) a self-confidence ideologies like to parade. In his view, for these features social science usually pays with a loss of the complex picture of society. I believe that all of the above factors are at work behind the inbuilt bias for irreconcilable rivalry evident in the discourse on postcommunism. In addition I show below that two groups of specific conditions magnify the effect of these general factors: the first group includes the historically unique properties of the postcommunist transformation, while the second results from a number of new psychological and institutional features emerging in response to the mass-production of social science ideas in our days. Hence in terms of flawed interpretation and simplistic view of reality, transitology has to pay even higher a price than the older views did.

The Difficulty Of Perceiving Diversity And Dialectic Processes

By recognizing and defining the sources of the contradictory processes at work in society, the difficulty of accepting the existence of diverse and unpredictable outcomes can be tempered (Hirschman 1992a: 139). The standard path of scientific inquiry that leads from the visions or preanalytic orientations to reliable interpretations and scenarios involves precisely the recognition and definition of the conditions that generate social processes. On this path, it is hard to avoid the examination of somebody's "conceptual scheme for its compatibility with other construals of reality" (Heilbroner 1990: 112-13). If this comparison in turn happens, it may help to bridge the gap between competing interpretations. But to proceed this way requires two conditions to be met: interest in and empirical knowledge of the features making for contradictions and diversity exist. I think one reason why the gap between the rival views of postcommunism has not yet been bridged is that their advocates in a number of cases did not meet either of the two conditions.

Frequently, theorists made explicit that instead of diversity and variations they searched for generalizations based on the common systemic features of the postcommunist societies. Arguing that commonalties were more important than differences they conceptualized the likely dynamics of the market society's "systemic core" rather than its varied appearances, they predicted the fate of the entire region rather than that of the individual countries. A lack of interest in country-specificity and diversity were equally forcefully expressed by some representatives of the free market road to freedom thesis, the incompatibility theorem, and the Leninist legacy thesis. ₂₆ Unlike them, advocates of one of the "possibilist" theses,—namely the communist assets thesis—, repeatedly stressed their interest in diversity and variations. ₂₇

Clearly, most transitologists' bias for generalization may be fueled by an array of motivations from intellectual taste to professional position or political calculation. Nevertheless, I believe that ignorance about diversity is not always and not only a matter of deliberate choice. It can result from the lack of empirical data on the details of the subject. The existence of sketchy data is again explained by several factors. On one hand, a number of researchers are newcomers to the field thus they neither know the history of the countries under study, nor do they speak their language. Often they do not have the time or the funding to gather the required information. On the other hand the rapid development of events, the actual lack of reliable data both on the past and the present state of affairs, and the unexpected outcome of regime change itself shocked even many "area specialists" and those "generalists" who were both interested in and well prepared to recognize both the common features and the diversity of the changes. One typical way of coping with the lack of solid empirical facts was to rely on the media as (sometimes the only) source of evidence. However, reliance on media coverage makes one wonder to what degree social science is capable of transcending daily news given its dependence on it. ₂₈

All in all, the above brief inventory of the intellectual arsenal of transitology reveals serious shortcomings. In the absence of interest in or evidence on the details, a number of transition theorists based their generalizations on the only tool available to them: their preanalytic cognitive orientations. The constitutive element of scientific inquiry was missing, the analytic act failed to follow, and the macrosocial prognoses and scenarios were directly inferred from visions, which happened to be mainly the reincarnations of centuries-old intellectual perspectives.

Thus firstly, a large part of transitology is an ironic proof of the timeless power of ideas and hence strongly supports John Maynard Keynes's belief that, "[T]he ideas of economists and political philosophers, both when they are right and when they are wrong, are more powerful than is commonly understood. Indeed the world is ruled by little else. Practical men, who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influences, are usually the slaves of some defunct economists. Madmen in authority, who hear voices in the air, are distilling their frenzy from some academic scribbler of a few years back" (Keynes 1991: 383).

Secondly, the above interpretation of much of the postcommunism debate as a rivalry of visions and of scenarios directly based on visions also helps us to understand why transitology continues to be a discourse without reconciliation. One vision cannot be superior to another one, and "the validity of the underlying vision cannot be inferred from the success of prognoses built on them" (Heilbroner 1990: 1112). The impossibility of the visions' falsification implies that advocates of various visions are not forced to surrender to their rivals even if their prognoses do not come true. For example, despite the fact that many democracies emerging in the postcommunist transformation process survived their first tough period of economic crisis and the ensuing radical austerity measures, it remains plausible to argue that reform radicalism precipitates political breakdown, or that the triple transformation is extremely difficult. But I find such an attitude problematic. On one hand in our world, where decisions of the international community of financiers and investors sometimes reflect the strong influence of rumors and fears rather than of reliable analyses, it is irresponsible to stubbornly advocate negative visions even if their gloomy prophecies do not materialize. Nobody will invest or allocate loans in a country or a region suspected of never-ending economic and political chaos. Thus the doomsday forecasts may prove to be self-fulfilling prophecies. On the other hand the great lack of attention to falsification results in little debate on prognoses and the predicted macrosocial scenarios. This absence of debate implies losses for social science, because unlike visions, predictions can be proved or disproved. Prognoses in a way reflect the efficiency of scientific inquiry, of the cognitive analytic act, and even if they fail, their failure helps to identify neglected explanatory variables, and thus raise new questions for social science. The next issue then is the problems associated with forecasting in social science and specifically in transitology.

The Obsession With Predicting The "Inevitable"

The wish to predict the future is the second item on Hirschman's list of factors responsible for the lack of communication and intellectual exchange among the older views of market society. As an explanation he mentions a psychological factor: social scientists had wanted "to impress the general public by proclaiming some inevitable outcome of current processes" (Hirschman 1992a: 139). But for social analysis, there is a trade-off between embracing complexity and having predictive power. Neglecting the former in favor of the latter usually results in an increased chance for failed predictions. Up to this point Hirschman's argument fits the case of postcommunism debate. Similar to their historical predecessors, advocates of rival views on postcommunism frequently made predictions that mostly failed. Given the presented and many additional obstacles to reliable prognoses, neither is it surprising that most recent predictions have proved to be failures, nor is it difficult, intellectually challenging to find the reasons for the failures. ₂₉

However, there are two important questions that arise in connection with the failed prophecies on the likely dynamics of postcommunist transformation. These are: (1) what can we learn from the prediction failures, and (2) what are the specific factors, in addition to the general ones observed by Hirschman, which make for the transitologists' obsession with future?

As to the first question I believe that there are three messages to be taken seriously in social science: first, past is no fate; second, present is no fate either; and third, the market society has dramatically changed towards the end of the XXth century.

The failure of universal prognoses stemming from the "Leninist legacy" thesis indicates that the past—even a communist one—does not predetermine future. As it looks by now, a number of East European countries manage to cope with their Leninist legacy. Faced with this fact social science has to ask, what the specific conditions are under which past legacies prevail and impair successful transformation. Or alternatively, what are the conditions under which legacies can be transcended, and can even become assets for postcommunist capitalism?

Present is not fate: this is clear from the failure of prophecies of serious disruptions of political stability and the breakdown of new democracies based on the assumption that economic frustration breeds political discontent. Faced with the fact that the unprecedented economic decline and social dislocation have not resulted in region-wide political breakdown under postcommunism, social science has to reconsider the earlier assumptions on the political impact of economic crises. It has to explore: in what way, other than precipitating systemic collapse, economic crises might affect the political dynamics of transforming societies.

Finally, the failure of some of the prognoses stemming from evolutionary, path-dependentist approaches underlying the communist assets thesis suggests, that the choice of economic development paths is subject to international constraints. Development paths seem to be constrained at least as much by the arrangements of integrated world economy, which the new Eastern capitalisms want to accommodate, and by the global actors, as by their past legacies (Bohle 1997). The latter seem to account for the individual risks and opportunities associated with the various East European governments' commitment to "going global" by becoming integrated.

With the second question I come back to the original topic of my inquiry: what explains the transitologists' rush to macrosocial prognoses even if the postcommunist transformation has been "a bizarre time to engage in prediction" (Bunce 1993: 42). ₃₀

My answer concludes that in addition to the general psychological temptation to predict, other specific and forceful incentives were also at work. I believe that paradoxically the failure to foresee the collapse of communism might have urged social science to predict the likely dynamics of—at least—the successor system and to "correct" the past failure by new "more adequate" prophecies. Also fuelling self-criticism and doubts about the claim to predictive power, this failure might have substantially increased social scientists' interest in the future. John Kenneth Galbraith forcefully articulates the disappointment and the self-critical stance when writing that, "The greatest economic failure of our time, needless perhaps to say, was in not foreseeing the recent revolutionary changes in Central Europe and the Soviet Union" (Quoted by Wojtyna 1992: 158). ₃₁ Similar processes might have been in motion in the powerful international organizations, which, just like social scientists, did not foresee the changes. ₃₂

Beyond the extra motivation provided by the experience of the prediction failure, additional factors originating in the new psychological, political, and institutional environment specific to the mass-production of social science ideas towards the end of the XXth century contributed to the eagerness to engage in prognoses making. Specifically, in the last few decades social science underwent an extensive process of international integration and marketization. After the collapse of communism influential factors pushed social scientists towards hurried prognoses, both on the supply and demand side of this market. Since Valerie Bunce succinctly describes one of the supply side mechanisms, I shall focus on the demand side below. ₃₃

On the demand side, an intensive need for all kinds of forecasts appeared: including economic, social, political, military and, geopolitical prognoses. Furthermore, there was no time to wait until empirical evidence has accumulated making reliable prognoses possible. Both old and new actors on the demand side stressed the significance of the time factor. At the same time that external public and private creditors worried about the future of their old loans and were eagerly looking for new allocations, they wanted information about the "area-risk", and "country-risk" to avoid earlier failures. International organizations; IMF, World Bank, EBRD, GATT, OECD, NATO, and last but not least the European Union, and the governments behind them expected new partners or members from the East. Thus they needed analysis about who these potential partners were in terms of their likely political, economic, and social developments; not only in the medium or long run, but in the short run as well. Foreign, and international, small and large investors searching for new investment opportunities possibilities became interested in the region because of the return on investment they expected. In addition, given the political, economic, and geopolitical interdependence in the region, in order to know for example Hungary's "country-risk", one had to be familiar with Russia's risks as well.

While this demand, as earlier, was primarily met by professional suppliers of predictions,—economic and political research institutes, think-tanks, rating agencies, economic, political and military advisers—, in the early 1990s new developments changed the situation to some extent. Firstly, the trust in these professional groups' ability to prognosticate was undermined as a consequence of their failure to foresee the collapse of communism, (and right after it, the deep and long "transformational recession"). ₃₄ Secondly, because of the fuzziness of the empirical evidence, the professional prophets were in a disarray themselves, and became more open than ever before to absorbing the available—more or less complex and careful—narratives and even visions. Thirdly, the speed, scale and complexity of changes justified and encouraged new non-professional or semi-professional entrants to the market of predictions. Thereby East Europeanist (and, partly, the "generalist") social science arrived at an exceptional period of its existence during which its scenarios, evaluations, and prognoses have been in great demand and could easily reach publicity. Also, for a limited time, and relative to earlier periods, private and public foundations, universities, government agencies, and international organizations channeled generous funding to the research area. Hence social scientists learned they could live on their analyses, forecasts, and recommendations, if they were competitive enough. Finally, the existing institutional framework of social science,—the workshops, networks, scholarships, conferences, scholarly exchange programs, periodicals—was filled with new life, deepened by the exchanges, and by the intensified demand for forecasting the future (or, sometimes the present). Often the show-like stage design and the media interest also strengthened the competitive rather than the cooperative dimension of international scholarly exchange forcing analysts to buttress their identity and to enhance their competitive advantage by original, provocative and extremist predictions.

I do not mean that transitology with its accentuated prophetic orientation crept out of the bank-accounts and safe-deposits of various actors and institutions of global capitalism, only that social science, among many other motives, also felt the challenge of intensified practical interest in the future of the region well before it could be prepared for reliable prognoses. To highlight one peculiar aspect of the recent situation of social science by a somewhat absurd comparison, I just recall that Karl Marx was not urged to hasty speculations on the future of capitalism because his sponsor Engels worried about the return on its investments. Neither did Ludwig von Mises, Friedrich Hayek, or Oskar Lange have to argue on the feasibility and practicability of socialism in order to help forceful players to come to rapid decisions in the context of a forthcoming geopolitical reality or of the practical need for evaluating the "country risk" of Soviet Union, or Fascist Germany. By our times however, the political, financial, and institutional relationship between action and perception, power and social science imagination became more intimate than before. Social scientists, perhaps more than ever before want to know reality in order to change it. In this respect it is telling why Douglas North, a social scientist who is among the last to be blamed with extreme practicist orientations, found it imperative to know more about the interaction between economy and politics. He recently wrote: "The interface between economics and politics is still in a primitive state in our theories, but its development is essential if we are to implement policies consistent with intentions" (North 1997: 17, highlight by B.G.).

The Self-Confidence Of Advisers And Utopists

Last, but not least, if social scientists are driven by the ambition to transform their ideas into policy their resistance to accepting the element of truth in alternative concepts is further magnified. In this respect both the unique historical challenge of prescribing concrete agendas for postcommunism, and new institutional features of the mass-production of social thought pushed many social scientists towards active participation in the process of transformation, and exaggerated the need for self-confidence ideologies like to parade anyway. Two interrelated processes with essentially similar negative effects on scholarly quality have been put in motion: the "adviserism" and the direct political involvement of social science.

As far as adviserism is concerned, it is striking how often recent economic, political and sociology analyses of post-communism end up with policy recommendations or prescriptions for action. A significant part of transitology seems to have given in to the temptation to advise the practitioners of transformation; top politicians and top policy makers, on "what is to be done". Clearly, on the largest scale this is characteristic of economists. But surprisingly, not just economics but sociology and political science as well appear to have elaborated a comprehensive set of economic conditions for democratic stabilization. As also demonstrated in the preceding sections, the list of policy suggestions includes adequate welfare provisions, less haste in economic transformation, various tactics of reform sequencing, engagement of labor unions and works councils in economic restructuring and privatization, employee ownership experiments, and neocorporatist strategies (Offe 1993, Walton, and Seddon 1994, Devatripont, and Roland, 1994, Roland 1992, Ost 1992, and 1995). The latter conditons almost look like a social democratic counterpart to IMF-World Bank conditionality and they are in fact often in conformity with the views propagated by another circle of international organizations and sponsors of research: the International Labor Organization, the United Nations, a number of agencies of the European Union, or the Friedrich Ebert Stiftung. It is not my aim here to point out that most advice occurred when legislative or executive efforts in the proposed direction had already been underway. Nor is it my intention to criticize the values underlying the advises. Rather my point is that reliable analysis is frequently substituted for or preceded by practical recommendations. Thus adviserism easily becomes a hindrance to open-minded, complex, and reliable conceptualization. In addition, an adviser, a social and economic "technician" more easily than a critical social scientist may believe that his/her prescriptions are universal, and diversity and specificity do not really matter. This highlights one more factor of the difficulty of the perception of dialectic, and diversity. ₃₅

Yet another consequence of social scientists' wish to translate views into policy, namely their direct or indirect involvement in politics, further reduces their ability to capture complexity and produce reliable results. At one extreme social scientists become top politicians or top-policy makers, yet continue to express social science views and macrosocial prognoses,—under postcommunism this extreme sometimes became the norm. But even in less extreme cases, "To become policy, ideas must link up with politics—the mobilization of consent for policy (Gourevitch 1989: 87). However, political competition entails mechanisms which may artificially increase the intellectual distance and distort the relationship between ideas. One such mechanism for example is the phenomenon that in order to mobilize political support, ideas often construct themselves as "utopias" and their alternatives as "pathologies". The latter are the merge-terms for all possible negative consequences if the utopia would turn out to lose. ₃₆

In the framework of political competition between utopias and their pathologies, rival views risk to lose even the minimum of mutual respect and the chance for reconciliation. Social science suffers in both of the following ways: its capacity to capture complexity is fatally impaired, and a number of terms which originally served the conceptualization of a particular social phenomenon lose their empirical content and meaning. Instead they become mere catchwords of political discourse. ₃₇

 

6. Conclusions, And Questions For Further Research

In my essay on the short history of social thought on East European transformations, I presented the structure of the discourse on the likely economic, social and political dynamics under postcommunism. For mapping the discourse I chose four influential frequently asserted but mutually contradicting theses, which I called the "free market road to freedom thesis", the "impossibility theorem", the "Leninist legacy thesis", and the "communist assets thesis". The free market road to freedom thesis says that economic liberalism breeds political liberalism, however the impossibility theorem challenges this view arguing that capitalism and democracy are either mutually incompatible or in other versions, that economic liberalism is a threat to political liberalism. Next, the Leninist legacy thesis demonstrates how democracy and marketization are going to be undermined not by their mutual tensions and contradictions, but by the inheritance of Leninist rule; the powerful remnants of the communist society. Finally, the communist assets thesis accepts that the legacy is important for the postcommunist society, but unlike the Leninist legacy thesis, it asserts that its effect can be positive.

While asking about the historical and theoretical roots of the four mutually contradicting theses, I found that they are not new rather they all have their own history. In addition I discovered that while as a first step the debate on postcommunism can be traced back to the rival views of market society, neither the specific historical, nor the specific systemic context of capitalist expansion alone can account for the reincarnation of similar but competing interpretations. Rather the controversy and its pattern are a reflection of the manner social scientists think about systems and systemic change in general. Specifically, I argued that the rival views of market society strongly and directly reflect ideologies and visions: radical or conservative, optimist, or pessimist preanalytic cognitive orientations.

The fact that these visions can both be illustrated and refuted by historical examples and have a vast influence on our understanding of the world is an explanation of the visionary and ideological manner in which many social scientists think about postcommunism. But what I believe is wrong about the transformation debate is not that many participants are "visionary" and "ideological". Rather what constitutes the problem is that much of the discourse seems to have got stuck at the stage of rival archetypal preanalytic cognitive orientations, and the next step, the analytic act of scientific inquiry, often does not follow. I argue that this state of art is mainly reflected by the fact that transitology exhibits a rivalry without reconciliation and fails to find a balance between two equally important missions of social science: the task of embracing complexity, and having predictive power.

Reconciliation between the rival views is easier if attention is paid to the contradictions and the diversity of reality. But many transitologists could not capture complexity because no less than their predecessors in social thought they were exposed to the fallacies and temptations characteristic to the production of ideas in general: in Hirschman's terms, the difficulty of perception of diversity and of dialectic processes; the psychological temptation to predict the "inevitable"; and the self-confidence ideologies like to parade. For these features, social science usually pays with failed predictions and a loss of the complex picture of society.

However, I also believe that a number of transitologists failed to realize their potential because their scientific inquiry has been constrained by the absence of, or by their lack of knowledge of supportive evidence, and by their disinterest in details and diversity. Hence arguing that commonalties were more important than differences they preferred to conceptualize the likely dynamics of the "systemic core" rather than its varied appearances and the fate of the entire region rather than that of individual countries. The direct implication was that often the macrosocial prognoses and scenarios were directly inferred from visions which happened to be mainly the reincarnations of centuries-old intellectual perspectives. Thus follows the conclusion that the price transitology had to pay in terms of failed predictions and loss of the complex picture of society is significantly higher than paid by its predecessors. Visions are not falsifiable and cannot be declared as failures on the basis that their prognoses did not materialize. Consequently, too little debate about the prognoses and the predicted macrosocial scenarios takes place, even though unlike visions, predictions can be debated, since they reflect the efficiency (or in this case, more often than not, the inefficiency) of scientific inquiry.

Finally I showed how the negative effects of the usual fallacies and temptations characteristic of the production of social thought in general were magnified by the influence of specific conditions: the historically unique properties of the postcommunist transformation and a number of new psychological and institutional features of the mass-production of social science ideas at the end of the XXth century. Many transitologists acted as advisers, and their adviserism often resulted in the substitution of cognitive for an activist attitude to society, and of mature and reliable analyses for practical recommendations. Other social scientists driven by their wish to translate some of their ideas into policy, flirted with politics with a tendency of presenting their rivals' views as the pathologies of their own utopias. The dramatically increased demand for all types of hasty predictions, and the specific forms of institutionalization of social science in our times gave impetus for both of these tendencies which in turn enhanced the bias for rivalry against reconciliation.

Consequently, transitology's contribution to our understanding of social change has been modest. At least in terms of theoretical agenda-setting, the "value-added" component of the postcommunism ideology-map is quite unsubstantial. Therefore, a pessimistic and ironic conclusion could claim that, while the emergence of the new systems has been unfolding at a rapid speed and a large scale in the postcommunist East, their conceptualization could not go far beyond the first step of routine-exercises. At the end of the XXth century history luckily surprised social scientists with a complex social laboratory that allows the undertaking of new intellectual experiments. So far however social scientists were capable of little more than testing their predecessors' ideas, and teaching contradicting results.

A less ironic and more optimistic conclusion argues that the opportunities for improvement are abundant. If transitologists are willing to accept that even if none of their theories are universal, but all may be relevant in different countries or different times, as Hirschman suggested, they will find opportunities to creatively combine the theses on the "free market road to freedom", on the "impossibility", the "Leninist legacy", and the "communist assets", and probably a number of other approaches. This acceptance, however, implies that transformation studies will become less "elegant" than before and more eclectic than reductionist.

Finally, while many predictions failed, some came true. Much can be learned even from failed prophecies, because they may tell about neglected explanatory variables, and thus raise new questions for social science. I believe there are three major lessons to be learned from the prognostication failures of transitology: first, past is no fate, second, present is no fate either, and third, the market society has dramatically changed towards the end of the XXth century, and we have to pay attention to this.

The failure of universal prognoses stemming from the "Leninist legacy" thesis indicates that the past—even a communist one—does not predetermine future. As it looks by now, a number of East European countries manage to cope with their Leninist legacy. Faced with this fact social science has to ask, what the specific conditions are under which past legacies prevail and impair successful transformation. Or alternatively, what are the conditions under which legacies can be transcended, and can even become assets for postcommunist capitalism?

Present is not fate: this is clear from the failure of prophecies of serious disruptions of political stability and the breakdown of new democracies based on the assumption that economic frustration breeds political discontent. Faced with the fact that the unprecedented economic decline and social dislocation have not resulted in region-wide political breakdown under postcommunism, social science has to reconsider the earlier assumptions on the political impact of economic crises. It has to explore: in what way, other than precipitating systemic collapse, economic crises might affect the political dynamics of transforming societies.

Finally, the failure of some of the prognoses stemming from evolutionary, path-dependentist approaches underlying the communist assets thesis suggests, that the choice of economic development paths is subject to international constraints. Development paths seem to be constrained at least as much by the arrangements of integrated world economy, which the new Eastern capitalisms want to accommodate, and by the global actors, as by their past legacies The latter seem to account for the individual risks and opportunities associated with the various East European governments' commitment to "going global" by becoming integrated.

 

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Endnotes

Note 1: An earlier version of my essay was presented at the workshop on "Theories and approaches" organized by the E.S.F. Network on "Social transformations in Central and Eastern Europe" in Paris, 14-17 May 1998. To the recent draft I got helpful comments from Lóránd Ambrus Lakatos, Valerie Bunce, Michel Dobry, Phillippe Schmitter, and Sid Tarrow. In Fall 1998 the draft was also discussed at the Political Economy Research Colloquium of the Department of Government of Cornell University. I got inspiring and helpful comments and criticisms from the members of the Colloquium including Valerie Bunce, Richard Bensel, Peter Katzenstein, Jonas Pontusson, Hector Schamis, and Christopher Way. Back.

Note 2: Of course, I am not alone in this enterprise. Other recent attempts at structuring the transformation debate by classifying rival views of various kinds include Murrell (1992b), Bunce (1993), Bruszt (1993), Schmitter, and Karl (1994), Bunce (1995), Crawford, and Lijphart (1997), Tilly (1997), Stark, and Bruszt (1998, esp. Chapter 4). Back.

Note 3: It was Hirschman's path-breaking essay on "Rival Views of Market Society" (1992a) which inspired me to revisit his topic and findings in the new context of postcommunist transformations. Back.

Note 4: The free market road to freedom thesis, both in its straightforward and inverse formulations, has numerous advocates. In line with Sachs, Lipton or Gaidar, Anders Aslund, an adviser to Gaidar wrote that, "A worrying question is for how long the current anomaly with state ownership and democracy may last in East and Central Europe. The experiences of Latin American countries with their largely state owned industries suggest an imminent danger of populist authoritarian dictatorship with chronic economic imbalances, if privatization does not proceed fast enough" (Aslund 1991: 19). For similar views see also Killick, and Stevens (1991: 15). Back.

Note 5: More specifically, the communist state bureaucracy which may ally with workers and managers in the declining economic sectors to help populist politicians to come to power (Sachs 1990: 21), or "the former party nomenclature" resisting the transition (Killick and Stevens, 1991: 15) form the politically threatening part of the stalinist legacy. Back.

Note 6: "Reliance on economic liberalism in the context of East European transformations according to this view includes establishing individual property rights, promoting market-based inequalities, supporting the evolution of a strong bourgeoisie, and limiting state intervention in the economy. Political liberalism, threatened by economic liberalism, however denote: universal tolerance, the systemic guarantee of suffrage, freedom of speech and association, and of democratic political representation. (Ost 1995: 200) Back.

Note 7: For a similar view and similar scenario see also Hausner (1992: 124-8), and Roland (1992: 1). Back.

Note 8: In a framework similar to Elster's John Walton and David Seddon predict that, "if government economic reform cannot be made compatible with adequate welfare provision to constitute the basis for a broadly acceptable, new moral economy (combining economic development with social justice) within the existing framework of the state, then the rule of law will all too easily be disregarded on a massive scale and popular protest against the cost of economic liberalization all too easily be engulfed in the monstruous growth of ethnic violence and nationalism and break apart that framework from top to bottom" (Walton, and Seddon 1994: 328). Back.

Note 9: Still a third version of the Leninist legacy thesis underlies Claus Offe's argument. He wrote that the nostalgia for the remarkable and attractive accomplishments of the past in terms of security and equality—that is, the positive components of the Leninist legacy—also may cast a shadow on the prospects of the transformation. "[S]izable portions of the population of postcommunist societies will be inclined to reason that 'we have given up much of the beneficial aspects of the old regime without having been able to redeem the promises of the new.' Needless to say, it is quite likely that this kind of evaluative perceptions may help to mobilize political forces of a reactionary, populist, authoritarian, and chauvinist kind, which in turn can jeopardize the accomplishments...thus reversing even the partial modernization that has actually occurred" (Offe 1993: 659-60). Back.

Note 10: See also Bruszt, and Stark 1994, and Chavance, and Magnin 1997 for a similar approach. Back.

Note 11: For an extreme version of viewing the (reformed) party state, and the (reformed, and disciplined) public sector as a whole as an "asset" see Michael Burawoy's argument in the context of comparing the Russian and the Chinese economic reform performance, "For the Russian 'reformers' the party-state was so morally and politically repugnant and its incumbents so corrupt and venal that the destruction of the state apparatus was worth any price. The Chinese 'reformers,' on the other hand, were prepared to go to any lengths to preserve the party state...at the present time the Chinese strategists can look back on a period of continuous growth, while Russia's reformers seem to have destroyed the economic capacity of their society in the process of saving it from the state" (Burawoy 1996: 1105). Back.

Note 12: In conformity with Hirschman's interpretation, I use the term "possibilist" to characterize approaches which do not accept the "deep structuralist" determinist view that "given such and such a structural condition, the outcome was preordained" (Hirschman, 1992b: 171). Back.

Note 13: In the context of the postcommunism ideology map Phillipe Schmitter asked about the history of individual social scientists' preference for one or another view, and about the direction and frequency of changes of views in the sense that for example somebody started as an advocate of the free market road to freedom thesis, but later became a believer in the leninist legacy thesis. I believe that these questions are both interesting and important, but I cannot address them in the present essay. Back.

Note 14: Related to this observation Mihály Laki expressed the view that one should be careful with the suggestion of unrestricted similarity between the rival views of market society, and the rival views of its version under postcommunism. Because of the variation of their historical, philosophical, and contextual environment these apparently identical statements may express actually very different theoretical substances. I believe that this problem is relevant and should be explored by further research. However, I do not think that the similarity of the two collections of rival views is purely formal. Back.

Note 15: The term was coined by Károly Polányi (1946). Back.

Note 16: Apart from the fact that such an explanation would run counter to the extensive literature both on the unique historical properties of postcommunist transformation and on the significant changes of capitalism over the past centuries, conceptualizing the postcommunist transformation mainly "by where it is heading" is not good social science methodology anyway (Bunce 1993: 36). Back.

Note 17: I shall present the rival views of socialism in a logical but not in a historical sequence. Back.

Note 18: For an excellent summary and evaluation of the debate, see Heilbroner (1990). Back.

Note 19: In this respect, the radical slogan known from the postcommunism debate, "You don't try to cross a chasm in two jumps" (Quoted in Sachs 1990), seems a late reincarnation of the manner Oskar Lange encouraged the socialist government to act rapidly and decisively. In a section of his essay called "On the Policy of Transition" Lange wrote "a socialist government really intent upon socialism has to decide to carry out its socialization program at one stroke, or to give it up altogether. The very coming into power of such a government must cause a financial panic and economic collapse. Therefore, the socialist government must either guarantee the immunity of private property and private enterprise in order to enable the capitalist economy to function normally, in doing which it gives up its socialist aims, or it must go through resolutely with its socialization program at maximum speed. Any hesitation, any vacillation and indecision would provoke the inevitable economic catastrophe" (Lange and Taylor 1964: 124-5). Back.

Note 20: Actually, Hayek accepted that a collectivist economy is theoretically possible but impracticable. Back.

Note 21: Friedman wrote "that there is an intimate connection between economics and politics, that only certain combinations of political and economic arrangements are possible, and that in particular, a society which is socialist cannot also be democratic, in the sense of guaranteeing individual freedom" (Friedman 1962: 8). Back.

Note 22: Actually, the "capitalism-shackles thesis" appears in the argument that after the socialist revolution the development of collectivist norms and the spirit of mutual help and cooperation is constrained by the "anachronistic survivals" of egoism, and other bourgeois, or petty bourgeois values. Back.

Note 23: The role of radical and conservative visions during the postcommunist transformation was first raised by Murrell (1992b). Back.

Note 24: I do not mean, that Marxism as a whole lacks "radicalism" only that in the given set of dimensions, and with respect to the presented thesis, it is both conservative and optimist. Back.

Note 25: When introducing the selected rival views Hirschman stresses that "there was an almost total lack of communication between the conflicting theses. Intimately related intellectual formations unfolded at great length, without ever taking cognizance of each other" (Hirschman 1992a: 106). Back.

Note 26: In their book called "Reform in Eastern Europe" five influential economists Olivier Blanchard, Rudiger Dornbusch, Paul Krugman, Richard Layard, Lawrence Summers,—several of whom became adviser to one or another East European government later—, point out in advance that, "Our goal is to identify and clarify the main issues and choices rather than to draw a detailed road map. We do not emphasize differences across Eastern European countries...And while we occasionally refer to the Soviet Union, we make no attempt to deal with the specific political and economic aspects of reform in that country" (Blanchard, et. al. 1991: XXII). Similarly, Jon Elster wrote, "Vital distinctions among the various countries are ignored. For some purposes it may be ridiculous to treat China and the Czech and Slovak Republic within the same framework. Yet I believe that all of these countries have some dilemmas in common, if we define them at a sufficiently high level of abstraction. To discuss exceptions and solutions, however, one would almost certainly have to use concepts of finer grain, and look at each individual country" (Elster 1993: 267). Or, as Ken Jowitt put it, "I have obviously, if not explicitly argued that the historical differences between countries and their current modes of transition from Leninism are not as important as the similarities" (Jowitt 1992: 219-20). Back.

Note 27: Ironically however, the evolutionary path-dependentists' susceptibility to the diversity of the cases did not always go hand in hand with their intellectual openness to the diversity of explanatory concepts, that is to recognizing the element of truth in their rival's argument. On the resulting conceptual problems and prediction failures see Bohle (1998). Back.

Note 28: This was wittingly put by Stephen Holmes: "In periods of dizzingly rapid social change, exactly as in wartime, scholars and policy analysts are exceptionally dependent on journalists while journalists, in turn, rely intuitively on metaphors to knead and color 'typical' anecdotes, making them chime with popular expectations and apprehensions" (Holmes 1996: 28). Back.

Note 29: However, I engaged in this venture and developed the argument that most predictions failed because they were ideologically biased and were based on questionable theoretical premises, such as economic determinism, teleology, universalism, and globalism. See for the details Greskovits (1998). To this list of reasons for the low survival rate of predictions, I want to add one more problem originally raised by Bunce: the improper choice of analogies. As put by Bunce, "When social scientists confront bewildering situations, they often turn to analogies in order to create a more coherent picture" Bunce 1993: 39). Bunce argues that the more "bewildering" the given situation and the more "fuzzy" the available evidence, the greater is the chance for choosing the wrong analogy and for "misplacing stress". For the choice of the wrong analogy Bunce's main example is the application of the lessons of the Latin American democratization experience to Eastern Europe. While in general, I share Bunce's scepticism on the use of analogies in the context of postcommunism, I am more optimistic in the specific case of the Latin American democratization. I believe that this analogy provides useful points of reference and contrasts to our understanding of East European transformations provided that the right questions are asked and the analogy is not overused. I consider the passionate dispute between Bunce, and Schmitter and Karl on the appropriateness of analogies and on the tensions between "area-specific" and "generalist" approaches among the theoretically richest contributions to the transformation debate. (See Bunce 1993, Schmitter, and Karl 1994, Bunce 1995, and Karl, and Schmitter 1996) Back.

Note 30: An alternative could have been to adopt a "wait and see" attitude by taking seriously that "the transitional period is quite unlike other types of social situations. It has its own logic; it requires very different assumptions and concepts than social scientists usually employ; and it is quite resistant to prediction" (Bunce, and Csanádi 1992: 221). Back.

Note 31: Galbraith, just like many other social scientists had good reasons for self-criticism, because as late as 1984 he asserted, "That the Soviet economy has made great material progress in recent years...is evident both from the statistics...and from the general urban scene...One sees it in the appearances of solid well-being of the people on the streets, the close to murderous traffic, the incredible exfoliation of apartment houses, and the general aspects of restaurants, theatres, and shops...Partly, the Russian system succeeds because, in contrast with the Western industrial economies, it makes full use of its manpower" (Quoted by Aslund 1991: 31). Back.

Note 32: "Even as late as 1979 the World Bank published a long and detailed study of Romania—the most Stalinist of the Eastern bloc. The Bank found, that from 1950 to 1975 the Romanian economy had grown faster than any other country in the world (9.8 percent per annum). The Bank attributed this startling performance to the fact that the government through its system of central planning, had control of all resources. The Bank forecast a rosy future for Romania—growing at 8.7 percent per capita to 1990. Nor was Romania an aberration. The Bank published in the same year of 1979 a most rosy history of, and prognostication for, Yugoslavia" (Walters 1992: 99-100). Back.

Note 33: On the supply side, the specialists in Eastern European politics, economics and societies were joined by the students of Southern European and Latin American economic reform and democratization, who, in the 1980s produced "a rich and seemingly exportable literature...This was further aided by the considerable interest specialists in the above, 'southern' transitions had in the eastern European cases. To be credible theorists of democratization, they needed to expand their focus to include the newest recruits to the democratization process. Moreover, eastern Europe as a whole offered what could be termed an optimal research context. These regimes were similar in history, geographical location, and social structure, yet they varied in their methods of transition" (Bunce 1993: 37). Back.

Note 34: The term "transformational recession" was coined by Kornai (1994). Back.

Note 35: A straightforward formulation of such an attitude is Leszek Balcerowicz's opinion on the necessity of country-specific versus therapy-specific knowledge. He wrote, "Every country is specific in some respect, and the mere fact that a country is specific does not imply that there is any good specific strategy available to cure its basic economic ills. A Chinese and a Russian are different in some respects, but if they have tuberculosis, say, the best therapy available would be the same" (Balcerowicz 1995: 247-8). Back.

Note 36: "[U]topias and pathologies supply the raw material for political debates about the paradigms they express: one way of mobilizing support for a utopia is by suggesting that the only alternative is its pathology—even when the utopia is an unattainable ideal and the pathology an unrealistic threat" (Commisso, et. al. 1992: 27, with reference to Robert Alford's work). Back.

Note 37: A far from complete list of social science terms suffering fatal decline of empirical content and specificity through their politicization in the transformation debate include "third way", "shock therapy", "market socialism", "gradualism", "neoliberalism". On the losses originating in the utopian and pathologic uses of the above terms see Greskovits (1998). Back.