Third Category Of Post Communist States example essay topic

Compare how effectively two or more post communist countries have become institutionalised democratic countries. There is yet no apparent stable democracy formed from a post-communist country. The democracies are still very unstable due to a number of diverse factors. This instability is very obvious in those regions of the formerly communist world where there is warfare, notably in parts of the Soviet Union. But even where there is no definite fighting, there are frequent symbols of instability.

These are the frequency in which there are elections, changes in government and government policy. Constant change in government polices and non-adoption of policies. 'Constant reforming of political parties and coalitions; frequent constitutional changes and so on'. According to Disk & Karatnycky three types of states emerged from the communist regime. The first would be where the communist regime had been overthrown and replaced by democratically elected leaders. Secondly a state where both democracy and communism were forced to coexist in an uneasy alliance.

The third type was where the communists still ruled but in the guise of democrats. I am going to take one country from each of these types of states to examine. Firstly from the first category we will look at Armenia. By 1988 it was democratized and had a strong government.

However where Armenia was concerned the government consisted of non-communists and former communist opposition. The press had a free rein and all opposition groups were allowed to run. In the second category, During the summer of 1992 'Ukraine, which had elected a former communist party ideology secretary as president, had a government in which the old guard apparatchiki constituted the majority'. The press in the Ukraine were allowed have as much freedom as they wanted the television stations were strictly controlled. At this time the parliament held a communist majority. By 1992 the leading democratic groups brought about by demand the resignation of the government and held a new national election resulting in the formation of a strong democratic coalition government.

Finally the third category of post communist states, where the democrats are only communists in hiding. The main country we will look at is Kazakhstan, there the media and press were held under tight control. However protests were not really suppressed but the authorities did stop the publication of eleven unusual publications through harsh measures. Their leader President Nazarbayev showed no sign of allowing the democratisation of his government.

He used the old communist ways to retain his power. One of the many reasons for the instability of these states was the rejection of exterior supremacy. There is a very under developed independent society in most post-communist countries. This can be explained by the fact that many of these countries had no experience of liberal democracy in the pre-communist time in their country. The people of these states also hold excessive faith in the ability of individual leaders. It is worth noting the amount of post- communist states that have voted for strong independent charismatic leaders as opposed to weak coalitions.

The citizens probably have unrealistic aspirations in the early stages. Subsequently, if it becomes clear that the president's capacity to bring rapid, significant change is limited, many formerly supportive citizens become disillusioned with or even hostile towards the president.