Eastern European Studies Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Eastern European Studies - Essay Example It also has practical implications for the lives of citizens of these countries, whose future depends on the development of democracy backed by a robust judicial system. Constitutional reform or engineering toward this end is a daunting task and early signs of this experiment have shown disappointing results1. This essay will take an in-depth look into factors that are holding back constitutional engineering in the Eastern European bloc; and especially focus on how the Soviet legacy is still influencing crucial areas of reform. The ongoing transformation from state communism to a free-market economic system in Eastern European countries is unprecedented in its scope and wide-ranging in its impact. Given that communism radically altered major institutions in these countries, it should come as no surprise that the early stages of the reform process have not been fruitful. Since economic growth is a key indicator of a stable constitutional structure, it is instructive to look into this facet of a nation's health. It turns out that the degree of economic contraction is larger than what was predicted by analysts. This trend can be observed in the republics of former U.S.S.R as well. For example, â€Å"With the important caveat that the rise in private sector activity may not be fully captured in the official statistics, the drop in output in the region since 1989 is now estimated to have reached 20 percent, and for some countries it has exceeded 35 percent. There has been some progress in the implementation of reforms in Eastern Europe, but the supply response thus far has been limited. Signs of a bottoming out of the contraction can be discerned in some countries, but further output losses may yet be in store. In the republics of the former U.S.S.R., the reform process has barely started.† 2 The transformation from communism to democracy involves radical overhaul of former authoritarian institutions. Hence, political commentators were under no illusion about the turbulences it is going to involve. Already, in the twenty years since the collapse of the Soviet Union, three former communist countries of the union have seen political upheavals. The Rose Revolution threw out Eduard Shevardnadze in Georgia and brought to power a 36-year-old lawyer from New York. The Orange Revolution that followed in 2004 handed power to Viktor Yushchenko, who is known to have the backing of Washington. Yushchenko's election victory was disputed by the opposition party and he narrowly escaped an assassination bid as well. Similarly, the Tulip Revolution of 2005 in Kyrgyzstan removed dictatorial president Askar Akayev (who eventually took refuge in neighbouring Russia) and in his stead brought the opposition leader to power, whose election rhetoric was centred on constitutional reform. These examples show the magnitude of the task of bringing democracy to the region which has not yet come out from the communist hangover. At first these so-called revolutions w ere hailed in the Western press as the beginning of a new era of prosperity and progress for these countries. But the truth is far from this idealization. These three 'revolutions' are now recognized as total failures. In fact, â€Å"no fresh heroes rose from the grass roots, swept into power by a newly robust civil society