Frankfurter Institut für Transformationsstudien. Ivan Bernik

Transcription

1 Ivan Bernik Political Culture in Post- Socialist Transition: Radical Cultural Change or Adaptation on the Basis of Old Cultural Patterns? No. 09/00 Frankfurter Institut für Transformationsstudien

2 Ivan BERNIK Political Culture in Post-Socialist Transition: Radical Cultural Change or Adaptation on the Basis of Old Cultural Patterns? Prof. Dr. Ivan Bernik is professor of sociology at the University of Lubljana and visiting professor at the Frankfurt Institute for Transformation Studies (FIT) at the European University Viadrina, Frankfurt (Oder). The FIT is supported as an innovation college by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG).

3 Political Culture in Post-Socialist Transition: Radical Cultural Change or Adaptation on the Basis of Old Cultural Patterns? 1. Egalitarian syndrome and civilisational incompetence: A latent cultural matrix of socialist societies? The starting point of this analysis will be the concept of egalitarian syndrome that was defined and sociologically elaborated by J. Županov in his article Egalitarianism and Industrialism published in On the basis of some surveys of attitudes towards social inequalities in Yugoslavia, Županov concluded that egalitarianism, i.e. a demand that economic and other social rewards should be distributed more or less equally among the incumbents of functionally different roles, was a prevailing distributive norm in Yugoslav society. This would have remained a rather unimportant statement, if Županov had not gone further by arguing that in Yugoslav society egalitarianism did not exist on its own but as a central axis of a broader complex, which represents (represented, I. B.) a set of cognitive perspectives, ethical principles, social norms and collective attitudes (Županov 1970: 21). He termed this complex egalitarian syndrome and claimed that it consisted of besides egalitarianism a cognitive perspective of zero-sum-economy, redistributive ethics, fear of private (individual) initiative, anti-professionalism, intellectual levellingdown and anti-intellectualism (see Županov 1970: 21-39). His analysis of egalitarian syndrome structure led him to the conclusion that egalitarianism in the economic sphere... requires (required, I. B.) authoritarianism in the political sphere, i.e. a specific redistributive role of the state, coalescence of the Party and the state and centralisation of political power (Županov 1970: 29). Therefore, egalitarian syndrome was basically composed of two sets of complementary value orientations and attitudes of egalitarian and authoritarian ones. The values and attitudes favouring egalitarian distribution of economic rewards were, according to his analysis, inextricably linked to the support for an authoritative state which was supposed to take care of egalitarian expectations. The main thrust of Županov s analysis was to show the contradictory societal functions of egalitarian syndrome. By preventing full use of available human and organisational resources, the egalitarian syndrome was, according to his analysis, an important obstacle for the development of Yugoslav society towards a full-fledged industrial society. But at the same time it contributed significantly to the stability of the socialist regime. The stabilising and legitimising function of egalitarian syndrome was related to the fact that it provided a basis for a stable interaction between the socialist political elite and the strategic parts of population, especially manual workers. Values and expectations implied in egalitarian syndrome not only legitimised the redistributive role of the socialist state, but they also provided legitimacy to the ruling elite as long as it was able and willing to fulfil the egalitarian expectations of the majority of population. In other words, egalitarian syndrome

4 2 F.I.T. Discussion Paper 09/00 provided a cultural framework for an exchange in which support for socialist regime on the part of the most numerous social strata and the fulfilment of egalitarian expectations on the part of the political elite were traded. Drawing on ethnological studies, Županov explained the existence of egalitarian and authoritarian values and attitudes as a relic of traditional societies once existing on the territory of the socialist Yugoslavia. He assumed that both set of values were so ingrained in the cultural matrices of these societies that they easily survived the change of political regimes and even some far-reaching changes in social structure (e.g. the decline of rural population and emergence of manual workers). Thus the socialist regime, that broke radically with all aspects of tradition on the manifest level, could gain mass support only by taking into account traditional values and expectations widespread in the population. In other words, the emergence and stabilisation of socialist was paradoxically facilitated by traditional cultural patterns. This led Županov to the conclusion that the main obstacles for a thorough modernisation of Yugoslav society were in the inherited and rather immutable cultural sphere. On the basis of later studies of modernity of socialist societies and modernisation perspectives of post-socialist societies (see Adam 1989, Bernik 1989, Eisenstadt 1992, Tiryakian 1994a) it can be argued that Županov s analysis does not deserve attention only as an early endogenous attempt (i.e. written by social scientist from a socialist society) to analyse critically the developmental potentials of a socialist society. The theoretical logic of his analysis and even its main conclusions resemble strongly to the results of recent studies. There is almost a striking similarity among his study and the studies of P. Sztompka, the most prolific proponent of the view that in analysing processes of post-socialist change social scientists should focus primarily on the cultural imponderables of social change (Sztompka 1998). According to Sztompka, modern social structures presuppose the existence of a complex set of rules, norms and values, habits and reflexes, codes and matrixes, blueprints and formats, which he designates as civilisational competence (Sztompka 1993: 88). The components of this competence are enterprise, civic, discursive and everyday culture (see Sztompka 1993: 88-89). According to Sztompka, the former socialist countries were not able to develop satisfactorily any of the components of cultural competence partly because of their traditional cultural background, but mostly because of the negative cultural effects of socialist regimes: The decades of real socialism not only blocked the appearance of civilisational competence, but in many ways helped to shape contrary cultural syndrome civilisational incompetence (Sztompka 1993: 89). Although mostly generated by the socialist regime, the civilisational incompetence has gained considerable autonomy and persistence; that is why, as argued by Sztompka, it has influenced and will influence the developmental chances of post-socialist societies to the extent that some breakthroughs achieved by the post-socialist revolutions can be endangered.

5 I. Bernik: Political Culture in Post-Socialist Transition 3 Although Županov s and Sztompka s analyses are temporally separated by more than three decades, of which the last one has been characterised by an historical rupture marking the death of a social world and the emergence of a new world on the historical stage (Tiryakian 1994b: 131), they share similar views of the cultural characteristics of socialist systems and of their functions. These similarities can be briefly summarised in three points: 1. Both authors converge on claim that socialist societies were characterised by a broad consensus regarding the key value orientations. According to Županov, the egalitarian syndrome was accepted at least by the most numerous and from the point of view of the political elite strategic social strata and in Stompka s opinion the civilisational incompetence was a common cultural pattern in socialist societies. As these value orientations were not unrelated to the interests of the ruling elite, both authors suggest that the socialist elite was successful in establishing its cultural hegemony. Županov indicates that this aim was achieved in a rather passive way. i.e. by the elite s successful adaptation to and reliance on the traditional cultural patterns, whereas Sztompka stresses that cultural incompetence was mostly a result, although not always intended, of socialist elite s indoctrination of and control over population. Both analyses tacitly suggest that this hegemony was not affected by the occasional regime crises; according to Županov egalitarian syndrome remained a stable characteristic of Yugoslav society despite its adverse economic effects and Sztompka leaves no doubt that civilisational incompetence did not lost any influence even in the period of disintegration of socialist economic and political order. Moreover, he even believes that this cultural heritage survived the collapse of socialist regime and that it is the most vicious legacy that communism has left behind (Sztompka 1993: 87). 2. Both authors also converge in their claim that the prevailing cultural patterns have shown high persistence and internal consistency despite changing economic and political circumstances. In this respect, they share a widespread belief that the sphere of culture is much more resistant to change than other societal spheres (see Dahrendorf 1990: 93; Andorka 1993: 334; Tiryakian 1994b: 141). Županov sees egalitarian syndrome as a vicious legacy of traditional societies which was in socialist society only adapted to the regime needs. The fate of the syndrome after the fall of socialist regimes could not be a research topic in the seventies, but Zupanov would have undoubtedly agreed with the claim proposed by Sztompka that its key components would survive the collapse of socialist regimes and influence the developmental potentials of post-socialist societies. Although Sztompka does not see civilisational incompetence as a relic of traditional society but as a more recent and endogenous product of socialist regime, he firmly believes that it has been able to outlive the conditions in which it emerged. By stressing the persistence of the prevailing cultural patterns in socialist societies, both authors suggest that the cultural sphere was internally heterogeneous and characterised by contradictions

6 4 F.I.T. Discussion Paper 09/00 and conflicts. They only admit that there were systemic tensions between the rather immutable cultural sphere and other more dynamic societal spheres. 3. As already indicated, both authors also claim that the cultural patterns that prevailed in socialist societies were incompatible with the modernisation of these societies. The explicit concern of Županov s analysis was to explain how and why egalitarian syndrome blocked emergence of modern economy in Yugoslav society; But at the same time he also indicated that it legitimated the socialist regime. In a similar vein, Sztompka argues that civilisational incompetence was the main reason why the socialist modernisation project in reality led to a fake modernity, i.e. a type of society which was modern in some respects but in other respects it was characterised by vestiges of traditional, pre-modern society (Sztompka 1994: 137). They both suggest that the prevailing cultural patterns not only prevented a thorough modernisation of socialist societies but they also significantly contributed to accumulation of contradictions and tensions in these societies. Considering this, it is not surprising that Županov was very pessimistic about the possibilities of socialist societies to modernise at least the economic sphere and that Sztompka argues that a precondition for the stabilisation of post-socialist breakthroughs is a development of modern cultural patterns, i.e. of civilisational competence. If not as representative, these two studies can be undoubtedly considers as idealtype examples of culturalist approach to the analysis of the dynamic of socialist societies and, as far as Sztompka s study is concerned, also to the post-socialist transition. It also implies that they represent well both the advantages and shortcomings of this approach. Our further analysis will take rather ambivalent stance towards the key ideas implied in both studies it will treat them as a productive approach to the study of post-socialist transformation, but at the same time it will try to point to some questions regarding their theoretical consistency and empirical validity. These questions will be dealt with in the next section of our paper. This section will be followed by a brief examination of trends in the research of political culture in post-socialist societies, i.e. of a research field where, in our opinion, the merits and shortcomings of the culturalist approach are especially obvious. By taking a critical stance towards the mainstream research of political culture in postsocialist societies we will try to outline some alternative views regarding the nature and function of political culture in the democratic transition. In the final part of the paper, some hypotheses derived from our understanding of the nature and function of political culture will be tested or at least assessed empirically. 2. Value consensus and value conflict in the post-socialist transformation As already indicated, the most striking point in both analyses of the cultural background of socialist regimes, is their claim that in socialist societies existed a broad consensus regarding the key value orientations. They also leave no doubt that this

7 I. Bernik: Political Culture in Post-Socialist Transition 5 consensus served especially well the interests of the ruling elite. The claim about an undisputed value consensus understandably did not seem contentious at the period of time when Županov analysis was written, but it seems surprising that it appears also in Sztompka s article written after the collapse of the socialist regime. It is surprising that in contrast to Sztompka, who believes that the cultural field was and is dominated by civilisational incompetence, Županov s study indicates that egalitarian syndrome was not shared by all social strata. His analysis leaves no doubt that both egalitarian and authoritarian component of egalitarian syndrome were not accepted by at least two social strata professionals and managers. This can be explained by the fact that egalitarian syndrome was in conflict both with professional vales and interests of these strata (e.g. fear of individual initiative, antiprofessionalism, intellectual levelling-down and anti-intellectualism) and also with their ambitions to increase their share of economic goods (distributive ethics). Županov shows convincingly that under the domination egalitarian syndrome the action potentials of professionals and managers 1 who could have been the main agents of modernisation were strongly limited. But the existence of strata which did not share the value orientations implied in egalitarian syndrome can nevertheless interpreted as a sign that the socialist order was even in the time of its relative stability characterised by different if not conflicting value orientations and that these orientations were strongly related to the interests of individual social strata. It seems highly unlikely that the growing importance of expert knowledge in the seventies and eighties (see Konrad and Szelenyi 1979, Sekulic 1987, Solga 1994) had not contributed to a further value and interest differentiation of socialist society. An additional circumstance which also had strong impact both on interest and value differentiation was growing economic and political crisis of socialist regimes in the eighties. Therefore, it can be reasonably assumed that the maturation of socialist societies were accompanied by the attenuation of value consensus and accumulation of conflict potentials. The most obvious fact supporting this claim was the emergence of different forms of dissent and protest in the eighties which was at the beginning mostly limited to the field of culture. Not surprisingly, the proponents of new ideas and ideals came from the social strata which, according to Županov, already in the sixties did not share the dominant value orientations. This was an obvious sign that the ability of the ruling elite to exert its cultural hegemony was decreasing in the eighties or even did not exist any more. Without taking into account this fact, it seems almost impossible to explain the collapse of socialist regimes. This is undoubtedly a weak point in Sztompka s analysis; although he argues that the revolutions of 1989 in Eastern and Central Europe were a powerful affirmation of human agency (Sztompka 1993: 85), he 1 Due to Yugoslav system of»self-management«, the economic units had some autonomy from the state. It also implied that the interests of managers and political elite were not identical in all respects.

8 6 F.I.T. Discussion Paper 09/00 identifies no social actors whose actions have contributed to the historical breakthroughs, especially in the cultural field. Moreover, he claims that, as he puts it, the avant-garde of civilisational process has yet to emerge. Thus his analysis boils down to an implicit assumption that post-socialist transformation has been generated by systemic tensions and that social actors have yet to adapt to the results of transformation. Because he postulates that transformation process has not implied any substantial cultural change, he must conclude that civilisational incompetence has proved to be a subversive force both against totalitarianism and democracy (Sztompka 1993: 87). This conclusion resembles strongly to the Županov s claim that in the long run the egalitarian syndrome was leading socialist society in a developmental cul-de-sac. Sztompka just adds that cultural heritage of socialist system can, due to its resistance to change, undermine also the historical breakthroughs of post-socialist revolutions. The previous remarks imply also a criticism of the claim that cultural patterns that characterised socialist societies were stable in time to the extent that they could survive the collapse of socialist regime and influence the stability of new order. Even in Sztompka analysis this claim has been simply postulated and upheld despite abundant empirical evidence which can challenge it. It is not surprising that the same author writing in 1998 on trust in Polish society comes to a self-critical conclusion: The extremely pessimistic picture which I painted on the basis of data collected in the early nineties... has been refuted by my current research on the state of trust in Poland... (and) other sources as well. The things are changing for the better much more rapidly than I expected, (Sztompka 1998: 54). Although he does not name it explicitly in his definition of civilisational (in)competence, (dis-) trust is undoubtedly one of its key components. Therefore, the old cultural patterns have not been that immutable as expected. It is again interesting that Županov s analysis of egalitarian syndrome provides some arguments that put in question his assumption about high temporal stability of cultural patterns. These arguments can be found in his finding that in Yugoslav society egalitarianism was not highly valued by all social strata, but mostly by the lower strata. Therefore, this value orientation could have remained socially relatively uninfluential, if it had not been taken into account by the ruling elite. But the elite did not take egalitarianism seriously because it shared the same values with the lower strata (data showed that in Yugoslav society political and economic elite, like other higher social strata, was rather non-egalitarian), but because it was beneficial as far as its legitimacy was concerned. By taking care of egalitarian expectations of lower strata, the elite elicited support from the most numerous social strata. In other words, the lower social strata saw the authoritarian regime as deserving support because it took into account seriously their vital interests epitomised in egalitarianism, or better - as long as it did that. From this point of view, the stability and importance of egalitarian syndrome was not based on a value consensus rooted in tra-

9 I. Bernik: Political Culture in Post-Socialist Transition 7 ditional society but primarily on the needs of the socialist political elite to win mass support. The idea that the stability of socialist regimes was strongly dependent on the exchange between the elite and the lower social strata was well elaborated in the studies of legitimacy crisis of socialist regimes, written in the eighties (see Zaslavsky, 1982, Pakulski 1986, Rychard 1989). These studies showed that legitimacy of socialist regimes was not based on an indisputable consensus between the elite and the most numerous social strata, but it was dependent mostly on elite s ability to fulfil the expectations of masses and/or its ability to control and mould these expectations. Applied to egalitarian syndrome thesis, this would mean that the regime stability was dependent not only on elite s ability to satisfy egalitarian expectations of lower strata but also by the ability to persuade the masses that these expectations are their key expectations. In other words, the support for its authoritarian rule was highly dependent on elite s ability to make egalitarian expectations to the only legitimate expectations of the lower strata. It is not entirely surprising that in the eighties Županov reinterpreted his egalitarian syndrome thesis by arguing that in time of economic crisis of the socialist regime the elite would increasingly seek to strengthen the exchange with industrial (manual) workers who were in his opinion most dependent on elite s paternalism (Županov 1983). But at the same time he also stressed that this would further alienate the elite from other social strata, especially form professionals and managers. Needles to say that this strategy of winning mass acceptance was rather precarious. Analyses of the declining legitimacy of socialist regimes showed that political elite was actually never able because their mass acceptance was strongly dependent on their performance - to win unconditional support from the strategic parts of the population, i.e., to legitimate its rule properly. From the point of view of our analysis it seems especially important that these analyses indicate that the (in-)stability of value orientations has been highly dependent on changes in social structure and interest constellations. Therefore, there are good reasons to expect that in the eighties the socialist system did not only experience deep economic and political crisis but also important reorientation in cultural sphere. The fact that at least some value orientations changed ever prior to system change, or as Sztompka puts it, more rapidly than expected, sheds also some light on the question regarding the possibilities of post-socialist societies to stabilise already achieved modernisation breakthroughs. If one postulates that the basic value orientations have remained unchanged despite deep systemic change, the conclusion that post-socialist societies will long not find way out of cul-du-sac of fake modernity seems inevitable. When the possibility that certain cultural changes occurred even prior to system transformation is taken into account, the collapse of socialist regimes can be interpreted as a conflict of two models of modernisation the socialist one and the one which is based primarily on Western experience (see Eisenstadt

10 8 F.I.T. Discussion Paper 09/ , Andorka 1993). No matter how slow and contradictory is the process of the final decline of the old, flawed modernisation model and the raise of the new one, the emergence of a new modernisation programme necessary implies the emergence of new actors acting on the basis of new value orientations. From this point of view the post-socialist transformation is undoubtedly a powerful affirmation of human agency also in a sense that actors can act against the established cultural patterns and thus set in motion a process of a comprehensive cultural change. In our account of Županov s and Sztompka s analyses of cultural background of socialist order (in Sztompka s case also of post-socialist order) we have tried to show that even their analyses allow much more dynamic understanding of value orientations than they openly admit. We have tried to accentuate those aspects of their analyses which show that cultural patterns are not unrelated to social interests, conflicts and decisions of (collective or individual) social actors. These interrelations are especially obvious in time of rapid social change and can lead, as Sztompka must admit, although it contravenes his theoretical assumptions, to rather rapid change of at least some value orientations. Although Zupanov s analyses do not deal with the post-socialist transformation, he also takes into account that close interrelations between interests of different social strata and value orientations can lead, especially in time of social crises, to growing diversity and even conflictuality of value orientations. Nevertheless, despite some compelling results of their own analysis both authors do not make a further step to reconsider their theoretical postulates regarding the stability of cultural patterns. They both see their transformability more as an exception (or even surprise) than as a rule. In contrast to them, we believe that opposite view is analytically more promising. This view is well epitomised in the following statement: Wahrscheinlich stellen die Wertorientierungen kein geordnetes Gebilde dar, sondern eine zum Chaos und zur Überfülle neigende Ressource, die nicht etwa ein für alle Mal gegeben ist, aus der vielmehr je nah Situation und Bedarf ausgewählt und die je nach Situation und bedarf überhaupt erst reaktualisiert wird. (Pollack 2000: 305). The obvious general analytical advantage of this view is that it makes the stability of value orientations and a (possible) existence of value consensus to an important research problem, i.e. it broadens the scope of research problems by a question under which conditions, if at all, value stability and consensus do emerge. Exactly in this respect seems this approach especially appropriate for study of transitional societies. It can be expected that in those societies the plurality and conflictual nature of value orientations (which can almost border to chaos) is especially pronounced and that social actors have to choose more often than in stable societies between different and even conflicting values orientations. But this also raises the question how these societies reduce the uncertainties stemming form the chaos of value orientations and establish at least a minimum of societal order and stability. In the next section of the paper we will try to analyse briefly how the general dilemmas we identified in Županov s and Sztompka s studies of cultural background

11 I. Bernik: Political Culture in Post-Socialist Transition 9 of socialist and post-socialist societies are dealt with in studies of political culture in post-socialist societies. 3. Cultural preconditions of democracy acceptance in post-socialist societies It is not surprising that in their analyses of cultural background of socialist systems (in Sztompka s case also of post-socialist ones) both Županov and Sztompka give pride of place to political culture. According to Županov, among the functions of egalitarian syndrome the political one was of paramount importance and its other functions were more or less side effects of the political one. The fusion of egalitarianism and authoritarianism implied in egalitarian syndrome provided a mass basis of statism (Županov 1970: 41), i.e. a mass support for an authoritarian socialist state and the ruling communist party. As already indicated, Županov suggests that this support, although in his opinion it was primarily rooted in the traditional cultural patterns, was not entirely spontaneous but organised by the ruling elite. The political culture component is even more obviously incorporated in Sztompka s concept of civilisational (in)competence. Two of the four aspects of civilisational incompetence, the civic and discursive culture, can be subsumed under the concept of political culture. By arguing that socialist and the emerging postsocialist societies have been characterised by the absence of both civic culture and discursive culture, he clearly indicates the centrality of political culture for the understanding of the dynamic of socialist and post-socialist regimes. Although he assumes that the entire social milieu of real socialism acted against the emergence of civilisational competence, he, like Županov, also stresses the active role of socialist elite in shaping the political culture by arguing that political autocracy alienated the masses and blocked the emergence of citizenship (Sztompka 1993: 89). The main ideas of our authors are in line both with the mainstream tradition of political culture research and with the prevailing trends in political culture research in post-socialist societies (see Boulanger 1999: 2-7). The first point which they share with the mainstream tradition of political culture research is the assumption that mass political culture strongly influences the stability of political systems and indirectly the stability of the social order in general. This assumption suggests that a congruency between the politically relevant values, norms and attitudes and the organisational structure of political system is a precondition for long-term stability of the political system. In other words, a broad consensus regarding the desirability of certain political system is a key predictor of its viability. The second point, where our authors and the political culture studies meet, is the assumption that political culture, like other cultural patterns change relatively slowly because, as Sztompka puts it, culture is always a construct which has been developed by many generations, one which has many layers, accumulates and is passed on together with tradition (Sztompka 1998: 52). These two assumptions imply a conclusion

12 10 F.I.T. Discussion Paper 09/00 that an appropriate cultural background of a certain political system normally needs ample time to emerge, but when established it is characterised by a high level of stability irrespective of a political system performance and even of its change. 2 It is often assumed that the thesis about the importance of political culture for the stability of political systems applies especially to democratic systems which are as a rule much more then the other ones dependent on voluntary mass support. But both Županov and Sztompka argue convincingly that also the socialist regimes could not achieve their stability without taking into account the mass responses. As already shown, both of them claim that socialist regimes were characterised by a rather broad value consensus and the political values and orientations were not an exception. In other words, socialist societies were in their opinion characterised by a distinctive political culture appropriate to the authoritarian type of political system. The broad acceptance of authoritarian values, as Županov shows, and the absence of civic and discursive culture, as argued by Sztompka, contributed significantly to the stability of socialist regimes but also to the accumulation of their internal contradictions. Finally, political culture which was congruent with the socialist political system, has shown, as argued by Sztompka, high resilience to change; it has outlived the authoritarian political order and represents one of the main obstacles for the stabilisation of new political order. The claim about the persistence of communist legacy in the sphere of political values and attitudes in the new democratic system and its destabilising functions is broadly accepted in the current political culture research in post-socialist societies. It also implies that majority of this research agrees with the thesis that socialist systems were characterised by a distinctive, consistent and in many respects consensual political culture (see Fuchs 1998: 14). But in contrast to Sztompka which analysis boils down to same general hypotheses on the effects of cultural lag on political processes in post-socialist societies, the majority of political culture research tries to establish empirically the characteristics of political culture in postsocialist societies and the extent of mass support for the democratic regimes. In doing that, they can refer to a well-established tradition of comparative research of political culture. The long research tradition and the practical relevance of these studies probably explain why no other aspect of post-socialist transformation has been studied so extensively. Moreover, it also seems that the post-socialist transformation has contributed to the revival of this tradition and to the marginalisation of other explanation of stability of political systems. 2 It can be also argued that that the key concept used by our authors, especially by Sztompka, and in the mainstream tradition of political culture research are difficult to operationalise or that they, when operationalised, lose most of their initial complexity (see Boulanger 1999: 4). For other remarks on the methodological deficiencies of the prevailing quantitative studies of political culture in post-socialist societies see Plasser and Pribersky (1996: 4-7).

13 I. Bernik: Political Culture in Post-Socialist Transition 11 Despite its current revival, this tradition has besides their merits some obvious weak points both in theoretical and empirical respects. As the general problems implied in the political culture research have already been extensively discussed (see Boulanger 2000: 2-7), we will focus only on some specific problems related to the application of this research pattern to the study of socialist societies. In doing that, we will mostly draw on our previous remarks on the culturalist explanation of both stability and disintegration of socialist regimes implied in the studies of Županov and Sztompka. Precisely we will focus mainly on the theoretical consistency and empirical validity of the claim that political values, norms and attitudes that prevailed in socialist societies have survived the regime transformation rather intact and they have influenced strongly the stability of democratic order. The question how the system change was possible without any substantial change in the prevailing cultural patterns, which we addressed in the previous section, applies well also to the mainstream analyses of the role of political culture in postsocialist transformation. It seems that it is much easier to postulate both the relative stability and homogeneity of political culture under socialism than to explain it. Namely, to argue that the socialist culture has outlived it systemic framework implies to argue that tensions, conflicts and changes which socialists systems experienced in the years before their collapse had no influence on the prevailing political culture. Most of the mainstream analyst of political culture in post-socialist would agree with Sztompka s surprising claim that that the conspirational struggle and contestation against autocratic rule, have drawn large segments of society into peculiar cultural settings, unfortunately not much helpful for producing civilisational competence (Sztompka 1993: 89), i.e. also not helpful for development of democratic political culture. His explanation suggests nothing less than a conclusion that the way in which democracy has been established in socialist societies has not been conducive to the emergence of democratic political culture both on the elite and mass level, but even strengthened the non-democratic one. The democratic organisational forms of political life have come to being in a inimical cultural environment which has from beginning on endangered their existence. This bold claim about the persistence of non-democratic political culture can find little support in the results of more detailed studies. Analysing Hungarian political culture and its development from the late eighties to the mid-nineties A. Agh comes to the conclusion that transformation in Hungary has seen the victory of political subcultures over previous institutions, and led to the establishment of new democratic institutions (Agh 1996: 141). His conclusion suggests that transformation of political culture preceded the transformation of the organisational framework of political life or, as he puts it: The first value conflict had thus been lost by the state and won by civil society in Hungary before the actual political struggle of system change even began (Agh 1996: 132). The results of Agh s study are well complemented by an analysis of the role of intellectuals and their ideology of civil society in the process of democratisation of Central European socialist systems. This analy-

14 12 F.I.T. Discussion Paper 09/00 sis shows that the new political ethos implied in the ideology of civil society was instrumental in dismantling the ideology of socialist elite and in enabling intellectuals to respond sensitively to the dissatisfactions of the People and even to act as the organisers and legitimisers of mass protest (Bernik 1999: 198). These findings allow an interesting but tentative generalisation. They (especially Agh s analysis) suggests that political culture innovations have been initially limited to small groups which had resources to create and disseminate new political value orientations and were able due to set of circumstances generated by the crisis of socialist system to undermine the cultural hegemony of the socialist elite. Precisely, the decisive push for the change of political culture and for undermining of ideological hegemony of the old elite came from a small counter-elite in the form of different, even conflicting, political orientations united only by a narrow consensus regarding the basic principles of democracy. This breakthrough in the transformation of political culture has established preconditions for the building of democratic institutions and they in turn have provided an catalytic framework for the transformation of mass political culture. Therefore, the transformation of political culture and the transformation of the organisational forms of political processes have been strongly interrelated. Considering that, one can speak neither of high persistency of non-democratic political culture nor of en bloc change of nondemocratic to democratic culture. This model may explain well the transformation of elite political culture but is much less promising in explaining the change of mass political culture. It more or less assumes that in the new conditions characterised by the elite consensus on democratic principles and the democratic institutions the emergence of mass support for democracy has been almost imminent. But this assumption begs the question, what has motivated the masses to renounce support for the authoritarian and paternalistic state and to accept new democratic order. Moreover, even if they have been motivated to do that, the question remains whether they have been able to do that considering the fact that the basic political orientations are supposedly learned early in socialisation. Taking into account this questions, it seems highly unlikely that in new democracies the gap between the democratic elite and more or less authoritarian mass political culture, which can generate instability of the new political order will be closed in a short period of time. In our attempt to answer these questions we will refer to the claim (already mentioned in the first section of the paper) that mass support for the socialist regime was strongly dependent on the regime ability to fulfil expectations of masses whereby its ability to control and mould these expectations was also important. As indicated by Županov, the socialist regime had to keep the masses depoliticised and limit their demands and expectations to the sphere of economic well-being and security. Therefore, the mass support for the regime was not based on value commitment to socialist order but was dependent on assessment of the masses whether

15 I. Bernik: Political Culture in Post-Socialist Transition 13 their interests are well cared of by the regime. In other words, the support for regime was mostly conditional, i.e. dependent on its performance. This also implies that manifest socialisation processes had little influence on mass political culture formation but it was mostly learned on the basis of everyday experience with the regime, i.e. people learned to judge and support the regime not on the basis of its political proclamations and promises but on the basis of its deeds. From this perspective, it can be argued that support for an authoritarian and paternalistic state was not a primary characteristic of the mass political culture in mature socialist societies. In the centre of this culture stood a sense for sober calculation and pragmatic attitude towards the regime. 3 As poignantly expressed by Županov, one of the main paradoxes of the socialist regime was that, by taking into account and even encouraging the mass egalitarian expectations, it undermined in the long term its own ability to satisfy these expectations. Nevertheless, in the time when Zupanov wrote his analysis the socialist regimes were still able to re-establish its pact with the majority of population after occasional breakdowns. The prevailing mass political culture put socialist regimes on serious test in the eighties as its dramatic deterioration of economic performance was accompanied by a gradual emergence of a political alternative. The failure in the economic arena touched on the central nerve of the regime (Eisenstadt 1992: 29) but not, as he argues further, because it was the economic arena that provided the most telling test of the regime s vision (ibidem) but because it in the opinion of the increasing share of population was not worth supporting due to its inability to fulfil its practical promises. This dramatic attenuation of the mass support for the socialist regime might have led to an attempt to re-establish the pact between the elite and the masses by pragmatic concessions made by both sides if there were no political alternative to the regime. It was not surprising that the masses, lead by their pragmatic and calculative attitudes towards politics, reacted favourably to the emerging alternative. In this perspective, the final breakdown of the pact with the socialist elite and the support for democratic alternative was primarily a result of a series of rational decisions. Our conclusion regarding the stability of mass political culture is formally similar to the conclusions of those who argue that the political culture prevailing under socialist regime outlived the regime transformation almost unchanged. But at this point similarities end. Contrary to the prevailing views, we argue that mass political culture in socialist societies was (and is not) characterised neither by authoritarian orientations nor by incompetence to adapt to the democratic institutional framework. In our view, the adaptability has been one of the main traits of the socialist mass political culture. This has enabled the majority of population to adapt prag- 3 Analysing the Hungarian case A. Agh argues that the value conflict opposed paternalisminfantilism and pragmatism-individualism, and was lost by the state socialist regime long before its political collapse (Agh 1996: 130).

16 14 F.I.T. Discussion Paper 09/00 matically to the socialist order but also to transfer smoothly its loyalty from the worse to a better political option, i.e. from the authoritarian to a democratic regime. Therefore, the prevailing mass political culture has not been an obstacle to political transformation but has contributed to the surprisingly peaceful transition form socialist authoritarian regimes to the democratic ones. Our understanding of the socialist mass political culture implies at least two further implications that are not in line with the assumptions of the mainstream political culture research. First, it suggests that transition to democracy has been characterised by a pronounced difference between the political culture of the emerging democratic political elite(s) and the political culture of the majority of population. Whereas the new elites, as shown convincingly by A. Agh, have developed and asserted their democratic ethos in their confrontation with the old elite, the basic political attitudes of the masses, i.e. their underlying realism and pragmatism, have not changed significantly in the course of democratic transformation. But it has not prevented a gradual convergence of political attitudes and interests of the new elites and the masses. As already indicated, this convergence has been motivated mostly by the fact that, form the point of view of the majority of population, the democratic alternative has been a far better choice then the old regime. The claim that the transition to democracy in former socialist societies has not entailed a broad value consensus between the protagonists of this process but only a mostly situational conditioned convergence of attitudes and interests corresponds to the findings that different social strata experienced socialist regime differently. The active opposition came from the strata which were not encompassed by, if we draw on Županov s concepts, the egalitarian-authoritarian pact, whereas the social strata which were included in this pact supported the emerging political option mostly because the old regime was not able any more to fulfil the promises implied in the pact. As indicated, the prevailing mass political culture has enabled a swift adaptation of the majority of population to the democratic political order. But according to the cannons of the mainstream political culture research this type of democracy acceptance can prove to be highly volatile in the long run. These cannons suggest that pragmatic acceptance of the new political order entails only a specific and not a diffuse support for democracy (see Easton in Fuchs 1998: 6-9) but the democracy which is not accepted unconditionally. i.e. irrespective of its day-to-day performance, is inevitable unstable (Lipset 1994: 13). If we leave aside the question how both types of support are interrelated empirically, the claim that nothing less than diffuse support stabilises a democratic order should be qualified in one important respects. The main weakness of this claim seems to be that it postulates a too strong link between the stability of democracy and the mass support it enjoys. In other words, it underestimates the stabilising forces in-built in a democratic institutional framework. This point is well elaborated by N. Luhmann who argues that, in contrast to other political systems, in a democratic system the difference between the rulers and the ruled is supplemented by a difference between the government and

17 I. Bernik: Political Culture in Post-Socialist Transition 15 opposition (Luhmann 1989: 17). That is why the processes in democratic system are characterised by a high level of self-referentiality what makes them rather independent of immediate public support or protest. This implies that stability of democracy depends strongly on the readiness of the political elites to obey the democratic. At the same time it also suggests that every mass support towards democracy tends to be diffuse in a sense that democracy cannot not judged and supported (or rejected) on the basis of its individual performances but on the basis of general outcomes of political competition between the government and opposition. In contrast to democratic regimes, the authoritarian ones are more dependent on the immediate mass support or dissent. 4 Our general outline of cultural background of the democratisation of former socialist countries tries to bring together two conflicting explanations of individual and collective adaptation to political change; the political culture explanation which assumes that political preferences of individuals or collectivities are derived from normative orientations, learned mainly, but not exclusively, in childhood from the family and other institutions of socialisation and which are subject to relative continuity over time (Whitefield and Evans 1999: 130) and the rational choice explanation which emphasises situational characteristics, including the social characteristics of the agent, political opportunities and recent experience as factors shaping an individual s attitudes and behaviour (Whitefield and Evans 1999: 131; see also Pollack 2000: 304). 5 The conflicting relationship between the explanations is related to the importance they ascribe to culture as a determinant of attitudes and behaviour; whereas the first perspective sees culture as independent variable in shaping actor s attitudes and decisions the second explanation treats culture at best as a dependent variable, i.e. actor s values and attitudes are selected on the basis of his experiences and interests. They are both strongly reductionistic; whereas the first cannot avoid narrow cultural determinism the second almost inevitably denies, ignores or freezes the independent significance of humans perceptions, affects, intentions and evaluations (Smelser 1997: 13). In other words, the second perspective underestimates the fact that individuals are endowed by ability to interpret their current situations in many ways and that rational interpretation of a situation is only one among many. 4 This probably at least party explains why the socialist elites were surprisingly powerless when confronted with sudden protests on the large scale. 5 The possibility of inter-societal diffusion of certain cultural patterns can also be important for the understanding of post-socialists transition (see Fuchs 1998: 15). It can be hypothesised that culture diffusion has had different impacts on the emerging democratic elite and the masses. For the former, the contacts to the ideas and actors from established democracies has been an important source of new ideas and ideals and also of self-assurance. For the latter, the foreign media, especially radio and television (see Eisenstadt 1992: 23) were an important source of information which, a- mong others, moulded their expectations related to democracy. It may be also argued that actions (or omissions) of the old elite to democratic opposition and mass protest in individual societies had also been influenced by the»demonstration effects«of the developments in other societies.