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Purpose – East European ex-communist countries have now experienced nearly two decades of turbulent economic conditions and challenges resulting from the market transition. Since the early 1990s, there has been considerable decline in unionization throughout the region. This study uses information on union membership provided by four waves of the World Values Survey (WVS) to explain trends in unionization in East European ex-communist countries from 1990 to 2006.

Methodology/approach – We use random-effects and fixed-effects models to test predictions for three sets of explanations for cross-national and historical variation in unionization: industrialization, globalization, and institutions.

Findings – We find a degree of support for all three explanations of union decline. Overall, our analyses reveal the strongest support for industrialization and business cycle explanations. Inflation, unemployment, and urban population growth are all significant factors in shaping patterns of unionization in ex-communist East Europe. Our analyses show that aspects of economic and financial globalization have had significant, negative effects on unionization in the region. Manufacturing imports and foreign direct investment inflows appear to have undermined the position of domestic labor and contributed to declines in union membership.

Originality/value of the chapter – Successor and newly independent unions face the twin challenges of gaining public confidence as representatives of workers' interests, and withstanding increasing market pressures and conditions unfavorable for unionization. We provide evidence that without strong institutions to serve as buffers to external economic conditions, unionization levels in East European ex-communist countries are more open to market forces.

Purpose – Public debates about censorship laws largely focus on their desirability and the limits set on free speech. From a historical perspective, however, the logic and contradictions inherent in these laws’ implementation, as well as their evasion, also merit attention. This chapter places at the heart of its investigation the General Communist Notification (1932) in British India which prohibited specific kinds of Communist publications from import and circulation, even more so in a context of mass anti-colonial nationalism. Methodology/Approach – Using government and intelligence agencies’ archival records, intercepted documents of the Communist Party of India, legislative debates and memoirs, this chapter illustrates the censorship of Communist literature in India at two levels: one, it sketches a broad picture of the mode and extent of the censorship of Communist literature in late colonial India (c. 1925–1947). Two, by excavating debates and processes around the treatment to be accorded to books of two British Communist writers, John Strachey and R. P. Dutt, it reveals the constraints and dilemmas of censorship of Communist literature. While doing so, it brings both Indian and British voices to the fore. Findings – This investigation provides valuable insights into the operation of laws related to specific genres of publications, provides an assessment of the success of censorship measures, and highlights the repercussions of their failure. Originality/Value – By illustrating the limited success of censorship measures, as well as the dilemmas of censors and debates among them, this chapter urges for a more nuanced and multidimensional understanding of the operation of censorship, particularly in politically fraught contexts.

The purpose of this paper is to identify and explore how different stakeholders represent communist and revolution heritage for tourism, with a case-study on Bucharest, the capital city of Romania. The research attempts to identify gaps and tensions between representation makers on communist heritage tourism.

The research employs a range of qualitative methods in order to explore communist heritage tourism representation from different perspectives: content analysis of secondary data in the form of government, industry and media destination promotional material; interviews with a range of representation producers (government, industry and media); focus groups with potential tourists; and content analysis of user generated content under the form of blogs by actual visitors to Bucharest.

Findings reveal that there are gaps between the “official” or government representations of communism and revolution heritage and “unofficial” or industry, media and tourists’ representations. The research confirms and builds on Light’s (2000a, b) views that communist heritage is perceived as “problematic” by government officials and that attempts have been made to reinterpret it in a different light. The process of representation is made difficult by recent trends such as the increase in popularity of communism heritage tourism in countries such as Germany or Hungary. The potential of communist and revolution heritage to generate tourism is increasingly being acknowledged. However, reconciliation with “an unwanted” past is made difficult because of the legacy of communism and the difficulties of transition, EU-integration, economic crisis or countless political and social crisis and challenges. The “official” and “unofficial” representations successfully coexist and form part of the communism and revolution heritage product.

The research attempts to look at the representation of communism heritage from different angles, however, it does not exhaust the number of views and perspectives that exist on the topic. The research only records the British and Romanian perspectives on the topic. The topic is still in its infancy and more research is needed on communism heritage tourism and representation.

The research identifies and explores gaps, agreements and disagreements over the representation of communist and revolution heritage in Bucharest, Romania.

The purpose of this paper is to describe and evaluate red tourism in China and, in doing so, shed light on the complex relationships between tourism, heritage and identity politics.

Mixed methods – literature review, document analysis, interviews with government officials, travel agents and tourists.

Red tourism is an initiative to preserve, promote and pass down China’s communist past that is underpinned by political purposes. It has resulted in an imbalance between the government’s designation of communist heritage sites all over the country and the concentration of visitors in a small number of popular destinations. Red tourism fosters allegiance to the Communist Party of China. At the same time, it is expected to bring economic opportunities to remote locations through tourism spending and the branding opportunities that it provides. However, a different emphasis can be discerned at the national and local levels, whereby the former emphasizes political cohesion and the latter stresses local economic development.

Four sites are investigated in detail out of the hundreds that might have been explored.

Recommendations are made to: diversify the product, increase stakeholder involvement, enhance heritage conservation plans, improve interpretation.

Many implications for relationships between governments at all levels and the Chinese population. Also implications for the economic well-being of places and people adjacent to red tourism sites.

One of very few papers in either English or Chinese that addresses the red tourism policy in detail and with substantial empirical materials.

The paper investigates the utility of economic theory for post‐Communist economic transformation. It serves to explain the main reasons for market reform failure in different post‐Communist countries.

A literature review suggests that after the collapse of the Communist system there was no economic theory of transition to market. Whenever one considers the transition of post‐Communist economies to a market system (which, in fact, is nothing but post‐Communist transition to capitalist economies), it has to be placed on record, as this kind of transition has no precedent in history.

The main mistake of gradualists stems from their overlooking some very important conditions for successful transition: political guarantees and internal assets for reforms. And the success of shock therapy rests on the paradox, “the worse, the better”.

There is as yet no special economic theory of post‐Communist transformation and it is just developing. This paper helps one to understand the main features of shock therapy and gradualism for designing the framework of such a theory. It is geared towards researchers and students interested in the theoretical aspects of the post‐Communist economic transition to markets.

This paper aims to explore the level of convergence in employment practices among firms in the post‐communist countries and capitalist countries in South Eastern Europe. Firms from a total of ten countries were included in the post‐communist block and firms from Greece and Turkey were included in the capitalist block. The main purpose was to verify whether employment practices in firms in the post‐communist countries now resemble that of firms in the capitalist countries after almost a decade of transition.

The study analyzed the employment practices in terms of the skill ration, employment of temporary workers and the education level of employees of about 8,000 firms in the region.

In terms of skill ratio and the education level significant levels of divergence was found between firms in post‐communist countries and capitalist countries. However, in terms of employing temporary workers significant levels of convergence was detected.

The research shows that there is some convergence in the employment practices of post‐communist countries and capitalist countries. This shows that several post‐communist countries in South East Europe have completed the transition from a communist society to a capitalist society.

The study is one of the first, which compares the employment practices of post‐communist and capitalist countries in the region. By showing some levels of convergence, the study argues that the transition period in the post‐communist economies is finally ending and thus firms in post‐communist countries finally resemble those in capitalist countries at least in employment practices.

The purpose of this paper is to provide details of the communist and socialist past to inform the debate on redesigning tourism in Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries as impacted by the transition and accelerated by European Union (EU) membership.

The issues from two sides are addressed: academic and practical. Based on a literature review, the authors propose a model of five main research topics that represent the main areas of change and conceptualise the general EU accession research debate on tourism. Content analysis is conducted on each of the revealed main research topics that are presented and discussed from the standpoint of tourism-relevant socialist and communist stature and image. On the other hand, this paper engages with reality as it surveys real-life practices in tourism development and business operation based on the personal experience of the researcher regarding the social situation under consideration.

The findings concerning the revealed main areas of tourism change in CEE countries following EU accession refer to the: change from communism towards a new image (Europeanisation and re-imaging), change from communism to capitalism (transformation and marketisation), change from old communist tourism products to new products (rejuvenation, diversification), change from communist towards sustainability values (sustainability) and change from tourism inside the communist block to international tourism (re-internationalisation) The discussion indicates how each area of change relates to socialist and communist content and its tourism relevance and the potential for tourism development, policy and business.

The list of relevant works is not exhaustive as only tourism-focussed quality journals are surveyed in order to define the main areas of change.

A very relevant source of information and impartial advice for tourism developers and policymakers in ex-socialist and communist countries is provided regarding tourism development at the strategic and managerial levels.

This paper fills an identified information/resource gap concerning the potential and contribution of communist and socialist heritage to tourism development and business, and places this in the context of the changes CEE countries have made in order to stay and/or become tourism destinations. It introduces a new term “tourism redesign” which explains the transition in tourism development, policy and management through different areas of change.

The purpose of this paper is to identify the attitudes of Bulgarians towards country’s historical monuments, communist heritage, communist heritage tourism and their willingness to participate in communist heritage trips.

The sample includes 359 respondents recruited via an online survey. Mann-Whitney U-test is used to identify the differences in the respondents’ attitudes towards communist heritage tourism in Bulgaria on the basis of their age, gender, frequency of visit to historical monuments, attitudes towards country’s communist past, prior visit to, familiarity with and attitude towards communist monuments and identification of communist monuments with country’s heritage.

The respondents who visited historical monuments more frequently, had more positive attitudes towards communist past of the country and its communist monuments, those who had visited and were very familiar with the communist monuments were more supportive towards donating money for the restoration of communist monuments and their inclusion in tourism supply.

The paper reveals that domestic communist heritage tourism demand exists in Bulgaria and tour operators need to focus on including communist heritage in tourism supply.

Communist heritage is controversial and different social groups perceive it differently, depending on their attitudes towards communism as a political, economic and social system.

The paper compares the attitudes towards historical and communist monuments and revealed that communist monuments received less support for inclusion in tourism supply than historical monuments; the respondents were less inclined to participate in trips to them and to donate money for their restoration.