Search results

Through Chinese experience, the purpose of this paper is to underpin the hypothesis of institutional change as cultural change.

The paper compares Chinese postsocialist transformation to a chemical change reaction. So, the paper discerns initial conditions, factors which triggered the reaction, catalysts, and elements of synthesis. Chinese institutional change per se derived from a cultural shock induced by the economic, political, and cultural opening which acted as trigger. Then, it deals with the other elements of the process.

The paper reveals that Chinese postsocialist transformation is based on change in values and mentalities particularly in the Chinese Communist Party. In this perspective, institutional change is not only an economic or a political process but also it is fundamentally cultural.

This paper shows the process of postsocialist transformation in a different light. Whereas, economists often only focus on political considerations or conflicts of interests, it insists on the cultural dimension of the process.

The purpose of this paper is to contribute to extant literature on socioeconomic transition in Central and Eastern Europe through using a spatial lens in order to address, at the level of individual experience, some of the changes that have affected Polish society post‐1989.

This paper adopts Taylor and Spicer's three‐fold conceptualisation of organizational space as a framework to present and discuss qualitative data collected through interviews.

This paper finds that socioeconomic restructuring has brought about changes in space conceived of as distance, as materialisation of power relations and as experience. In the narratives of research participants, present experience of space within the city they live and work in is related to their past experience and to their movement in the space. Different spaces are interconnected to form the individual's “mental map” of the city. The spatial dimension of postsocialist transition has an important impact upon the identities of individuals, and an analysis of narratives allows for gaining rich insights into the ambiguities and contradictions involved in evaluating its significance.

An awareness of the link between the transformation of the city and social change contributes to the understanding of postsocialist transition.

By applying a spatial lens to analysis of the processes of social differentiation, as experienced at the micro‐level of individuals, this paper contributes to the literatures on organizational space and postsocialist transition.

The purpose of this paper is to reflect upon the politics of and in organizational transformations in the wake of the fall of the Berlin wall and Germany's reunification.

The paper juxtaposes a political‐philosophical perspective informed by Rancière – what we call a dramaturgy of politics – with the findings of an ethnographic study conducted in the Berlin State Library in 2002/2003.

The paper outlines a reading of the event of November 9, 1989 and its aftermath as a dissensual event of politics proper, i.e. the emergence of a new political subjectivity, followed by a consensual process of social organization. In the state library, both the consensual “fantasy of the organizational One” as well its disruption are causing struggles over what is visible and sayable. A dramaturgy of politics thus encourages us to add our voices to the specific time‐spaces in which an excess of words, signs and forms alters the configuration of what is visible and expressible.

The usual disclaimers about the limits of ethnographic research apply. The paper calls for further inquiries into the dramaturgy of organizational politics. It also reflects upon the “Western gaze” and the problematic of “speaking for” the presumably dominated.

It is hoped that the paper contributes to the understanding of the politics of organization (theory) by outlining an alternative conceptual approach and confronting it with ethnographic findings.

The purpose of this paper is examine governance and enterprise restructuring in Southeast Europe (SEE) (Western Balkans) transition economies. International organizations classify the following countries in SEE (Western Balkans): Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia.

The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) has governance and enterprise restructuring as a basic indicator of economic transition and defines it as effective corporate governance and corporate control exercised through domestic financial institutions and markets, fostering market‐driven restructuring. The corporate governance is most often defined in terms of the roles, responsibilities, and interactions of top management and the board of directors. Using data of SEE economies, the interrelationships between governance and enterprise restructuring and set of policies that influence the governance patterns will be examined.

Due to the analysis of the first assumption where a relation was made between governance and enterprise restructuring and imposed set of policies, the results have shown that there are mixed outcomes. The second hypothesis analyzed the importance and progress of corporate governance and enterprise restructuring.

The paper shows that the overall outcome of SEE countries is mixed, as there are significant improvements in some countries and noteworthy lags in others. Indeed, needed considerable improvement is needed in corporate governance, institution‐building controlling agency problems and in imposing already adopted regulation; as well as adopting new ways of enterprise restructuring policies within existing policies of overall transition economy restructuring.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the impact of societal and cultural factors on the practices and perceptions of school principals in Kazakhstan.

The paper draws on empirical data collected in Kazakhstan over two years in the course of an international, collaborative, multi-stranded project.

The findings support the claim that educational policies and practice are deeply embedded in the national culture, which is an evolving mixture of traditional Kazakh, Russian and diverse ethnic, Soviet and paternalistic cultures. These various societal characteristics exemplify various aspects of the tensions between traditional forms of social organisation, the Soviet legacy, and the sort of educational development promoted by Western educational and international organisations, which now plays an important role in Kazakhstan.

The analysis, though limited in scope, has nevertheless yielded insights into important differences and similarities amongst rural and urban schools and explored the effects of societal cultural factors that shape the practices of school leaders on the periphery of the system.

The paper provides an empirically grounded illustration of the way in which societal culture and cultural norms shape the role of school principals, and how schools cope with a top-down policy in Kazakhstan. By contrasting the norms that shape both existing practice and the reform agenda, the paper offers some explanations for how cultural norms represent both strengths and weaknesses when applied to the process of change in a post-Soviet context.

The purpose of this paper is to address the intensive spread of the English language in Central and Eastern Europe as an aspect of postsocialist transition.

The paper analyses the discourses and ideologies related to the spread of English in postsocialist Poland, drawing on insights from critical discourse analysis and language ideology. The empirical material discussed comprises newspaper articles dealing with the topic of language policy in Poland, with a focus on the media campaign, “battle for English”.

The paper finds that the spread of English is facilitated by powerful discourses propagating the knowledge of English together with the ideology of neo‐liberal economic and social transformation. The exploration of the discourses inherent in the story of the “battle for English” enables the links between the linguistic practices applied by individual actors and the ideologies conveyed by the discourses found in mainstream media to be made explicit.

An awareness of the mechanisms of discourse and ideology allows us to question both the drive behind and the social impact of the spread of English in Central and Eastern Europe.

The paper offers a novel theoretical and empirical contribution to the understanding on postsocialist transition.

The rule of law and an efficient legal system are the core factors that ensure growth in BRIC economies. Weak institutions and failures with respect to the rule of law in Russia call into question its position as one of the BRIC countries. The purpose of this paper is to propose that the legitimization of newly created formal legal institutions in Russia is impossible without a new set of values that reflect the ideals of professionalism. It aims to explore the role institutional stakeholders play in establishment of the new set of professional values.

A survey of existing legislation and academic research on professionalism and the development of the legal profession in Russia was undertaken to determine the state of the development of its formal and informal legal institutions. The role of stakeholders in the development of new professional institutions was also examined.

The paper finds that the creation of formal institutions supporting the rule of law in Russia is largely completed. Yet, in some cases the institutions lack legitimacy and public trust. Professionalism – a vital informal institution that promotes trust in legal systems and legitimizes its formal institutions is in the process of development. The agents of professional socialization such as the state, educational institutions, professional bodies and organizations play different roles in development of professionalism. Potential avenues for enhancing legal professionalism by the agents of socialization are identified.

The current study contributes to the literature on institutional change in transition economies and suggests a complicated relationship between various formal and informal institutions in the Russian legal sector. Future empirical research should focus on the investigation of the newly forming informal institutions and the impact of old informal institutions on this process.

Companies doing business in Russia should be aware of the fact that the legal systems in the country are still in the process of development. Even though major formal legal institutions have already been created, some informal institutions still represent a serious challenge to safe and efficient business in the country.

The paper contains ideas for the future development of legal professionalism in Russia.

The purpose of this paper is twofold: first, to count the number of international program accreditations at universities in Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan; and second, to understand why Kazakhstan has dramatically more such accreditations.

The methodology included identifying agencies working in each country, reviewing data on their websites, and analyzing government documents and relevant literature.

Findings were that Kazakhstan has 645 international program accreditations and Kyrgyzstan has 9. Analysis of the reasons for this difference includes strong government support and incentives for internationalization of higher education in Kazakhstan, furthering the government’s goal of becoming one of the world’s 30 most developed economies by 2050; Kazakhstan’s financial wherewithal to support internationalization policies; and its membership in the Bologna Process. In Kyrgyzstan, on the other hand, few rewards result from the costly and time-consuming process of international accreditation; only programs with existing international connections or institutions with large international student populations seem interested.

Limitations are that the research was based on document analysis and did not include interviews with staff of programs seeking international accreditation.

One implication, i.e., international program accreditation, while an indicator of program quality, also denotes the financial and infrastructural wherewithal to carry it out, plus the perceived benefits and costs of doing so.

The value of this research is that it analyzes the reasons for divergence and different results in two countries that, 25 years ago, were part of the same higher education system.

The proposed definitional framework can be used to define housing typologies of cities in developing countries. It aims to define housing typologies in the capital city of Albania, Tirana, using the proposed hierarchical framework within the dynamics of four political periods: Ottoman, establishment, socialist and postsocialist.

This study proposes a new definitional approach for the housing typologies through a hierarchical framework that defines the typologies based on their political period and legality statuses departing from the case of Tirana, which is featured by a heterogeneous context. Such context is characterized by uncontrollable urban development, making typology definition problematic. Furthermore, beyond the form, spatial and functional features, it presents their exterior distinctiveness as an innovative element. The methodology used in the study includes archival research, image documentation, spatial, functional and exterior distinctiveness analysis of housing typologies and exploration of housing form features in different political periods.

The study identifies urban formal housing typologies in Tirana detached houses, apartments, mass housing, social housing, gated communities, informal detached houses and housing with in/formal additions.

This definitional approach can be used to define housing typologies for cities featured by heterogeneous urban context.

The relationship between institutional quality and economic growth is revisited.

A panel cointegration methodology and causality analysis are applied to 27 postsocialist economies over the period from 1996 to 2016.

Utilizing the Worldwide Governance Indicators as a means of assessing the quality of institutions, it is found that in the long run, economic growth is positively associated with the rule of law and voice and accountability. In the short run, regulatory quality retains a positive effect, but voice and accountability demonstrate a puzzling negative effect on economic growth that merits further analysis. In exploring the causal dimension of our variables, supporting evidence of the strong links between the quality of institutions and economic growth is provided, hence rendering robust results.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, it is the first time that an ARDL methodological framework, which addresses potential endogeneity issues, is used to investigate the relationship between institutional quality and growth in the context of postsocialist economies.