>
Why Communism Did Not Collapse: Understanding Authoritarian Regime Resilience in Asia and Europe

Why Communism Did Not Collapse: Understanding Authoritarian Regime Resilience in Asia and Europe

  • £16.69
  • Save £59



Cambridge University Press
Edition: Illustrated, 7/31/2013
EAN 9781107035539, ISBN10: 1107035538

Hardcover, 390 pages, 22.9 x 15.2 x 2.5 cm
Language: English

This volume brings together a distinguished group of scholars working to address the puzzling durability of communist autocracies in Eastern Europe and Asia, which are the longest-lasting type of non-democratic regime to emerge after World War I. The volume conceptualizes the communist universe as consisting of the ten regimes in Eastern Europe and Mongolia that eventually collapsed in 1989–91, and the five regimes that survived the fall of the Berlin Wall: China, Vietnam, Laos, North Korea and Cuba. The essays offer a theoretical argument that emphasizes the importance of institutional adaptations as a foundation of communist resilience. In particular, the contributors focus on four adaptations: of the economy, of ideology, of the mechanisms for inclusion of potential rivals, and of the institutions of vertical and horizontal accountability. The volume argues that when regimes are no longer able to implement adaptive change, contingent leadership choices and contagion dynamics make collapse more likely.

Part I. Reform and Resilience
1. Understanding communist collapse and resilience Martin K. Dimitrov
2. Resilience and collapse in China and the Soviet Union Thomas Bernstein
Part II. Ideology and Resilience
3. Ideological erosion and the breakdown of communist regimes Vladimir Tismaneanu
4. Ideological introversion and regime survival
North Korea's 'our-style socialism' Charles Armstrong
Part III. Contagion and Resilience
5. Bringing down dictators
waves of democratic change in communist and postcommunist Europe and Eurasia Valerie J. Bunce and Sharon L. Wolchik
6. The dynamics of contagion in the Soviet Bloc and the impact on regime survival Mark Kramer
Part IV. Inclusion and Resilience
7. Authoritarian survival, resilience, and the selectorate theory Mary Gallagher and Jonathan Hanson
8. Cause or consequence? Private-sector development and communist resilience in China Kellee S. Tsai
Part V. Accountability and Resilience
9. Vietnam through Chinese eyes
divergent accountability in single-party regimes Regina Abrami, Edmund Malesky and Yu Zheng
10. Vertical accountability in communist regimes
the role of citizen complaints in Bulgaria and China Martin K. Dimitrov
11. Conclusion
whither communist regime resilience Martin K. Dimitrov.