Throughout human history whether the food supply is plentiful or in shortage has been a fateful a... more Throughout human history whether the food supply is plentiful or in shortage has been a fateful and strategic question, and this was no less the case in the second half of the 20th century when food played a decisive role alongside weapons and ideologies in the competition between capitalism and socialism. In socialist Eastern Europe, queuing for food was the everyday experience everywhere – except Hungary where, not only was food plentiful, but, in the 1970s and 1980s, food products were exported in significant quantities. It had not always been so. Collectivisation had resulted in dissatisfied urban consumers and aggrieved peasants, contributing to revolution of 1956. The post-1956 political leadership wanted above all to make peace with the peasantry to ensure a stable food-supply and improving living standards. Some of these new leaders were of rural origin who understood both the world of the peasant and the workings of the party-state. This ’agrarian lobby’ was able to transform peasant initiatives from below into policies which gradually turned Hungarian producer cooperatives away from the Soviet kolkhoz; and it also convinced the leadership not only to open up to the West but also permit the transfer of knowledge and technology. The result was a successful hybrid of American technology and socialist structures. The monograph could be of interest also to a wider audience, because it examines not just high politics and trade deals, but exchanges, research visits, enterprise managers, academic links. It draws attention to the fact that ordinary people and interest groups too had agency even in an authoritarian state.
Corvinus Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, 2021
Review of "A Factory Town that Belongs to the Past… Social Changes in Ózd and its Surroundin... more Review of "A Factory Town that Belongs to the Past… Social Changes in Ózd and its Surroundings from the System Change until Today", by Péter Alabán (Kronosz Publishing House, 2020).
Introduces the results of a life-history interview project conducted with workers and former work... more Introduces the results of a life-history interview project conducted with workers and former workers of two large ex-socialist model factories, Carl Zeiss in Jena (East Germany) and Rábe in Gyo´´r (Hungary) between 2002 and 2004. The essay analyzes the post-socialist experience of the East German and Hungarian workers in three main dimensions: the experience of post-Fordist development in the factory; the subjective evaluation of the standard of living; interpersonal relations. Lastly, it examines examines the social and political attitudes of the workers in the mirror of their post-socialist experience. Hungarians had a more direct experience of peripheral development than the East Germans. While East Germany's greater success of integration into the capitalist world economy was accompanied by a change of mentality and the appearance of post-materialistic values, in Hungary nationalism seemed to be the only alternative to a capitalism, that disappointed and effectively impoveri...
ABSTRACT This book challenges the one-sided account of Poland as a successful transition case, by... more ABSTRACT This book challenges the one-sided account of Poland as a successful transition case, by exploring the huge social costs for workers in terms of impoverishment and employment precarity. The ambivalent role of the European Union in the economic restructuring of Poland emerges through comparisons to earlier rounds of restructuring of steel in Western Europe, Eastern Europe and other parts of the world. By offering an exemplary case of multi-level analysis, an in-depth case study and biographical research, Fallen Heroes in Global Capitalism provides a compelling read on postsocialism and the restructuring of the Polish steel industry.
While appreciating the novelty of Akos Huszar's model, the article criticizes his normative c... more While appreciating the novelty of Akos Huszar's model, the article criticizes his normative concept of capitalism by drawing the attention to the essential differences between postsocialist capitalism and the normatively understood West-European and Anglo-Saxon capitalist development. Privatization has never been accepted by Hungarian society as legitimate. The dispossession of the working people, who were the "owners" of property in principle, reinforced unequal competition. This undermined social trust in the established norms and the new democracy, which rendered democratic institutions essentially fragile in Hungary.
Throughout human history whether the food supply is plentiful or in shortage has been a fateful a... more Throughout human history whether the food supply is plentiful or in shortage has been a fateful and strategic question, and this was no less the case in the second half of the 20th century when food played a decisive role alongside weapons and ideologies in the competition between capitalism and socialism. In socialist Eastern Europe, queuing for food was the everyday experience everywhere – except Hungary where, not only was food plentiful, but, in the 1970s and 1980s, food products were exported in significant quantities. It had not always been so. Collectivisation had resulted in dissatisfied urban consumers and aggrieved peasants, contributing to revolution of 1956. The post-1956 political leadership wanted above all to make peace with the peasantry to ensure a stable food-supply and improving living standards. Some of these new leaders were of rural origin who understood both the world of the peasant and the workings of the party-state. This ’agrarian lobby’ was able to transform peasant initiatives from below into policies which gradually turned Hungarian producer cooperatives away from the Soviet kolkhoz; and it also convinced the leadership not only to open up to the West but also permit the transfer of knowledge and technology. The result was a successful hybrid of American technology and socialist structures. The monograph could be of interest also to a wider audience, because it examines not just high politics and trade deals, but exchanges, research visits, enterprise managers, academic links. It draws attention to the fact that ordinary people and interest groups too had agency even in an authoritarian state.
Corvinus Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, 2021
Review of "A Factory Town that Belongs to the Past… Social Changes in Ózd and its Surroundin... more Review of "A Factory Town that Belongs to the Past… Social Changes in Ózd and its Surroundings from the System Change until Today", by Péter Alabán (Kronosz Publishing House, 2020).
Introduces the results of a life-history interview project conducted with workers and former work... more Introduces the results of a life-history interview project conducted with workers and former workers of two large ex-socialist model factories, Carl Zeiss in Jena (East Germany) and Rábe in Gyo´´r (Hungary) between 2002 and 2004. The essay analyzes the post-socialist experience of the East German and Hungarian workers in three main dimensions: the experience of post-Fordist development in the factory; the subjective evaluation of the standard of living; interpersonal relations. Lastly, it examines examines the social and political attitudes of the workers in the mirror of their post-socialist experience. Hungarians had a more direct experience of peripheral development than the East Germans. While East Germany's greater success of integration into the capitalist world economy was accompanied by a change of mentality and the appearance of post-materialistic values, in Hungary nationalism seemed to be the only alternative to a capitalism, that disappointed and effectively impoveri...
ABSTRACT This book challenges the one-sided account of Poland as a successful transition case, by... more ABSTRACT This book challenges the one-sided account of Poland as a successful transition case, by exploring the huge social costs for workers in terms of impoverishment and employment precarity. The ambivalent role of the European Union in the economic restructuring of Poland emerges through comparisons to earlier rounds of restructuring of steel in Western Europe, Eastern Europe and other parts of the world. By offering an exemplary case of multi-level analysis, an in-depth case study and biographical research, Fallen Heroes in Global Capitalism provides a compelling read on postsocialism and the restructuring of the Polish steel industry.
While appreciating the novelty of Akos Huszar's model, the article criticizes his normative c... more While appreciating the novelty of Akos Huszar's model, the article criticizes his normative concept of capitalism by drawing the attention to the essential differences between postsocialist capitalism and the normatively understood West-European and Anglo-Saxon capitalist development. Privatization has never been accepted by Hungarian society as legitimate. The dispossession of the working people, who were the "owners" of property in principle, reinforced unequal competition. This undermined social trust in the established norms and the new democracy, which rendered democratic institutions essentially fragile in Hungary.
Uploads
Papers by Eszter Bartha