The Dissolution of Communist Power: The Case of Hungary

The speed and seeming ease with which the communist systems of Eastern Europe collapsed raises interesting questions about the stability of the structure that held them in place. Agnes Horvath and Arpad Szakolczai attempt to explain the demise of communist power by analyzing in detail the internal apparatus of the communist regime in Hungary shortly before these historic changes took place. The book is based on unique empirical material - the result of a sociological survey carried out in 1988 in the district level communist parties of Budapest. Extensive interviewing and direct questionnaires to party workers revealed the extent of the interpenetration of communist system in society, but also began to reveal the gradual self-elimination process of the communist system in Hungary. As events gathered momentum in Hungary, the data gathered significance as the documentation of a system in dissolution. This material is published here in English for the first time, and is used as the basis for a study which uses the methods of Foucault to provide insight into the social relationships of the old system and the connected problems of the post-communist epoch. This book should be of interest to postgraduates and researchers in politics, political theory and Soviet and East European studies.