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PubMed1999

Understanding the role of nationalism in "new democracies".

The transition from communism to democracy has raised numerous discussions regarding the nature of postcommunism in Eastern Europe. According to the author, the two main approaches used to explain the collapse of communism--one that claims that resurrected civil society triumphed over totalitarianism, and, the other that avers Eastern Europe's propensity for irrationalism and a political behaviour based on ethnic exclusion and hatred--overlook the unique nature of postcommunism. In order to properly grasp the nature of this phenomena, the author argues that one must first understand the intrinsic nature of Eastern Europe's transformation. To do this requires an analysis of the social structures that drive political change and identifying the social group that is the main bearer of transformation. The author believes that though her analysis focuses primarily on the case of former Yugoslavia, and Croatia in particular, the conclusions she draws from it are also valid for other East European countries: that the nation is regarded as the principal catalyst for political change and that nationalism is the main legitimizing principle of emerging states. This analysis rejects the common view according to which nationalism is casually discounted as an irrational political movement that is fundamentally hostile to democracy and freedom. Quite the contrary. Throughout Eastern Europe nationalism has had a positive role in bringing down communism and creating a space for democracy to take root. Still, tension exists between nationalism and the democracy it spawned. To understand this paradox requires an extensive sociological and historical study of the particular conditions within which a particular community defines the goals of nationalism and the specific content of its main undergirding concepts like nation and state. Identifying the circumstances within which nationalism begins to act as an obstacle to the establishment of full-fledge democracy is key to understanding the political reality of today's Croatia and of many other East European "new democracies". Nationalism works differently in different socio-political conditions--differently in countries that recently achieved independence from countries with a long tradition of sovereign statehood, differently in countries with an underdeveloped or non-existent civil society from those with a strong civil society, differently in countries that are economically prosperous from those that are experiencing economic hardship. All these factors, not nationalism per se, determine the overall prospects for liberal democracy in Eastern Europe.

Communism↗
PubMed2005

Health lifestyles and political ideology in Belarus, Russia, and Ukraine.

This paper examines the association of political ideology with health lifestyle practices and self-rated health in Belarus, Russia, and Ukraine. The political trajectory of post-Soviet societies has taken two divergent paths, either toward democracy or autocracy. The health trajectory has followed the same pattern with the more autocratic states continuing to experience a mortality crisis, while those former socialist countries that have embraced democracy and moved closer to the West have escaped this crisis. This paper investigates whether political ideology in three post-Soviet countries that are firmly (Belarus), increasingly (Russia), or recently (Ukraine) autocratic is related to health lifestyles and health self-ratings. Data were collected by face-to-face interviews (N = 8406) with a representative national sample of the adult population. The results show that respondents who are against restoring communism have healthier lifestyles and rate their health better than respondents who wish to see communism return.

Adult↗
PubMed2000

Educational differences in self-rated health during the Russian transition. Evidence from Taganrog 1993-1994.

In the beginning of 1992, in order to do away with the ruins of the old communist system once and for all, radical economic reforms--'shock therapy'--were introduced in Russia. However, there are winners and losers in the Russian transition from communism to market economy and democracy. The aim of the study is to investigate whether there are educational differences in self-rated health among the citizens of Taganrog in 1993-94. If there are indeed differences, the second aim is to investigate whether they can be explained by variations in specific social, economic and psychological circumstances, which are known to be affected by the present social and economic transformation in Russia. The analysed survey was carried out in a middle-sized Russian city, Taganrog, in late 1993 and early 1994. It was conducted by means of face-to-face interviews, with a sampling frame consisting of dwellings selected from an official register and stratified by type and size. The analysed sample consists of 2372 respondents, aged 25-54 years, in 1414 households. Data were analysed in logistic regressions with self-rated health as a dichotomised outcome variable. The results show that those with less than compulsory education reported poor health twice as often as the highest-educated group. Material prosperity and relations within the family were important for self-rated health and explained to a certain degree the educational health differences. Lower educational groups now live under conditions often characterised by economic hardship, family conflicts, etc., and consequently also poor health.

Adaptation, Psychological↗
PubMed2001

Analysing patterns of religious participation in post-communist Eastern Europe.

It is generally thought that processes of modernization generic to industrialized societies have resulted in a process of secularization with respect to conventional religious participation and observance in most Western countries. It is not at all clear, however, whether the post-communist societies of Eastern Europe have followed this pattern. In this we paper we examine whether levels of religiosity in ten post-communist societies--five generally Catholic in orientation and five Orthodox--are consistent with secularization theory, or whether instead they display, as some have suggested, the impact of seven decades of atheistic communism followed by a recent resurgence among the young. For this purpose we examine denominational membership and church attendance using descriptive and multivariate analysis of large-scale national sample surveys conducted in the mid-1990s. We find that age and educational differences in participation rates follow patterns expected on the basis of secularization theory with no evidence of resurgence among younger groups. Also, however, Catholic participation rates are significantly higher than Orthodox ones, indicating the importance of denomination in understanding patterns of religiosity in the post-communist context.

Civil Rights↗
PubMed2000

Social science. Stress: the invisible hand in Eastern Europe's death rates.

The end of communism opened up a life of economic uncertainty in the Eastern Bloc. And that, say some social scientists, may be exerting a deadly effect on residents, whose high expectations that their lives would improve were quickly dashed by the bumpy transition to a market economy. Disillusionment led to stress and depression, and depression was a harbinger of death.

Communism↗
PubMed2003

Rough and rocky road to the retinoid revolution.

Some of us who were born in the middle of Europe between World Wars I and II had to face quite a few unusual challenges that we all met in different ways. I was born and raised in Prague, Czechoslovakia, a country at the time of my birth that was governed by a Western style of democracy, which was later destroyed by the occupation by Nazi Germany and subsequently by the takeover by the equally cruel Communists. Life required special means of adaptation to the changing living conditions and a great deal of luck to survive. After graduating from the School of Technology, I started working in the Department of Medicine at Charles University in Prague as a clinical chemist in endocrinology. This work was followed with training in basic biochemistry and the study of metabolic changes in stress. This rather diversified research, due to my changing of workplaces, led to the findings that diet can change enzymatic activity of liver tryptophan oxygenase. For a short time I worked on the metabolism of cyclic AMP in Escherichia coli, and at the age of 41, I made a risky move and succeeded in escaping with my family from the "paradise of communism." The reasons for this decision will become clear. After settling in the United States, I worked on the mechanism of activation of liver tryptophan oxygenase by cyclic AMP and eventually moved to the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine. There I initially worked on the mechanism of action of steroid hormones and finally on the molecular mechanism of action of retinoids, retinol, and retinoic acid. Also in cooperation with neonatologists, I initiated studies on prematurely born human neonates which led to successful supplementation of these patients with vitamin A. The work from my laboratory and my coworkers eventually became recognized.

Biochemistry↗
PubMed2003

Informed consent in China: status quo and its future.

Informed consent is one of the fundamental rights of a patient. However it used to be ignored in mainland China and was neither academically discussed nor a matter of practical concern until recent years. Paternalism was dominant in the practice of traditional Chinese medicine which was intensely influenced by Confucianism. The historic medical paternalism was reinforced under communism and the planned economy due to the communist beliefs. But is has been frequently challenged in recent years with patients' awakening awareness of rights and the advent of rights-defending litigation culture in the course of the transformation to market economy. Nevertheless, the current Chinese laws lag behind this patients' awakening awareness and litigation culture. The resulting deficiency in Chinese laws governing medical relations has created dilemmas and chaos in the resolution of medical disputes. In conclusion, the author appeals for the amendment of Chinese law and tries to point out how it should be amended.

China↗
PubMed1992

Nursing in Latvia from the perspective of Oppressed Theory.

Few nurses have the opportunity to witness the rebirth of a democratic state. The author, an American nurse of Latvian birth, served as a visiting professor at the Latvian Medical Academy, Department of Nursing, three weeks after Latvia had declared independence in August, 1991 during the coup d'etat of the Union of the Soviet Republics (USSR). In this article, the author shares and discusses her cultural experiences and reflections of Latvia from oppressed group theory perspectives. In an ever increasing pluralistic society, the author believes that nurses need the widening perspective of transcultural nursing to understand populations and changes in Eastern Europe. She further contends that nurses need a full understanding of what developed with the Latvians and what they have experienced during the last fifty years under communism.

Communism↗
PubMed1995

Anthony Blunt and Guy Burgess, gay spies.

Anthony Blunt and Guy Burgess were prominent figures in the Cambridge spy ring operating on behalf of the USSR from the 1930s into the 1960s. The essay describes the complex personalities of Blunt and Burgess, whose homosexuality and communism were related aspects of a rebellious, antibourgeois culture in 1930s leftist Britain. The focus is on male homosexuality, and the question is put whether, and in what sense, Blunt and Burgess served the left, and whether they can be role models for gays at the end of this century.

Communism↗
PubMed1980

The recruitment, training, and distribution of physicians in Yugoslavia.

Yugoslavia has developed a form of communism very different from that found in other communist nations, yet it has faced problems of health manpower distribution not unlike those existing in other countries, both communist and non-communist. Recruitment and training patterns are in some respects similar to those found in the United States: medical students tend to come from high-status, urban families and specialization has increased very dramatically over the past thirty years, in marked contrast to the pattern in the United States. Moreover, though there are continuing discrepancies in physician distribution among urban and rural communes and developed and underdeveloped republics and provinces, these differences are not widening as they have in the United States when similar regional units are observed. It is suggested that physician distribution has been controlled more effectively in Yugoslavia than in the United States, in large part because of the control over available positions exercised by health workers and representatives of social insurance and other institutions.

Communism↗
PubMed1979

Health care and workers' self-management in Yugoslavia.

The form of communism developed in Yugoslavia since the early 1950s--called workers' self-management--has been of interest to many westerners concerned with the ideas of participatory democracy and workers' self-management. Yugoslavia's economic growth and general openness toward the West have encouraged many people to visit and to investigate the health care system as well as other aspects of the society. It is generally said that self-management is responsible for the remarkable successes that Yugoslavia has achieved. This paper suggests, on the other hand, that many of the successes achieved in the health care system are attributable largely to the fact that self-management is not allowed to work as freely as it does in other sectors of the economy.

Communism↗
PubMed1996

I've been where it's gone, so I know what I got ... An American Fulbright Lecturer in Albania, 1994-1995.

Spending 10 months as a Fulbright Lecturer in Medical Sciences at the University Medical Center, University of Tirana, Albania, gave me a first-hand view of academic medicine in a country merging from more than 45 years of Communist rule that impoverished the country and isolated it from the rest of the world. Even after the fall of Communism, every aspect of medicine in Albania continues to be government controlled. Early specialization is still the rule for academic physicians. Division chiefs exert absolute authority over their domain and seldom delegate this authority. Learning and teaching resources are scant, and access to current western medical literature is extremely limited because of both poverty and priority. Despite these obstacles, the medical students and postgraduate trainees I encountered were bright and receptive, which strongly reinforces the tremendous urge to help them. Fellowships abroad, however, are limited and available only to selected junior faculty; students and clinical trainees do not qualify. If we are to help, we must take the training to them. It takes time to become an effective clinical teacher in Albania: time to understand the system; time to devise the best teaching vehicles; and time to gain the trust of the students, trainees, and faculty. Given the time, the effort can be successful. The problem is, where do we find physicians with the time and interest? Might this be a role for still-energetic retired physicians? My experience in Albania permitted me only to formulate these questions; the answers must now come from this side of the Atlantic.

Academic Medical Centers↗