contributors

Articles by Yulia Gradskova, Nadezda Petrusenko & Irina Sandomirskaja

1. Armenian parliamentary elections 2012 – an extremely well scrutinized operation

   A week before elections the head of the Armenian Central Election Committee announced that the Armenian parliamentary election would be monitored by over 30 000 observers, both foreign and domestic. The elections in Armenia 2012 were far from revolutionary, but perhaps it was a sign of a gradual evolution of Armenian democracy towards normality. The election results have not yet being challenged and parliament is better representing the political forces in the country and the party system is more consolidated.

2. Parliamentary Elections 2012 in Slovakia

   Self-restraint will be the key test of Fico’s second government. Fico has periodically demonstrated an ability to take the long view, but Slovakia’s first single-party parliamentary majority will produce strong temptations to opt for short-term institutional gains for himself and financial gains for his supporters. If Fico can resist those temptations, he may secure for himself a long future in politics and a place in Slovakia’s history. If he cannot, then in 2016 he may again find himself on the losing end of electoral calculations.

3. Dissertation review. The struggle between Romanianists and Moldovanists

   Andreas Johansson, Dissenting Democrats Nation and Democracy in the Republic of Moldova, Stockholm 2012, Södertörn Doctoral Dissertations 62, 263 pages

4. The human hunt that nearly paralyzed the party. A microstudy of Soviet mass terror

   Wendy Z. Goldman, Inventing the Enemy, Denunciation and Terror in Stalin’s Russia, Cambridge et al.Cambridge University Press 2011, 320 pages

5. Cosmopolitanism outside the comfort zone

   The critical review of cosmopolitanism as a historical, philosophical, and moral concept was afforded a special place on the agenda, but presentations oriented towards practical policy applications of cosmopolitan ideas were also represented, at the conference arranged by CBEES at Södertörn University November 24—26 "Cosmopolitanism in a Wider Context: Conceptualizing Past and Present".

6. among wine and walnut growers. in the poorest country in europe

   A journey through Gagauzia, where walnuts and wine are important industries.

7. MINORITY Legislation in two successor states A comparison through the lens of EU enlargement

   In this essay there is a discussion whether the recent developments in the Serbian and Croatian legislations on minority rights represent one occasion on which the EU’s informal engagement has exerted a beneficial influence. It is also noted that, throughout the last decade, the roles of Serbia and Croatia as kin states to ethnic Serbs in Croatia and ethnic Croats in Serbia has been constructive.

8. SILENCE AND SURVEILLANCE a history of culture and communication

   The history and sociology of the telephone in Russian society have only slowly become the object of serious study. The scope of this essay is limited to the following two topics: first, the forms of use, in pre-revolutionary Russia and the Soviet Union, of the telephone as a means of communication, potentially universally available and “horizontal” but actually restricted by “vertical” forces; and second, the symbolism that accumulated around this means of communication in Russian and Soviet culture.

9. women entrepreneurs in russia SMALL BUSINESS in A BIG COUNTRY

   Interviews from three communities in a Russian region illustrate that there are many new opportunities for potential women entrepreneurs, while there are also many at times unpredictable obstacles to overcome.

10. icon writing. A journey through time

    It’s hard to say whether the revival of icons is the outcome of rising religiosity in general, a growing need to manifest one’s faith, or simply the search for some kind of salvation in a time of political and economic uncertainty. Nancy Westman went to St. Petersburg for a closer study of modern iconography; she also spoke to a couple of Swedish iconographers.

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