Dr Vesselin Dimitrov

For MSc Politics and Government in the European Union, MSc Comparative Politics (all streams), MSc History of Nationalism, MSc European Studies: Ideas and Identities, and LSE-Sciences Po Double Degree in European Studies. Students on other programmes can take the course with the permission of the teacher responsible.

The course provides an analytical assessment of the transition from communism to liberal democracy in Central and Eastern Europe, with an analysis of institutional structures, party systems, government and public administration, nationalism and integration with the European Union, including the Eurozone.

Topics covered include: The Communist system. Constitution-making and the development of democratic party systems. Reform of executive institutions and public administration. (Mis)management of ethnic conflict: the case of Yugoslavia. Integration with the European Union, including the Eurozone.

10 lectures and 10 seminars in the LT and two seminars in the third and fourth weeks of the ST.

Students are required to produce two essays.

V Dimitrov, K H Goetz and H Wollmann, Governing after Communism: Institutions and Policymaking; A Przeworski, Democracy and the Market; H Grabbe, The EU's Transformative Power: Europeanization through Conditionality in Central and Eastern Europe; J Elster et al, Institutional Design in Post-Communist Societies; R Taras (Ed), Postcommunist Presidents; R Crampton, Eastern Europe in the Twentieth Century, 2nd edn, 1997; G Schopflin, Politics in Eastern Europe; S White, J Batt & P Lewis (Eds), Developments in Central and East European Politics 3, 2003.

Two-hour unseen written examination in the ST.