Having lived through the times and being pretty close to the dissident millieu it's hard for me to comment. It has been complex. Maybe just about the idea that the writers were in fact politicians in hiding, people who would otherwise be politicians but were forced not to by the regime. I don't think it quite pans out.
Those who wanted to become politicians back then joined the communist party, they didn't write books. Also I would point out that couple of decades after the revolution barely anyone from the former dissent was still in politics. On the other hand, there's was no dearth of people with communist past.
Also, the political landscape after 1989 was very limited and some people may have been engaging in politics only because they've seen no reasonable alternative. There were no established parties (except of communist) and the general political landscape looke like this:
1. Former dissidents.
2. (Former) communists.
3. Petty crime rising to become organized crime and suddenly realizing they can co-opt the state.
The group 3. won in the end, but in 1990 they were still mostly invisible and the political struggle seemed to be between 1. and 2.
Thanks for sharing. That makes sense, many Communist party members just readjusted to the new liberal party system whereas many former dissidents just dropped out over time.
I think this also explains why, despite the drastic changes post-1989 in Eastern Europe, the way the public viewed the state stayed mostly the same. In ex-communist countries, people still see party politicians primarily as the gatekeepers responsible for distributing things (increasingly EU funds). I know this to be true in the fmr. Yugoslavia, but it certainly applies to all of Eastern Europe.
Political clientalism never went away, it just took on new groups and colors. In many ways, same as it ever was
Living under a grotesque dictatorship probably makes one less nervous about the risks and challenges of overthrowing a different grotesque dictatorship.
Wow, reminds me of how Chomsky, Hedges , Cornel West, Assange/WikiLeaks and others who called out the state going along with the COVID crap. They also went along with the 911 bs or avoided challenging it too!
" Such contradictions were on full display many years later when leading opposition heroes like Václav Havel, Adam Michnik, Lea Wałęsa, and others voiced their support for the 2003 Iraq War."
"The evolutionary psychologist William von Hippel found that humans use large parts of thinking power to navigate social world rather than perform independent analysis and decision making. For most people it is the mechanism that, in case of doubt, will prevent one from thinking what is right if, in return, it endangers one’s social status. This phenomenon occurs more strongly the higher a person’s social status. Another factor is that the more educated and more theoretically intelligent a person is, the more their brain is adept at selling them the biggest nonsense as a reasonable idea, as long as it elevates their social status. The upper educated class tends to be more inclined than ordinary people to chase some intellectual boondoggle. "
Fantastic, sir as always.
Having lived through the times and being pretty close to the dissident millieu it's hard for me to comment. It has been complex. Maybe just about the idea that the writers were in fact politicians in hiding, people who would otherwise be politicians but were forced not to by the regime. I don't think it quite pans out.
Those who wanted to become politicians back then joined the communist party, they didn't write books. Also I would point out that couple of decades after the revolution barely anyone from the former dissent was still in politics. On the other hand, there's was no dearth of people with communist past.
Also, the political landscape after 1989 was very limited and some people may have been engaging in politics only because they've seen no reasonable alternative. There were no established parties (except of communist) and the general political landscape looke like this:
1. Former dissidents.
2. (Former) communists.
3. Petty crime rising to become organized crime and suddenly realizing they can co-opt the state.
The group 3. won in the end, but in 1990 they were still mostly invisible and the political struggle seemed to be between 1. and 2.
Thanks for sharing. That makes sense, many Communist party members just readjusted to the new liberal party system whereas many former dissidents just dropped out over time.
I think this also explains why, despite the drastic changes post-1989 in Eastern Europe, the way the public viewed the state stayed mostly the same. In ex-communist countries, people still see party politicians primarily as the gatekeepers responsible for distributing things (increasingly EU funds). I know this to be true in the fmr. Yugoslavia, but it certainly applies to all of Eastern Europe.
Political clientalism never went away, it just took on new groups and colors. In many ways, same as it ever was
Re: Eastern-European dissidents and Saddam
Living under a grotesque dictatorship probably makes one less nervous about the risks and challenges of overthrowing a different grotesque dictatorship.
Wow, reminds me of how Chomsky, Hedges , Cornel West, Assange/WikiLeaks and others who called out the state going along with the COVID crap. They also went along with the 911 bs or avoided challenging it too!
" Such contradictions were on full display many years later when leading opposition heroes like Václav Havel, Adam Michnik, Lea Wałęsa, and others voiced their support for the 2003 Iraq War."
"The evolutionary psychologist William von Hippel found that humans use large parts of thinking power to navigate social world rather than perform independent analysis and decision making. For most people it is the mechanism that, in case of doubt, will prevent one from thinking what is right if, in return, it endangers one’s social status. This phenomenon occurs more strongly the higher a person’s social status. Another factor is that the more educated and more theoretically intelligent a person is, the more their brain is adept at selling them the biggest nonsense as a reasonable idea, as long as it elevates their social status. The upper educated class tends to be more inclined than ordinary people to chase some intellectual boondoggle. "
-Sasha Latypova