Political involvement in transition: Who participated in Central and Eastern Europe?

Using surveys conducted in 1991, we find that western individual-level models of participation also largely apply to Eastern Europe during the early transition. In the post-communist states, we find that youth, experienced political injustice, post-materialism and anti-socialist beliefs were important determinants of political protest participation and party sympathy, but not of the decision to vote in the first elections. This may have contributed to divisions in these countries such that elites promoted market-oriented reforms, and the public responded with left-turns in subsequent elections.Also appears in Wil Arts and Loek Halman, eds., New Directions in Quantitative Comparative Sociology (Leiden: Brill, 1999).Note: Link is to the article in a subscription database available to users affiliated with Butler University. Appropriate login information will be required for access. Users not affiliated with Butler University should contact their local librarian for assistance in locating a copy of this article