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Alexander Ott , Parteienund Machtstrukturen inder Ukraine von 1991 bis1998Roland LeitingerPublished online: 02 Jul 2010.

To cite this article: Roland Leitinger (2000) Alexander Ott , Parteien undMachtstrukturen in der Ukraine von 1991 bis 1998, Europe-Asia Studies, 52:6,1167-1168, DOI: 10.1080/09668130050143914

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09668130050143914

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Titanic? Finally, a minor weakness of the book is that the analysis of re-elections of regionalincumbents covers the period from 1993 through mid-1996 only (33 regional cases), despite thefact that in more than half of the regions the wave of chief executive elections was launchedafter this time, so that the remaining cases were not included in the analysis. For a bookpublished in late 1999 this looks a bit strange.

Nevertheless, Treisman’s book is certainly useful for scholars of contemporary Russianpolitics and comparative federalism. It � lls a gap between schools of thought on the territorialdimension of Russia’s state building. Those schools emerged from related academic disci-plines—such as ethnic studies, economics, geography, history and law. Treisman is one of the� rst scholars to offer a political science approach toward solving the puzzle of Russianfederalism, and his study will be a point of departure for the next generation of Western andRussian students in this � eld.

European University at St Petersburg VLADIMIR GEL’MAN

Alexander Ott, Parteien und Machtstrukturen in der Ukraine von 1991 bis 1998. Cologne,Verlag Wissenschaft und Politik, 1999, 160 pp.

IN THE PAST DECADE the successor countries of the former Soviet Union have often dominatedinternational politics and economics. Yet whereas most of the research studies up to now haveconcentrated on the biggest and for world politics most important successor country, i.e.Russia, only very little research has been conducted on Ukraine. The main reason is that Russiawas a prime nuclear power with an internationally known president who had a signi� cant rolein world economics and politics. But Ukraine also plays a vital role in European economics andpolitics, although nowhere near to the extent of Russia and not primarily for the countries ofthe European Union, but more especially for the smaller Central and Eastern Europeancountries in transition, for which Ukraine not only exercises political in� uence but alsorepresents a large market which could help their own economies to recover.

Alexander Ott was awarded his PhD in 1992 at the Philosophical Institute of the Academyof Sciences in Moscow and has since then been working for several institutions in Germany.His position at the time of writing this book was as a researcher at the Bundesinstitut furostwissenschaftliche und internationale Studien in Cologne. He was one of the � rst German-speaking scholars to concentrate on studies on Ukraine.

Since its independence in 1991 Ukraine has been facing a major restructuring and modern-isation process, although there have been no large improvements for the majority of thepopulation. One major part of this development is the economic and political emancipationfrom Russia. For the European Union, the in� uence of Ukraine becomes important whenconsidered in terms of the enlargement of the EU and NATO. In order to avoid misunderstand-ings and in order to really understand the position of Ukraine, it is essential to examine thepolitical developments in the second largest successor state of the Soviet Union. Ott’s bookdiscusses the major developments and in� uential factors in the political sphere, with theemphasis on the new political elite, the changes in the power structures and especially on thechanges in the landscape of the numerous political parties.

The � rst chapter deals brie� y with the political development of Ukraine in the � rst yearssince its independence and discusses the power structures and the failure to reform underPresident Kravchuk, which led to a presidential change in 1994 with the election of Kuchma.In the second chapter the author concentrates on the transformation of the political system inthe mid-1990s, from 1994 until 1997. The emphasis lies on the new constitution and theimplementation of a new electoral procedure. Chapter 3 deals in detail with the key govern-

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mental authorities whose rights and duties were rede� ned by President Kuchma, i.e. theparliament, the government itself and the Ukrainian supreme court. These three chapters are alldeeply researched and unbiased in their presentation. Although the reader can follow theleitmotif and the central theme of these three chapters, a short introduction and summary ofeach chapter would have been a useful supplement.

The key chapters of the book deal with the political parties in Ukraine (chapter 4) and theparliamentary elections of 1998 (chapter 5). Chapter 4 is well structured and analyses allthe parties in Ukraine, beginning with the leftist parties, the left centrists, the centrist parties,the Christian-democrats, the National-democrats, the rights and � nally the ultra-right. Thischapter forms a good basis for chapter 5, which discusses the election campaigns and the roleof the media companies, the election itself and the results and consequences. The majorstrength of the book is that all relevant topics and questions are dealt with and are deeplyresearched, and while the reader never gets the feeling of being stretched too far, the bookshould leave him or her with a good understanding of Ukrainian politics.

The annex offers very useful statistical tables, a timetable of political developments andhistorical events as well as a list of key actors in Ukrainian public life since independence. Theauthor provides a realistic future scenario with the key point that the political stabilisationprocess will still take some time. The outlook on the future development should have beenworked out in a much less technical way and in a separate chapter. Also, it should have offereda broader perspective and some thoughts on the repercussions of political developments oneconomic and social life.

Ott’s book can be regarded as a very useful contribution for understanding Ukraine from apolitical standpoint. The structure of the book is concise and logical, the aims of the editor areachieved and the message of the book effectively conveyed to the reader. This book isinteresting both for the professional reader and the layman who wants to gain a basic insight.Ott has dealt with a very important and from this perspective new topic which he has presentedin a very interesting way.

Vienna University of Economics and Business Administration ROLAND LEITINGER

Rudolf Andorka, Tamas Kolosi, Richard Rose & Gyorgy Vukovich (eds), A Society Trans-formed: Hungary in Time–Space Perspective. Budapest: Central European University Press,1999, xiv 1 206 pp., £ 16.95 p/b.

THIS IS A VOLUME of 11 papers plus introduction, edited by well-known social scientists, aboutthe Hungarian transformation to a market economy, written primarily from a sociologicalviewpoint. I myself am an economist and � nd this book a valuable contribution to knowledgeabout the Hungarian transformation in that it complements the picture with aspects whichusually escape economists.

The introduction gives a short survey of the political development of Hungary from the ninthcentury until 1998. Its focus is primarily on political events in the period after World War II.The � rst paper gives a short survey of the systemic changes in the economy and of economic,social and cultural life. In the further chapters the following topics are analysed: demographicsituation, religious af� liation, dissatisfaction and alienation, the post-communist elite, trans-formation of the middle strata, consequences of privatisation, inequalities, poverty and politicalparties, though not in this order. The last chapter deals with living conditions; unlike the otherchapters, it is comparative.

My review focuses primarily on economic topics, but also on some non-economic problems.

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