On the East-west Slope: Globalization, Nationalism, Racism and Discourses on Eastern Europe

Attila Melegh

Jan 2006 · Central European University Press

About this ebook

Melegh's work offers a powerful analysis of the sociological and symbolic meanings of East-West in Europe after the end of the Cold War. While the fundamental poles of East and West remain, both their meaning and their relationship to one another have shifted profoundly since the late 1970s. Melegh exposes the underbelly of liberal characterizations of East-West, highlighting the polarizing effect of extreme nationalism and ethnic racism. The theoretical underpinnings of this work involve the ideas of preeminent theorists such as Karl Mannheim, Michel Foucault and more recently Maria Todorova and Iver Neumann. This work casts into fine relief how the "East-West Slope" oriented negatively from West to East has emerged from liberal characterizations of this project. The book analyzes the historical change in East-West discourses from a modernizationist type to a new/old civilizational one. In addition, this is one of the first attempts to link post-colonial analysis to developments in Eastern Europe.

About the author

Attila Melegh, sociologist, economist and historian by training. He has taught in the United States, Russia, Georgia and Hungary, now is a lecturer at Corvinus University, Budapest, and also works for the Demographic Research Institute. Beside discourse analysis he also does research on sociological and historical aspects of globalization and international migration.