Search

This paper, based on the qualitative study of 100 in-depth interviews, examines the strategies employed by academics in Central and Eastern Europe to challenge the limitations in access to scholarly literature. The findings demonstrate that there are basically four strategies: the first is to use open-source material, the second to "poach" materials, the third to download papers through intermediaries, and the fourth to "pirate" them. An example of the latter is the use of Sci-Hub, which some people see as a form of resistance against academic capitalism and imperialism and at the same time a call to reform how global knowledge production is accessed.

In European post-socialistic countries or more commonly known as Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) countries, regardless of their differences and specifics, the common communist and post-communist legacies in the field of educational sciences are still recognisable. The aim of this article is to explore research activity in the educational sciences in 15 CEE countries: 11 EU member states and 4 from the former Yugoslav Republic in the period from 1996 to 2013. The purpose of this research is to recognise the specificity and dynamics of subject and content issues, and development of methodological approaches in the educational science research. The sample consists of abstracts of 2,395 papers by CEE authors published in 265 journals indexed in Scopus between 1996 and 2013. Content analysis was applied, where the abstracts were grouped into specifically created categories describing the content and methods of the paper and analysed on the basis of two criterion variables -- CEE and non-CEE or international journals. The ?[superscript 2] test showed that the field of educational sciences in 15 European post-socialist countries changed over time in terms of quantity, content and methods, becoming more expansive and diverse, which is recognisable in papers published both in international and in CEE journals.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to define the impact of the investment in training in education by the European Social Fund (ESF) in four Eastern countries, namely, Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic and Hungary. Those countries have some political, cultural, social and economic similarities and share some common ground in the human resource development (HRD) sectors. Design/methodology/approach: The authors use the human capital theory with some extensions to analyze the context, operations and impacts of the ESF in the Visegrad four (V4) countries between 2007 and 2013. The authors use three levels of methodology to access each one of those problems. Findings: The authors conclude that the ESF helped building the vocational training system in those countries, and to help them get near the equilibrium of high skills of the V4 Western European neighbors, and therefore, this one was a success story. However, quality issues remain to be addressed that may hinder the continuation of the success in the future. Research limitations/implications: The research could be enlarged in time and space and deepened in terms of methodology. This is one a first clarifying step. Theoretical work should become aware of the dichotomy between absorption and scientific logic. Practical implications: Detailed and precise evaluation practices must be implemented to guide and assess the policy. Social implications: Precisely because funds are scarce this paper enlights the dilemma and the tension between quantity and quality in the European HRD policy, this is an important social problem. Originality/value: The study is original because even if the HRD in those countries had already been studied (Sheehan and Buchelt, 2016), no study analyzing specifically the ESF in those countries has been carried out so far. The authors use an innovative methodology and address questions on context, operations and impact, which are also innovative and very relevant.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to review the use of "competence" as a concept and through the use of occupational competence standards in six European countries. Design/methodology/approach: Partners in an Erasmus+ project in each of the six countries prepared a review of the use of "competence" in their countries using a common template. The authors of this paper reviewed additional literature, summarised the individual country reviews and provided an analysis and commentary. Findings: "Competence" is becoming a widely used concept across Europe, but its interpretation and application both vary. Between them, the countries in the study illustrate the use of separate occupational standards, both as a national strategy and developed by self-governing professions; as well as competence embedded directly in qualification and training specifications. The use of separate standards as a mandatory component in national vocational education and training systems is questioned, while the use of appropriate standards for licensing and qualified status is largely endorsed. Research limitations/implications: The country reviews were conducted principally from the perspective of informing the developments taking place in the project, so were not comprehensive and also differed in emphasis between countries. Practical implications: The study points to the need to avoid promoting any particular model of occupational competence at a European level, as opposed to seeking common ground that will aid mutual recognition of qualifications. It also cautions against the uncritical transfer of models and policies from one national system to another. Originality/value: The paper provides additional evidence against "policy borrowing" without careful consideration of context, and contrasts the use of competence standards as part of a system-wide strategy with their tailored application for specific purposes.

This paper reports on an investigation examining provision of physical education continuing professional development (CPD) in European countries undertaken to identify the types of practices being employed. We begin by providing a brief overview of what we currently know about CPD internationally in general education and physical education. Data are reported to reflect Parker and Patton's (2017) key characteristics of CPD that highlight effective CPD, summarise current trends and issues in physical education, and are intended to serve as a guide to how teachers learn and how they might be better served in that learning in these European countries. Studying current practices in CPD provision identified in this study provided modest insight to inform teacher education programmes and CPD providers on the current status of physical education CPD currently being employed in Europe. We propose these findings might inform international and comparative education with respect to CPD and set the foundation for physical education colleagues in Europe to develop a CPD network where endeavours such as sharing of CPD practices, engaging in discussion of those practices, and the design of collaborative research on such CPD practices are based.

This paper reports an international project which took place at Nicolaus Copernicus University, where students and teachers from four European universities met for a two-week summer school. The main objective was to develop intercultural competence of teachers of English as a foreign language and their ability to demonstrate this skill during an English lesson. The paper depicts the tools implemented in the project and shows how they affected the learning outcomes by presenting the students' and teachers' perspectives.

The goal of this paper is to provide a comparative account of tax administration training systems in V4 countries. We also compare their structure to basic training principles, such as those set out by the Intra-European Organisation of Tax Administrations. Because of limited data availability we concentrated on basic characteristics, not on performance indicators. The goal is not only a simple comparative analysis, but also to search for any obvious lapses in good international practice, to try to assess to what extent the organisation of training may account for the relatively poor tax administration system results. The data show clearly that, in the V4 region, the content of the tax administration training system aims to follow good international practice, specified by the Intra-European Organisation of Tax Administrations. The training systems are similar and offer almost fully compulsory vocational training, and good possibilities for specialised training. All four countries have specialist institutions for tax administration training. The most visible gap is the very limited link between tax administration training and university level training in the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to study the effects of a variety of levels of education, namely, high school, vocational and university education, on the probability of being employed in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union. Design/methodology/approach: The data are from two waves of the Life-in-Transition Survey that covers 29 post-communist transitional countries. The number of binary logistic models is estimated to quantify the effects of different types of education on the likelihood of being employed, while controlling for different sets of covariates. Findings: The findings reveal that the effect of employment associated with university education is higher than that of vocational education, which in turn is higher than that of high school education. However, the differences between the effects of the various levels of education are not considerable. Any specific level of education is always associated with a higher effect in Eastern Europe as compared to the former Soviet Union. The effect of education is also found to be higher for females than for males. In the former Soviet Union, the positive effect of university and vocational education on employment is found to go down with age. Originality/value: This is the first study which compares effect of different types of education on probability of being employed on a diverse sample of 29 post-communist countries over the period of five years.

This paper examines the usefulness of the new social movements (NSMs) paradigm in the changing context of East European post-communist societies and their agricultural systems and rural communities. Starting with statements formulated in Western sociology in the context of Western democratic societies about NSMs as a protest against modernity, the paper analyses the role of such movements in the still modernizing Eastern European reality. The first part of the paper briefly examines some basic elements of the NSMs paradigm in European and American social science. The goal of this section is not only to identify the basic characteristics of NSMs, but also to identify the typical frames used by them. The second part of the paper focuses on the presence of NSMs in the communist era. Drawing on the idea of NSMs as indicators of a "post-materialist shift" as well as of "anti-establishment" and "pro-participatory democracy", the paper examines the frames of democratic opposition in Eastern Europe before 1989. The final part of the paper considers several selected examples from Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic to explore the role of NSMs in the process of shaping new ruralities during the post-communist transformation.

This paper analyses an extensive corpus of texts from the German media and existing studies of German perspectives on Poland, Russia, the Czech Republic and Slovenia in order to demonstrate that there are two idealised culture cognitive models (ICCMs) that function as overarching categories for Europe: the ICCM west (the members of the European Union (EU) until 2004) and the ICCM east (the central and east European countries) as opposing constructions. These ICCMs are seen as hyperonymic categories to the construction of frames on a lower level. Frames are multielement cognitive models through which a society or nation views and structures its image of itself and that of other societies, countries or nations. The function of the frame is to present a simplified, often manipulative schema of a complex social, political and cultural reality. Frames are structures that include a variety of linguistic devices: metaphors that conceptualise, and nouns, verbs and adjectives that describe and evaluate. This paper focuses specifically on three frames (rationality/irrationality; power/weakness; civilisation/barbarism), which have been central to the German media representation of the new EU member states.

This paper examines the influence of self-esteem on achievements of students who are gifted, in relation to the theories of Virginia Satir. Self-esteem training with gifted adolescents in Poland is discussed, as are the influences of school and family on self-esteem of youngsters who are gifted. Implications for Eastern Europe are noted. (SW)

For many years internationalization has not been a strong point of geographical education in post-socialist countries, including Poland. Therefore, all attempts at intensifying it are a real challenge and good practices deserve dissemination. This paper seeks to present the organizational and programme assumptions of a new field of postgraduate study called "Cultural industries in the development policies of cities and regions," (Project supported by the European Social Fund under the Human Capital Operational Programme in the years 2013-2015 (Priority IV: Tertiary Education and Science, Measure 4.3: Enhancing the didactic potential of universities in areas of key importance for the Europe 2020 Strategy. UDA-POKL.04.03.00--00-152/12-00).) developed by the staff of the Institute of Socio-Economic Geography and Spatial Management of Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznan (Poland) as a didactic innovation, based on a modular system of education offering wide internationalization possibilities. The analysis focuses on experiences connected with this process. They include classes prepared in cooperation with visiting professors and practitioners from eight universities and European institutions as well as week-long practical placements in Brussels, arranged thanks to a network of experts and institutions specifically established for this purpose. The results obtained help to formulate conclusions and recommendations for higher schools interested in adopting this kind of good practices connected with the development of geographical education.

In this paper, I am interested in exploring citizenship regimes as they emerge from the interplay of neoliberal and neoconservative developments in contemporary Europe. I am particularly interested in the connections between different types of contemporary precarity and citizenship imaginaries as they transpire at the historical nexus of a transition between state socialism and neoliberalism. I will use Poland as an example of a post-transition neoliberal economy, where the new political leadership took up criticism of precarity, making it an important public idiom through which the interplay of predatory neoliberalism and national neo-conservatism can be viewed. I will address implications of these trends for education.

Presents a paper delivered in Poland in 1989 and in five additional Eastern European cities in 1990. Defines democracy and suggests ways to teach about democratic government. Explores education's role in a democracy. Encourages student participation in student government, classroom discussion, community service, and research projects to give them experience in democratic practices and to teach democratic values. (CH)

The aim of the paper is to analyse the involvement of the local and regional authorities within the Conference on the Future of Europe. The former, being closer to the citizens, could play important role in reaching "every corner of the European Union" and helping the citizens to articulate their ideas about the European integration. Therefore, the activity of the subnational level could contribute to the final success of the Conference (or failure - in case of lack of any actions). The analysis is based on the author's own empirical study conducted among the Polish territorial self-government units after the closure of the Conference. The local and regional authorities were asked if they informed the citizens about the Conference, organised events regarding this enterprise or took part in the events organised by other entities. The results show very low level of the activity, even among the territorial self-government units that are present at the European level. The conclusions regard both to the Polish circumstances as well as to the general performance of the Conference. In the first case, they unveil the unwritten practice among the Polish territorial self-government units on their involvement in the European affairs. Regarding the second point, the results indicate that the Conference did not manage to exceed the "European bubble". [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The "Teacher Education and Development Study in Mathematics" assessed the knowledge of primary and lower-secondary teachers at the end of their training. The large-scale assessment represented the common denominator of what constitutes mathematics content knowledge and mathematics pedagogical content knowledge in the 16 participating countries. The country means provided information on the overall teacher performance in these 2 areas. By detecting and explaining differential item functioning (DIF), this paper goes beyond the country means and investigates item-by-item strengths and weaknesses of future teachers. We hypothesized that due to differences in the cultural context, teachers from different countries responded differently to subgroups of test items with certain item characteristics. Content domains, cognitive demands (including item difficulty), and item format represented, in fact, such characteristics: They significantly explained variance in DIF. Country pairs showed similar patterns in the relationship of DIF to the item characteristics. Future teachers from Taiwan and Singapore were particularly strong on mathematics content and constructed-response items. Future teachers from Russia and Poland were particularly strong on items requiring non-standard mathematical operations. The USA and Norway did particularly well on mathematics pedagogical content and data items. Thus, conditional on the countries' mean performance, the knowledge profiles of the future teachers matched the respective national debates. This result points to the influences of the cultural context on mathematics teacher knowledge.

This article explores the experiences of young, well-educated Eastern Europeans who have moved to Western Europe in search of opportunities for professional development, opportunities that, for the most part, are not available in their home countries. The focus of this paper is on the resulting outcome of downskilling, where these individuals work in positions well below their levels of education and capability. Based on 22 in-depth interviews with workers living in Ireland, England, the Netherlands, Poland and the Czech Republic, the study offers two major findings. First, although self-directed expatriates move to host countries specifically for professional development opportunities, they do little to research on their career and employment options prior to moving to the host country. Second, organizations are not fully utilizing the available human capital offered by Eastern Europeans, suggesting untapped opportunities to achieve competitive advantage through human capital.

This article reflects on and discusses Central and Eastern European (CEE) learners' adaptability and achievement in one English post-1992 university. There appears to be a scarcity of studies of values, beliefs, attitudes and needs as well as achievement (and factors contributing to it) between CEE and other learners. Since the expansion of the European Union, CEE students' presence in British higher education has become more pronounced. CEE learners are treated as home students (for the purpose of fees) and yet they come from a distinctively different socio-historical background and pedagogic tradition--tradition (as explained further in the article) that is, to a certain extent, common in CEE countries as a result of the sovietisation of education systems within post communistic countries of Central and Eastern Europe. In the British higher education sector there is a move in curriculum delivery towards more personalised learning, which underlines that effective teaching and learning starts with understanding the individual student. Therefore, it is important that universities with a high proportion of EU students attempt to understand where CEE students come from and what their aspirations might be. This article provides some insights into CEE learners' values, attitudes and motivations to learn and looks for possible reasons for their success. (Contains 2 notes.)

Over a decade ago the newsletter of the American Historical Association "Perspectives" carried a long lead article entitled "Teaching 'Eastern Europe' without the Iron Curtain." Referring to the challenge posed by the revolutions of 1989 in Eastern Europe to the teaching of European history, the author, Larry Wolff, saw it as "an opportunity to think critically about the ways in which the Cold War has shaped the way we teach the history of Eastern Europe." He argued that the very notion of Eastern Europe was historically dubious, invented in the age of the Enlightenment "as a politically charged, cultural construction." The Cold War and the Iron Curtain gave this division of Europe "an air of geopolitical inevitability, encouraging historians to interpret earlier periods in terms of the same distinction between Western and Eastern Europe." A year after the publication of Wolff's article in "Perspectives" and four and a half years after the dramatic fall of communism in Poland, a paper surveying the treatment of Poland in historical texts, presented at the American Historical Association's annual meeting in January 1994, still found numerous omissions and distortions. With eight countries of Eastern Europe now in the European Union, and five years after three of them joined NATO, what do recently published Western Civilization textbooks say about Eastern Europe? Using modern Polish history (the Enlightenment to the present) as a test case, this article seeks to answer that question by surveying six representative textbooks. (Contains 159 notes.)

The COVID-19 pandemic brought many changes to social behaviours in Europe. One of its major consequences was the temporary closure of borders, which was introduced as a measure to prevent the uncontrolled pandemic spreading and involved internal Schengen borders. This has had a major impact in the way in which cross-border cooperation has been conducted in Europe, including the Czech-Polish borderland, as it dramatically restrained all flows across borders. In this paper, we evaluate the impact of the pandemic on five roles of cross-border cooperation: 1) as a multi-level governance form; 2) as a regional development tool; 3) as a para-diplomacy form; 4) as a post-conflict reconciliation tool; and 5) as Europe-building. We argue that the impacts of the pandemic complicated regional development and the Europe-building role of cross-border cooperation in the Czech-Polish borderland. The article envisages re-bordering processes also in the Czech-Polish borderland, but with important exceptions in the regions with a high level of cross-border integration, mainly in the Euroregion Těšínské Slezsko/Śląsk Cieszyński. The paper also calls for the elaboration of the guidelines for possible repeated (Schengen) border closures and proposes modifications of the INTERREG microprojects schemes, to keep them attractive also in times of expected cuts in public finances. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper focuses on the internationalization activities of Japanese MNCs in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) analyzing data on national level considering Japan's modes of market entry in the CEE region and some of the countries in it. Major trends and the development of Japanese internationalization in CEE are presented. Individual mini case studies contribute to the analysis using the experience of several major Japanese MNCs that have invested in the region. The goal of the paper is to uncover the specifics of the internationalization process of Japanese corporations in the CEE region. Main characteristics of the penetration of Japanese MNCs in CEE are unveiled and discussed in the concluding part of the paper. The management implications and conclusions from the study are discussed further in the final part of the paper. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Discusses the fall of communism in eastern Europe. Applies Latin America models to eastern Europe. Suggests that revolutions are shaped by the systems against which they are directed. Concludes that the problems of eastern Europe are not caused by the system so much as by geography. Argues that poor capitalism may lie in the future for eastern Europe. (DK)

The aim of the paper is to present issues related to the approach to the integration of immigrants in Poland in the last three decades. The article is seeking an answer to the question of how the approach to immigrant integration has evolved? Does the evolving approach reflect the rising tide of change taking place in Europe? First, the article discusses the issues of migration to Poland. It is essential to consider cultural conditions related to the national identity and migration history of a given country in an attempt to explain the evolution of the integration policy. The subsequent parts analyze the Polish integration policy until 2015 and the integration policy after 2015. The results of the research show that in Poland, the approach to the integration of immigrants has evolved in a short time: from the "strategy of abandonment" to "integration" understood as a two-way process of adaptation to the concept of assimilation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Focusing on three of the Central and Eastern European countries - Poland, Czech Republic, and Hungary - the paper investigates the evolution of spatial planning systems and the introduction of strategic planning practices from the beginning of the post-communist transition in the early 1990s to the present. It sheds new light on this issue by applying the conceptual lens of historical institutionalism to explain this process and elucidate the role of the accession to the European Union (EU) as a catalyst for change. In particular, the paper identifies and analyses the critical junctures at which path dependencies emerged and later constrained the capacity of the regional and local actors to adjust to the EU Cohesion Policy framework and engage in strategic planning as part of it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Economic & Political Thought / Myśl Ekonomiczna & Polityczna is the property of Lazarski University and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This paper will be the result of research and query in the state archive in Zielona Góra. I want to present criminals and criminality after WW II on the western territory of Poland, which before 1945 was a part of Germany (Northern Silesia). On those territories there was an displacement of population after the war ended. The Germans were deported to Germany within its new borders and the Poles, in turn, arrived from Central and the former Eastern Poland which was annexed by the Soviet Union. After WW II those people started a brand new life on the so - called Recovered Territories. This paper will analyse judicature of two regional courts in Zielona Góra and Głogów based in Nowa Sól (Northern part of the former Prussian province of Silesia). The author of this paper will present the situation connected with criminality on those territories based on criminal cases and published diaries by Polish settlers living in that part of Silesia. That will include not only registered criminality but also crimes 'undetectable' for the statistics - unregistered crimes, whose victims were not reported to the police. Information about crimes committed on those territories was very often mentioned only in the diaries of those settlers. The main aim of this article is to depict characteristic of criminality and criminals when the population changed its place and social bonds were disintegrated. The author would like to ask some important questions: Who were the criminals? Were they average or maybe demoralized persons? What were the motives of the crimes they committed? What crimes were the most common? Criminal (e.g. robbery, rape, murder) or perhaps political ones? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses the intriguing situation in which there is an identified paradox inside the Polish society, namely strong Euro-enthusiasm combined with clear EURO-scepticism. The author of this article differentiates between EURO-scepticism and Euro-scepticism. Euro-scepticism is a recognised and extensively researched phenomenon across Europe, most generally conceptualised as a negative attitude towards the European integration process (in particular in the form of the European Union). EURO-scepticism, by contrast, is a much narrower category which can be characterised as a negative attitude towards the monetary integration on a supranational level, its deepening, participation in it, etc. Poland serves as an example of this in this paper. In Poland, we can observe the interesting paradox of substantially pro-EU attitudes in society combined with strong anti-EURO feelings. They translate into a stable position of Poland in the outer core of the EU. Based on the available public opinion reports (from the national and supranational level), this paper aims to answer the question why there is so much EURO-scepticism in such a Euro-optimistic society and why it matters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]