The long-term effects of the collapse of communism on the political attitudes of the people who lived under it deserve serious attention, especially in light of the initial hopes these historical events stimulated. Of late these favorable expectations have been replaced by mounting concern over the shift toward authoritarianism, most notably in Russia under Putin, followed by similar trends in Hungary and Poland. The most obvious, if partial, explanation has been the absence of democratic historical-cultural traditions in these countries, as well as the unmet expectations the fall of the communist systems generated among their populations.
Another explanation of these trends, suggested by Dancing Bears: True Stories of People Nostalgic for Life Under Tyranny, is that human beings used to living under repressive governments over long periods find it difficult to adapt to their new freedoms, like the dancing bears liberated from their harsh routines. The first half of this book seeks to shed light on the creeping authoritarianism of former communist states by means of a detailed analysis of the behavior of the newly liberated bears. The human ambivalence about or outright rejection of freedom is not exactly a new idea and was a major explanation of the rise of Nazism put forward by Erich Fromm in his 1941 Escape from Freedom; this book might have benefited from some reference to his ideas.
In the second part of Dancing Bears, there is no further discussion of the liberated bears and their difficulties. Instead, the author relates his conversations and impressions in former communist countries (Bulgaria, Poland, Albania, and Serbia), former parts of the Soviet Union (Ukraine, Estonia, and Georgia), one remaining communist state (Cuba), and Greece. It is not clear why noncommunist Greece was included, nor for that matter how the other countries were selected—nor why postcommunist Russia was excluded, despite being the most representative setting and breeding ground of the attitudes probed.
There is a good deal of geographic and topical jumping around, presumably reflecting the author's itinerary. The chapter on Cuba relates conflicting views of Castro (still alive at the time of his visit) and the communist system, but does not deal with responses to the system's collapse because it remains in existence. The first of two chapters on Poland concerns a homeless Polish woman who lives on the streets of London, while the second is about “Hobbits Village,” an attempt to improve the rural economy by a theme park. The chapter on Ukraine is about smuggling between Poland and Ukraine. The single topic of the chapter on Albania is the concrete bunkers Enver Hoxha obsessively scattered around the entire country. The chapter on Estonia deals with the post-Soviet relations between Estonians and the Baltic republic's large Russian minority. The report from Serbia and Kosovo is mainly about Radovan Karad?iÄ? and his admirers. The chapter on Georgia relates conversations with native admirers of Stalin. The report from Greece is completely unrelated to the supposed theme of the book, dealing as it does with the economic crises and the anti-capitalist fervor of radicals and leftists.
In this part of the book, there is no unifying theoretical scheme. The conversations and impressions are very loosely connected to the first half of the book, insofar as SzabÅ?owski relates the diverse attitudes of people in some former communist states toward the political changes they experienced. There is no attempt to compare or synthesize these attitudes. Some of the people he talked to supported the communist systems and regretted their demise; others rejected them. These diverse dispositions remain unexplained and unexamined.
The lack of integration of the two parts of the book is not compensated for by the use of identical titles for the two sets of chapters in the two parts of the book. Nor is light shed on the relationship between the chapter titles and their substance, especially in part two. Only the first part of the book addresses in a focused and coherent manner the main theme of the work, the suggested parallels between the bears' and the humans' responses to liberation.
Bulgaria is the only former communist country where widespread practices of bear dancing existed, and where attempts were made to “rehabilitate” the bears in a new natural setting. The origin and main themes of the book are presented in the preface:
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