Having drawn lessons from the downfall of some of his fellow autocrats, President Alyaksandr Lukashenka is preventing the emergence of an effective democratic movement in Belarus.
A review of After the Fall: The Pursuit of Democracy in Central Europe, by Jeffery Goldfarb and Reinventing Politics: Eastern Europe from Stalin to Havel, by Vladimir Tismaneanu.
Across East-Central Europe, the political center ground has long been characterized by the uneasy cohabitation of liberal and illiberal norms, but the latter have been gradually overpowering the former.