| title: | Civil society and restoring of democracy in Estonia 1987-2000 . |
|---|---|
| reg no: | ETF5125 |
| project type: | Estonian Science Foundation research grant |
| subject: |
5.7. Political Sciences |
| status: | completed |
| institution: | University of Tartu |
| head of project: | Rein Ruutsoo |
| duration: | 01.01.2002 - 31.12.2003 |
| description: | Main focusing of the project is restoring of civil society in Estonia in the specific societal environment shaped by the post-communist society building, nation building and state building. Along the representative democracy also different societal networks are taking a shape. Contribution of these networks to modern society building, democratisation, socialisation, development of democratic citizenship and open society in general etc, depends largely on the legislative activity of state, procedural practices and transparency of the society. Analysis of this most general societal framework, which makes precondition of emerging civil society makes the first level of the study. Along some field research made in framework of the study, the project serves first of all for summarising of the ten year long studies of the head of the project on civil society in Estonia. Development of civil society is characterised in terms of the concepts of civil culture, democratic citizenship, social capital and networking. Project has six the most essential targetings. First is reconstruction of the main trends in post-communist restoration of civil society in Estonia. Second makes the research on contribution of the civil activism to democratization of Estonian society. Third aspect is focused on structure of organisational capital and financial resources of Estonian civil society. Fourth the structure of civil society in terms of public interest associations, private interest groups and a third sector is studied. Fifth emerging of civil society is compared to the parallel processes in thee other Baltic States and post-communist Europe. The main targeting of comparison is looking for explanation to the quite dramatic history of civil society in the post-communist world. Sixth focusing is the analyses of the capacity of civil society in Estonia to contribute to the democratisation of Estonia. Impact of different strategies of restoring of civil society is Estonia analysed. In the context of post-communist democracy building Estonia is compared to the other post-communist nations. On the bases of study a set of proposals will made to Estonian officials concerning development of civil society. The final results of research are shaped as book, which also serves for university courses on civil society. |
| project group | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| no | name | institution | position | |
| 1. | Leif Kalev | Univ. of Tartu | master student | |
| 2. | Rein Ruutsoo | .University of Tartu, Depart. of Social Sciences | Prof. | |
| 3. | Sven Tarn | Univ. of Tartu | master student | |
| 4. | Katrin Uba | Univ. of Tartu | master student | |