Weasel Words and the Analysis of “Postcommunist” Politics: a Symposium
EEPXXX10.1177/0888325419900244East European Politics & Societies and CulturesBernhard et al. / Weasel Words 900244research-article2020 East European Politics and Societies and Cultures Volume 34 Number 2 May 2020 283 –325 © 2020 SAGE Publications Weasel Words and the Analysis https://doi.org/10.1177/0888325419900244 journals.sagepub.com/home/eep hosted at of “Postcommunist” Politics: http://online.sagepub.com A Symposium Michael Bernhard1 University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA Venelin I. Ganev Miami University of Ohio, Oxford, OH, USA Anna Grzymała-Busse Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA Stephen E. Hanson William & Mary, Williamsburg, VA, USA Yoshiko M. Herrera University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI, USA Dmitrii Kofanov University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI, USA Anton Shirikov University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI, USA A weasel word is a term used in academic or political discourse whose meaning is so imprecise or badly defined that it impedes the formulation of coherent thought on the subject to which it is applied, or leads to unsubstantiated conclusions. In this sympo- sium we consider several key terms central to the study of postcommunist politics and discuss the extent to which they fall into this category. The terms discussed here include regime terminology, the notion of postcommunism, the geographic entity “Eurasia,” socialism, populism, and neoliberalism. While the authors come to different conclusions about the extent to which these terms are weasel words, they also provide pointers for how to deploy terms in ways that
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