International Institute for Political Studies
Head: Dr. P. Fiala
Veveøí 70, 611 80 Brno
Phone: ++420–5–41 21 48 52
As in previous years, the activities of the Institute for Political Studies focused on the organizing of seminars and conferences, the publishing of periodical journals and professional publications and the implementation of academic research projects.
At the beginning of April, the Institute held an international seminar on the subject of ”Regions in the Czech Republic in Cross-border Co-operation”. This successful event was accompanied by two conferences on the readiness of the Czech Republic and its neighbours for entering the European integration process. At the beginning of May, the first conference on this subject titled ”The Czech Republic and Its Neighbours in the Process of Integration I” was held, at which representatives of Czech embassies in Germany and Austria discussed joint issues with their opposites in the Czech Republic. The second cycle of lectures was held at the end of May, and focused on international relations between the Slovak Republic and Poland. Czech Ambassadors and their representatives in both countries and Slovak and Polish Ambassadors in the Czech Republic gave lectures on connected issues.
In the second half of October, the International Institute for Political Studies held an international conference on ”Nationalist Political Parties in Europe”. The interest of the academic and general public in the conference was great, and during individual seminars participants had the opportunity to discuss issues connected to nationalism and its manifestations today in Spain, France, Germany, Austria, Great Britain, the Czech and Slovak Republics, Poland, Belorussia and Ukraine. In November, the Institute welcomed participants to the conference ”Current Changes in the Czech Constitution”. Papers were given by prominent experts in the field of legislative, executive and legal authorities specializing in the subject of the Czech constitution and its improvement. The conference was accompanied by two international seminars on ”Minority Politics in Post-communist Countries” and ”Central Europe in Transformation”. The seminars focused on the comparison of a majority society with a minority society in post-communist counties.
The Institute continued to publish the quarterly journal Politický
èasopis (Journal of Political Science) and the bimonthly monitoring journal Politika v Èeské republice (Politics in the Czech Republic). It also issues a new quarterly Internet journal titled Støedoevropské politické studie (Central European Studies in Political Studies), in which individual articles are kept in their original language (Czech, English, German).Along with regular periodicals, the Institute started the publishing of publications in two editorial lines: studies and monographs.
Studies: V. Šimíèek (ed.):
Constitutional Justice in Selected Post-communist CountriesM. Strmiska (ed.): Post-communist Party Systems and Political Plurality
Monographs: M. Pitrová: The Institutional Structure of the European Union
The Institute also published collections of proceedings:
B. Da
nèák, P. Fiala, (ed.): Nationalist Political Parties in EuropeB. Danèák, V. Šimíèek (ed.):
The Topical Relevance of Changes in the Constitution of the Czech RepublicB. Danèák (ed.):
The Baltic Region in the Transformation Process: the Political Development of Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia J, Hanuš (ed.): Religiousness in a Period of Social Change