Runaway State Building: How Political Parties Shape States in Postcommunist Eastern Europe

Why has the rate of expansion of postcommunist state administrations varied so widely among countries that are at comparable stages of economic transition, have similar formal institutions, and have been equally exposed to the dynamics of EU integration? Based on a close comparison of Poland, the Czech Republic, and Slovakia, the author argues that the critical factor in postcommunist state building is the robustness of party competition. The legacy of communism creates strong pressures for patronage politics, which swells the administration, but it is party competition that determines whether the predisposition to patronage politics in fact becomes the practice of patronage politics. The number of state administrative personnel has expanded significantly more in countries where party system development has stalled, and party competition has failed to constrain the party(ies) of government.