Talk:Direction – Social Democracy

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

	This article is part of WikiProject Slovakia, an attempt to better organize information in articles related to Slovakia. If you would like to participate, you can edit the article attached to this page, or visit the project page, where you can join the project and/or contribute to the discussion.
Start	This article has been rated as Start-Class on the quality scale.
Mid	This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the importance scale.

Juro you have changed editing of SMER ("often using populism") entry on the basis that "this is an encyclopedia". In my opinion an encyclopedia should contain verifiable information.

Well first of all here is an excerpt from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Populism :

"Populism is characterized by a sometimes radical critique of the status quo, but on the whole does not have a strong political identity as either a left-wing or right-wing movement. Populism has taken left-wing, right-wing, and even centrist forms. In recent years, conservative politicians have increasingly begun adopting populist rhetoric; for example, promising to "get big government off your backs", or to stand up to "the powerful trial lawyer lobby", "the liberal elite", or "the Hollywood elite". Also in recent years, left-wing politicians have increasingly begun adopting populist rhetoric; for example, by contrast, tend to rail against large corporations, claiming that they put profits ahead of ordinary people. Populism has also, at times, been adopted as a vehicle for extreme radicals; in 1984 the Populist Party name was revived by Willis Carto, and was used in 1988 as a vehicle for the Presidential campaign of former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke."

And now some articles from one Slovak English language newspaper

http://www.slovakspectator.sk/clanok.asp?vyd=2005009&cl=19006

http://www.slovakspectator.sk/clanok.asp?vyd=2005010&cl=19092

and as you propably live in Slovakia, you might propably remember SMER's chairman Fico quotes about the gypsy-roma or hungarian minority or foreign companies doing their business in Slovakia. Mato

There is almost no political party (at least no one in the parliament) in Slovakia that would not fit the above "definition" of populism. Also, most politicians have said terrible things at some point of time and they are not defined as populists here. Remember for example the current government's promise - when they were an opposition party - that people would get an 100% increase in wages. Before adherents of various parties start to call "their" parties "the best in world, the most intellectual etc." (we have had this here already) and all the other parties "populist" parties, it is better to avoid judgements of this type. And, actually, in reality "populist" is basically simply an insult used by the governing parties in many countries with respect to critique coming from the opposition. And finally, if someone has said something negative on a minority than he is a chauvinist (or whatever) as a person, but that does not mean (necessarily) that his party is a "populist" party - that's not the definition of populism anyway. Juro 19:07, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC)

There is a difference by saying a populist thing to gain voter support from time to time, but for the SMER party it is a regularly repeating thing.

SMER considered a left-wing party (I hope that you don't disagree). One of the reasons is that it absorbed former communists and social democrats and established itself on the left-side of the political spectrum with the Slovak Communist Party. So it should be promoting left-wing agenda[1], which it does partially.

But also -has good relations with big business([2]), connections to energy sector and nuclear lobby ([3])

-and using nationalist rhetoric towards Gypsy-Roma [4] and Hungarians [5]

"The newly established Smer party used the Roma issue more effectively than any other party to bolster voter support. Party boss Robert Fico skillfully blended proposals for anti-Romany laws with pro-minority statements in an effort to disperse and negative consequences of his controversial initiatives aimed at the Roma.

This 'sugar and the whip' policy was typified by Fico's initiative to submit two bills to Parliament at once. The first was a Criminal Code amendment which would make a larceny on private property, then classified as trespass, a criminal offense, regardless of the damages incurred. The second bill aimed to amend the Law on Public Holidays and Red-letter Days, and establish September 9 as the Day of Commemorating the Victims of the Holocaust and Racial Violence. Parliament approved both proposals at the end of October.

Fico also addressed the issue of "Roma economic tourism", his name for the Roma migration to EU member states. Fico said that Slovak Roma were taking advantage of EU member states' generous asylum laws, and that they were indifferent to the harm they were causing Slovakia's image abroad. Therefore, he submitted in January 2000 an amendment of the Social Assistance Law, which would delete the provision which "entitles citizens to receive social security benefits for two months, even while abroad". The amendment also introduced a sanction according to which "a citizen loses the right to receive social security benefits for a period of one year if he speculatively leaves the country with the intention of obtaining an unearned profit by applying for political asylum" (this was Fico's understanding of the motive for the Roma exodus).

Juraj Hrabko, then director of the Section of Human Rights, Minorities, and Regional Development at the Slovak Government's Office, labeled Fico's proposals populist and added that it was unthinkable that "a democratic country would introduce any kind of sanctions against its own citizens just because they have decided to apply for political asylum abroad" (Romano Lil Nevo, No. 416 - 423)." [6]

So what is it - Left-wing, Right-wing? or Center or Third-way(term used by the party) or just being overly critical about the status quo and using the critique to gain votes? in other words using quite often populistic methods:)

"Populism is characterized by a sometimes radical critique of the status quo, but on the whole does not have a strong political identity as either a left-wing or right-wing movement." --mato 21:18, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I repeat, populism is a not a clearly defined term (you cannot take the definition from the wikipedia as a reference), it's a very subjective term and it is basically nothing else than an insult of the type "you are saying what people want to hear" (a quote from an Encyclopaedia of Politics). All parties in Slovakia and other countries when they are opposition parties fit your definition. Next, who will define the border between "sometimes populist statements" and "populist party" - you? Moreover, there is no "law" saying that a party considered to be a left party cannot have statements of "right" type (and vice versa) or (hardly provable) contacts to various firms, and if you had an idea of European politics, you would know that such changes of "orientation" and contacts with the business worlds are quite common nowadays and the terms left or right are getting outdated. Furthermore, now that I have read your links: the interpretation as anti-Romani and anti-Hungarian based on the articles is quite questionable, especially given that

• the Vasecka article is written with the clear aim to prove that the party is simply "primitive and bad" (to put it simply), and that
• the "Slovak coalition" is simply a political reaction to the fact that the Hungarian party has a constant number of electors in southern Slovakia which the other partie cannot win over and that Slovak schools and institurions are being shut down in Komárno and elsewhere in Southern Slovakia in favour of Hungarian schools (I have personally spoken to an inhabitant of Komarno on this topic).

I suggest the following: Put your links to the article and let everybody judge himself how he will classify the party. This has the disadvantage that you have selected all negative texts on the party, but I hope that some Smer fans will add their links one day. Juro 17:34, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

"(you cannot take the definition from the wikipedia as a reference)" So what are we doing here? Just playing? Or creating The Free Encyclopedia? mato 16:04, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Well, as far as I am concerned, in the English encyclopaedia most of the time (besides adding some articles) I'm just attempting to remove the greatest errors, personal bias and non-sense in articles referring to Slovakia and its surroundings (and believe me, there is usually a lot of them). Although there are many excellent articles in the Wikipedia, there are also many fundamental errors here, usually in topics which are attacted by various -ists and -logues having an emotional link to them (nationalists, communists etc. - as a small example, see the duplicated sentence on the year 1066 in the article Duchy of Normandy), in specific topics where not many people have an idea of them, and disputed topics whose current form is a result of the perseverence of one party rather then of knowledge of facts. Juro 19:18, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)