Comparisons - Central European Villages Repeatedly Visited

The major change to affect Wislok after 1989 was the collapse of the State Farm sector. Many were made redundant, and they survive through state benefits and their own gardening activities on small plots allocated to them for subsistence purposes. The only area of State Farm land in use in 2000, the time of my most recent visit, was contracted to an Italian entrepreneur, who was hopeful of producing veal for export. Only the forestry sector, still firmly in state ownership, has remained relatively stable and continues to provide a reliable source of cash income.

There has been no significant expansion of farming by the private sector, and here too output seems to have declined significantly. Farmers have been consistently bitter about the withdrawal of subsidies, notably for milk production, and herds have been cut back from their already low levels.
In these circumstance housebuilding, as in Tázlár, has become much harder than it used to be in the socialist period. The building pictured below is being erected on a family plot by Staszek, the eldest of three sons, shortly before his fortieth birthday. Until now he has lived with his parents. The first of his younger brothers to marry drew on everyone's support to build his own house next door. When the second younger brother married, he was allocated separate rooms in the family house. As the ageing parents gradually withdrew from the labour process, both house and farm were effectively taken over by this son. But the eldest brother was still unmarried; finally, with contributions in money and in services from everyone, in the course of 2001-2 he is building his new house. He is especially proud of the wooden construction, which he believes to be optimum in this climate.
Staszek speaks only Polish, but his grandmother, who died when he ws a child, belonged to the original Lemko-Ukrainian inhabitants of Wislok. Ethnic identity issues began to be openly discussed in Poland in the 1980s, and this gathered strength after the collapse of the socialist system. The ethnic cleansing of 1947 has been openly discussed in the media. Vigorous debates took place between those who argued that the east Slavs of this section of the Carpathians formed a separate 'Lemko' or 'Rusyn' nation(ality), and those who believed themselves to be Ukrainians. These had no impact on the small indigenous population in Wislok where, with the deaths of the older generation and Polish dominating in cases of mixed marriage, the ethnic minority has almost disappeared.
Distinct local and regional traditions do not feature in the curriculum at the village school in Wislok. Throughout the socialist period the Greek Catholic presbytery, appropriated by the state in 1947, served as a school. In the 1990s it was returned to this church, now fully legal once again, which then disposed of it to a wealthy urbanite, who is refurbishing it as a holiday home (the new Roman Catholic clerical regime has built a new presbytery). To meet school needs, a gigantic new building was finally erected in the late 1990s , but villagers are pessimistic about its future. It carries the name of Saint Albert Adam Chmielowski, for the simple reason that this renders the school eligible for sponsorship from the charitable foundation that bears the name of this saint. In this way staff are reasonably confident that at least the heating expenses can be covered.

It is difficult to move from the village level to macro ofanalyses the of region or state, but anyone visiting these two villages in recent years is bound also to be struck by some persisting contrasts. The villages and small towns of the Great Hungarian Plain are generally well maintained and tourism plays a significant role in the economy. The town of Kiskörös, (right), district centre of Tázlár, is particularly famed for its wine production and unemployment levels are low.
In contrast, the east of Poland has struggled to maintain jobs in the years following postsocialist 'shock therapy'. For many of the new unemployed, and for poor people in general, flea markets dominated by traders from the Ukraine have provided an economic lifeline. More than a decade after the introduction of the new market economy, these forms of petty trading were still conspicuous throughout south-east Poland, whereas in Hungary they had largely disappeared.