ABSTRACT
During the traumatic twentieth century, Eastern Europe underwent fundamental political, social and economic upheavals as it struggled to compete on all levels with the Great Powers and was subjected to their intervention in various guises – calculated economic aid, outright dominance, and belated and often half-hearted military assistance. By the century's end, Eastern Europe had finally broken free from Soviet shackles and sought to ingratiate and integrate itself, to varying degrees, with the more prosperous western half of the European continent and especially its key institutions, the European Union (EU) and North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). The extent to which this strategy will be successful is yet to be determined as the twenty-first century unfurls, but it seems unlikely that the region will experience an equivalent turmoil to the century that has just passed.
