ABSTRACT
With this book, we update the analysis of politics in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) along the coalition life cycle. Based on ten country chapters, and a concluding comparative chapter, more than 80 tables and several figures, we present and analyse information on the period from 2008 through 2021. The period saw three major crises, the financial crisis, the migration crisis, and the COVID-19 pandemic – as well as tendencies towards democratic backlash in some of the countries. In this chapter, we present the coalition life cycle approach in light of the many challenges that faced the CEE countries since 2008. The Russian invasion of Ukraine on March 24, 2022, is outside of our observation period, but it is, of course, a tremendous challenge for the countries in the region and our contributors are among the first to incorporate observations on how that invasion may impact national coalition politics.
