Monica Heintz Books

Definitions of citizenship often lack a solid grounding in the lived realities of ordinary citizens. They tend instead to focus on the debates of elites and on geopolitical processes. Citizenship in the postsocialist context defies the narrow definitions given by political elites, primarily because representatives of the state have been unable to guarantee the ‘social rights’ that citizens expect. This volume seeks to provide information by looking both at the making of citizenship from above and at the perceptions and responses of citizens from below. How citizens conceive of their relations to the state determines their involvement (or lack of involvement) in public life, including voting and participation in social movements. It also determines whether or not they will seek an alternative citizenship, and their attitudes towards ethnic conflicts. It follows that the possibilities of citizenship offered by postsocialist Moldova constitute a vital factor in addressing the political, economic, and social difficulties which this young state faces.

„Westernisation“ and the prospect of European integration have been formidable catalysts for social and economic change in Eastern European countries since 1989. Full of promises and expectations but lacking economic means and adequate structures, Romanian enterprises have faced particularly difficult problems. Prompted by employees' self-criticism, this book explores the dynamics of work values in the service sector in Bucharest. Based on long term ethnographic fieldwork, the study analyses the factors determining social and cultural change at the local level, from the impact of Western ideologies and symbolic measures to concrete organisational and economic constraints. Monica Heintz emphasizes the impact of the forced pace of change, which caused social disorder and disrupted individual values. She challenges the notion of a universal ethic of work and argues that what governs relationships between employers, employees and clients in the Romanian context is simply an ethic of human relations. Monica Heintz (PhD 2002 Cambridge) is Lecturer in the Department of Social Anthropology, University of Paris 10- Nanterre and a member of the Laboratoire d'Ethnologie et de Sociologie Comparative, Nanterre. She was previously a Research Fellow of the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology in Halle. She has conducted long term fieldwork in Romania and the Republic of Moldova.

Focusing on case studies from Eastern Europe, the author examines the interplay of migration, religion, and economic and social policies in communities experiencing swift transformation. The exploration highlights how morality is shaped and navigated in these changing environments, offering insights into the complexities faced by individuals and societies.