White But Not Quite

Since the migration crisis of 2016, long-simmering tensions between the Western members of the European Union and its new Eastern members Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Hungary have proven to be fertile ground for rebellion against liberal values and policies. In this startling and original book Ivan Kalmar argues that Central European illiberalism is a misguided response to the devastating effects of global neoliberalism, which arose from the areas brutal transition to capitalism in the 1990s. Kalmar argues that dismissive attitudes towards Eastern Europeans are a form of racism and explores the close relation between racism towards Central Europeans and racism by Central Europeans: a people white but not quite.