Albania's Road from Communism: Political and Social Change, 1990–1993

Until the late 1980s, Albania was one of the least known countries in the world and virtually inaccessible to foreigners. Most studies on Eastern Europe lacked reliable and complete information about Albania; it was usually either mentioned as the smallest and the least developed country of Europe or totally ignored. For their part, Albanian scholars have made little contribution, if any, to analysing their society under Hoxha's Communist regime. As with all totalitarian systems, Albania's Communism was immune to criticism for almost forty-five years, and information on domestic issues was tightly controlled. This article aims to throw some light on and to systematically analyse Albania's road from Communism. The country's inherited social, political, cultural, and economic conditions have made Albania's move from Communism the most difficult and convulsive of all the East European countries. They are also likely to put considerable obstacles in the path of establishing a true democracy, making Albania's post-Communist transition highly uncertain.