Faculty Seminar in Central Europe:
"Central Europe's Environmental Crisis: Scientific, Social, and Cultural Perspectives"
Summer 2003

Facilitator's report

Report by Myron Levine, Albion College

As the program schedule makes clear the 16 professors who participated in the 2003 GPP program on environmental policy in Central Europe were given an intensive and very challenging overview of the changing nature of environmental policy in the region. The philosophy of the program was simple: Bring the professors to the sites, and let representatives of the region speak for themselves in showing how environmental policy and conditions had changed since 1989. What was the overall "consensus" of the evidence that we saw? Simply, despite the early post-1989 evaluations, much had changed in the region substantially for the better as the environment had gained (and lost) prominence on national agendas.

The program was built on background reading, site visits in the region, and lectures from academics and activists in the region knowledgeable about issues of interest to the group. Before commencing travel, each group member was provided with two books summarizing environmental conditions and policy during the transition: William Chandler, Energy and Environment in the Transition Economies, and Petr Pavlinek and Jon Pickles, Environmental Transitions: Transformation and Ecological Defence in Central and Eastern Europe. As director, I kept in constant contact with program participants through the internet, distributing dozens of environmentally-related articles and reports from Central European Review and related sources. The internet provides a valuable way of providing members with short, readable, and current materials (as well as a means to keep participants "in the loop" regarding schedule options).

E-mail contact also allowed me to take advantage of members' expertise. David Ellison of Grinnell, for instance, was invaluable in pointing me to a number of possible speakers who became the backbone of our Budapest program. Pamela Hollie helped identify Restaurace Stoleti, the perfect venue for our group welcome dinner in Prague. David Ellison and his wife also were extremely helpful in taking group members on a tour of Budapest and in arranging a group dinner.

I believe that this program was quite different in its structure from prior GPP faculty summer seminars. The program was not restricted to a single campus/site or two (even though we did spend just the right number or days at Palacky in Olomouc in the middle of the program). Instead, it was a program based on travel, allowing participants to visit various environmental sites and allowing local activists and administrators to present their updates directly to the group. Looking back, I can say two things: (1) The concept and the program worked near perfectly!, and (2) I can't believe how much time and energy was involved on the part of the director in order to identify speakers, coordinate travel plans, and arrange and adjust the program schedule.

The good news is that with the proper commitment on behalf of the director, the internet allows an academic-oriented, site-based program to be fashioned. I was able to develop an appropriate speaker's list not just through contacts but also by finding the web pages of key environmental organizations in the region. Just as important, I was able to get very decent lodging at affordable rates in the various cities, again primarily by doing internet searches and then contacting (and bargaining with) the hotels on line. Future groups have a greater range of options than they may think. With the director's initiative, they will not be "stuck" in an unsatisfactory hotel. Nor will they be confined to a local campus.

The only major drawback of the approach that I took is that it is quite labor-intensive. I estimate that I made over 1,000 e-mails arranging speakers, bus schedules, hotels (which sometimes proved more than a bit difficult), and working out problems with participants. But an energetic and disciplined (and, I hope, well paid) director can pull it off.

I was given an ACM credit card for the trip. This was essential as it greatly eased the problems of obtaining cash upon our arrival (as the ACM bank is in Olomouc, not our initial stop) and in paying for expenses (especially hotels)--lessening the (still) huge amount of cash that I was forced to carry (somewhat uncomfortably, especially as I fended off pickpockets in Prague) to cover the group's expenses and per diems.

One note regarding per diems: If costs are a problem in future programs, I really do not think that it is necessary to pay per diems for participants. The participants this year were very thankful for the per diems, but no one really expected to receive them. The program members were grateful that their airfare and hotels (usually with breakfast) had been covered and that the program provided key group meals. Here is one possible source of economy in future programs should budgets prove very tight.

As the schedule shows, it really was a quite busy-almost exhausting-17 days of travel and site visits. Academic lectures were supplemented with "outdoors" activity-hikes in nature preserves, a visit to the Black Triangle restoration areas, a visit to the controversial Gabcikovo dam. I would recommend that future programs consider such a mix of activities to avoid the tedium of a strict lecture/classroom-based program. Also, the site visits (always with informed guides) were especially fruitful in changing stereotypes of the region. We saw (and questioned) the extent of the recovery of the once-destroyed Black Triangle area around Most. We saw extensive forestry restoration in the Jezersky Mountains-and compared it of the pictures of the same area when the area was eaten away by acid rain. We climbed nature preserves, allowing us to see the beauties and the preservation efforts of the region, destroying the pollution-based stereotypes of the region. We also had activists report how the proliferation of automobiles in the region is promoting sprawl, substituting sprawl and pollution for older rail-line-based, concentrated development patterns. We also saw how controlled development approaches still allowed for limited growth while protecting the historic, cultural, and fragile environmental character of a region under pressure.

For such an extensive travel-based program, a group bus was essential. It allowed me the maximum flexibility in scheduling-and also allowed me the ability to respond to last-minute changes. Such travel was also more comfortable and less exhausting than travel by public train. We did, however, lose a bit of the "feel" for the country, traveling in a rubber tire tube with other American professors, not with the region's indigenous residents.

I also had the great advantage of having Ilona Jurenova work as my on-the-ground assistant helping to make arrangements and deal with problems (especially the seemingly endless round of hotel reservation cancellations) on the portion of the program that included our arrival in Olomouc and our visit to Moravia. She was also quite knowledgeable in the area of nature preservation in Moravia. I am especially grateful to Gaudenz Assenza for recommending her to me. Future ACM program in Palacky should try to employ her as an assistant if at all possible.

Palacky professors Dan Marek and Gaudenz Assenza were as informative, helpful, and "fun" as I had heard from previous directors. Jitka Herynkova was her usual superb self, proactively providing all supportive detail. Marek runs a tight shop. He has an informed, friendly, and eloquent (and fairly young!) group of speakers who are quite used to greeting visitors and informing them of changes in the region. Their youth was an asset as they were practiced in western teaching and communication styles; their English was amazingly good! The welcome dinner and the brewery visit, both with Marek and Herynkova helped to arrange, were highlights of our visit. Obviously, ACM is lucky to enjoy a continuing relationship with this good group of hardworking people.

I enjoyed it. Others asked, quite reasonably, if their spouses could accompany them on part of the trip (as mine had accompanied me at my expense). I think that this is a matter that can be reasonably considered. We had quite good group morale; I don't think that the participation of spouses would harm the group esprit at all.