Termin crypto art pojawił się około 2017 roku w środowiskach, które, podążając za przykładem Rare Pepes (niszowych memów przekształconych w kolekcjonerskie karty cyfrowe) oraz projektów takich jak CryptoPunks i CryptoKitties, zaczęły kojarzyć cyfrowe dzieła sztuki z zarejestrowanymi w blockchainie i kontrolowanymi przez inteligentne kontrakty NFT (non-fungible tokens). Termin ten, sformułowany przez analityków danych, artystów, kolekcjonerów, właścicieli platform i badaczy sztuki w „zdecentralizowanym artykule” opublikowanym na łamach czasopisma „Leonardo”, został nieodpowiedzialnie spopularyzowany przez masowe media i czasopisma artystyczne w trakcie mody na NFT, która na początku 2021 roku zawładnęła częścią świata. Posługiwanie się nim jako nazwą gatunku sztuki budzi jednak zastrzeżenia na wielu poziomach. Niniejszy artykuł oferuje pogłębioną analizę samego określenia oraz praktyk nim opisywanych aby wykazać jego nieadekwatność oraz zwrócić uwagę na potencjalne zagrożenia, które może przynieść stosowanie go.
The study is devoted to the changes that have undergone since 1989, such an important area of the literary process as the market of literary and critical periodicals, experienced the «pros» and «cons» of the new system and changes in the position of the Word in the life of Polish society. The political change that contributed to the decentralization and diversity of literary life, led first to the flourishing, and then to the crisis of the market of literary-artistic and literary-critical publications, which is due to reasons not only economic (lack of finance), but also social and cultural (literature has lost its former significant place in public communication, decreased interest in the differentiation of society).
One of the most fascinating developments in post-communist education is the emergence of private schools and reform movements at every level of schooling. Ideologies in support of private education resonate with the liberal, marketoriented philosophies prevailing in the region; the policies of private schools promote and legitimate antistate rhetoric and echo the themes of renewal and transformation heard in other policy realms. Virtually every institution favours democratization and decentralization; the monopoly of the state over the provision of goods and services must be broken. Rigid educational hierarchies must be replaced with schools and teachers who are more responsive to the needs of individual parents and children. The curriculum needs to be completely overhauled; all traces of ideological indoctrination must be expunged. The organization and financing of schools should be lodged in democratically organized community groups; schools should be controlled by the families who can best monitor the education their children receive. Schools must be liberated not only from communist doctrine but from the state as a whole; a free market for schooling should replace state control. These themes lead directly to the assumption that the only workable strategy for eradicating state control of education is to establish new, independent private schools under the control of parents’ groups.
REVIEWS 78I Kirchner, Emil J. (ed.). Decentralization and Transition in the Visegrad. Poland, Hungagy, theCzechRepublic andSlovakia. Macmillan, Basingstoke, and St Martin's Press, New York, I 999. XViii + 237 pp. Notes. Bibliography. Index. ?47.50. LOCAL governmentreformin CentralEuropewas one ofthe earliestinitiatives in the process of institutional change characteristic of post-communist democratization.Decentralization was an importantelement of the platforms of Solidarityin Poland and Civic Forum/Public againstViolence in Czechoslovakia , not least to counter the oppressive, unresponsive bureaucratic centralismof the old regime. At the same time, completing the reformprocess proved difficultand halting, with both structuresand proceduresemerging as areas of technical and political controversythroughout the course of the first decade of transformation. Despite the book's title, the examination of this disjuncture provides the stuff of four solid empirical chapters by local specialistson the Visegrad Four, about half the book. In general the regional similarities are more striking than the differences, though the precise time periods underdiscussionare not alwaysclear, nor are they uniform. In I990 all three Visegrad governments enacted legislation to break the links between local government and the state administration by restoring genuine autonomy to communes (Poland) and municipalities (the Czech Republic, Slovakia,and Hungary),alongwith some reinstatementofproperty. The opportunities and obstacles for local democracy are effectively charted here, and three areas will serve to illustratesome of the common difficulties. First,there was a range of size, expertise and resourcesacrossthe local units, raisingseriousproblems of inequality.At the same time there was a growthin particularism, with few developed mechanisms for horizontal coordination and cooperation. In Hungary, the Czech Republic and Slovakiathere was a tendency for still furtherfragmentation into smaller units, though territorial settlementwas alreadyfragmentaryand dispersed. Secondly, the Centre gladly transferredextensive responsibilities to this lowest tier of government, but failed to secure the funds to ensure that they could fulfil them. This was especially acute in Slovakia from I994-98 when all spheres of social life based upon the principle of self-government came under attack'(Flatanand Krivy,p. Io8). Thirdly, decentralizationwas limited by the failureto addressintermediate levelsof government,the natureand cope ofwhich remainedhighlycontested. The Centre was anxious to retain control by direct as well as by financial means, despite the rhetoric of local democracy. In Poland and the Czech Republic this issue was still unresolved at the time the chapterswere written. In Poland resistance by the Polish Peasant Party, in coalition with the social democrats from 1993-97, meant that only a change of government could achieve the controversial restructuringof the provinces (wojewodztwa) from forty-nine to sixteen and the (re-)introductionof the county in I999. In the Czech Republic the provinceswere strippedof theirpolitical and administrative functions in I990, leaving seventy-eightdistrictsoperating as 'uncomfortably strongarmsof the centralgovernment and vehicles of centralism'(Illner, p. 9I). Prime Minister Vaclav Klaus was no friend of decentralization (nor 782 SEER, 79, 4, 2001 indeed of civil society), seeing it as a potential threat to a unified economic reform process. It was not until late I997 that the territorialdivision of the country into fourteen (small)provinces was resolved, but with their functions and finance still undefined. In both Hungary and the Czech Republic a 'politicalvacuum' emerged because of the weaknessof the intermediatelevel. In Slovakia the 1996 restructuringof the country's regions and districtswas certainly not final either: it was not only politically controversial but representeda clear attemptboth at partisangerrymanderingand to dilute the strengthof the Hungarian minority. Aside from the core studies a number of chapters cast differentangles on questions of decentralization. Issues of inequality surface in Andrzej Kowalczyk 's discussion of the development of Polish-German Euroregions, which notes the problems arising from economic differences between Poland and Germany. Successful cooperation can bring enormous benefits, as with the cooperation between Frankfurt-on-Oderand Stubice within the ProEuropa Viadrina Euroregion. Stubice became one of the wealthiest towns in Poland, thus magnifyinginternalinequalitieson the Polishside, while also castinginto starkreliefthe lack of comparablemotors of development on Poland'seastern borders. In other respects, however, this is a disparatecollection. It seems unlikely thatreaderswould expect to locate studiesof EU-Polish trade(Zielinska-Glebocka ) or European security and Polish debt finance (Sperling)in a study of decentralization;and these two sit especiallyuneasilyin thisvolume. They do not support or indeed refer to the questionable thesis...