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Personal Mobility and Communication in the Warsaw Pact StatesAuthor(s): Alexander J. Groth and William C. PotterSource: The Western Political Quarterly, Vol. 30, No. 2 (Jun., 1977), pp. 225-235Published by: University of Utah on behalf of the Western Political Science AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/447407

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226 Western

Political

Quarterly

societies,

cultures,

and

even of

the

personalities

of

individuals...."3

Moreover,

Deutsch

argued

that

abilities to

communicate should

be

measurable

and

provide

the

basis for an

evaluation

and

prediction

of

national

development

or

nation-

building. Ten years later another renowned political scientist, Lucian Pye, re-

newed

Deutch's call for research

into the

relationship

between

communication and

political

development.

"Communication,"

Pye

maintained,

"is

the

web

of

human

society....

The

flow

of communication determines

the

direction

and the

pace

of

dynamic

social

development."4

In the ten and

twenty

years

since the calls for

research

by

Deutsch

and

Pye,

significant

studies have

been

undertaken

n

the area of

communications

and

political

development.5

Surprisingly,

however,

there have

been

few

attempts

to

explain

dif-

ferential

rates

of social communication

in

terms of

as traditional

a

political

variable

as

type

of

political system.

It

may

be

that

level

of

economic

development,

social

mobility,and political and social integration independentlyor in interactive fashion

influence the

degree

of

national

and

transnational intercourse.

It

is

also

possible,

however,

that these variables are less

potent

in their

explanatory

power

than the

traditional,

if

presently

unfashionable,

political dichotomy

of

communist-non-

communist

political

systems.

Perhaps

the

most

important

reason to

assume

that

type

of

political

system

strongly

influences

a

society's

social communication

profile

is the demonstrated

concern

of

communist

ruling

parties

to

preserve

the

one-party

character

of their

regimes

and to stifle

potential

as

well

as

actual

opposition.

In the Stalinist

period

this fear of

loss

of

control

and alien

subversionand contamination

led

to a

structur-

ing

of

intrasocietal

and

interbloc

communications

along

vertical rather

than

hori-

zontal lines. In other

words,

an

attempt

was made to

establish control

over domes-

tic

interpersonal

as

well

as communist

international

relations

by linking

citizens

and states

to

Soviet

party-controlled

institutions;

at

the same

time,

an effort

was

made to atomize

society

and

preserve

Soviet control

over

the international

com-

munist movement

by discouraging

customs and

dismantling

institutions that

pro-

moted lateral

ties

among

citizens

and

multilateral ties

among

communist

states.6

The

"transmissionbelt" mode

of

communication

has been

modified

substan-

tially

in

the

years

since Stalin's death

and

genuine

lateral ties of communication

and influence

today

characterize relations in and

among

most communist societies.

Nevertheless,

the

ruling

Marxist-Leninist

parties

of

the

Warsaw

Pact retain

control over communication and transportation networks with a thoroughness

which

makes their

particular preferences

the dominant ones

in

their

respective

societies.

It

is

reasonable, therefore,

to

hypothesize

that these

preferences

ordinarily sympathetic

to

public

communal

as

opposed

to

private

modes

of

opera-

tion

-

will be

reflected in

a

distinctive

social

communication

profile

for

the

War-

saw Pact states.

To some

extent,

the

explanation

of

the

profile

also

relates

to

the

historic

orientation

of the

parties

to

dampen

investment

in

all

kinds

of

goods

of

private

consumption

and

enhance

public-communal

expenditures

particularly

on

industrial

and

military

objectives.7

'P. 87.4

Pye,

Communications,

p.

4.

'

See

Hamid

Mowlana,

International

Communication:

A

Selected

Bibliography

(Dubuque,

Iowa:

Kendall/Hunt,

1971).

e

See,

for

example,

Zvi

Gitelman,

The

Diffusion

of

Political

Innovation From

East

Europe

to

the

Soviet Union

(Beverly

Hills:

Sage,

1972);

R. V.

Burks,

"The

Communist

Poli-

ties of Eastern

Europe,"

in

James

Rosenau,

ed.,

Linkage

Politics

(New

York: Free

Press, 1969),

pp. 275-303;

David

Lane,

Polities

and

Society

in

the

USSR

(New

York:

Random

House,

1971);

H. Gordon

Skilling

and

Franklyn

Griffiths,

eds., Interest

Groups

in Soviet

Politics

(Princeton:

Princeton

University

Press,

1971

).

'

See

e.g.,

Stanley

H.

Cohen,

Economic

Development

in

the

Soviet

Union

(Lexington,

Mass.:

Heath, 1970);

cf. the

conclusions of

Phillip

M.

Weitzman, Planning

Consumption

in

the USSR

(Ph.D.

dissertation,

University

of

Michigan,

1969),

pp.

199-202,

both with



Personal

Mobility

and

Communication 227

Our more

general

hypothesis

on

the

relationship

between

political systems

and

the allocation of resources

and services

transcends

the communist-non-communist

dichotomy.

The

assumption

here

is

that all

systems

which are

highly

authoritarian,

i.e., effectively repress or inhibit the articulation of demands emanating from the

society-at-large,

are

more

capable

of

lop-sided

allocations than

pluralistic

regimes.8

In

the

latter,

conflicting

demands

are

less

likely

to result in "all

for

some"

and

"nothing

for others" outcomes.

The

particular objectives

of

such allocations

are

likely

to

vary

with the

systems.

In

the

case

of

the Warsaw

Pact

states,

the

historic,

dominant

tendency

of the dominant member

-

the U.S.S.R.

-

has been to em-

phasize

the

industrial

military

sector

at

the

expense

of

consumption.

One result

of this

tendency

has

been that with

a

GNP less than

50

percent

as

large

as

the

U.S.,

the

U.S.S.R.

has

reached

or

even

exceeded

parity

with the

United

States

in

the

accumulation

of

several

major

types

of armaments

as

well

as

the

production

of

steel, iron, cement, and coal, and near parity in oil. Against the background of

these

prodigious

efforts,

we have

the contrast

of stark

neglect

of other sectors-

some of them

discussed

n this

paper.

RESEARCHSTRATEGY

Our method

is

comparative.

As

previously

indicated,

seven

Warsaw

Pact

states are

compared

to

a

maximum of

112

other

nations

on

a

number of indicators

of social communication.

Our

communication-mobility

data

are drawn

principally

from United

Nations'

statistics,

in

reflecting

international

comparisons

for the

year

1970,

and

in

some

cases the nearest available

year

between 1967 and 1971.9We

group

our information

in two

basic

categories.

The

first

combines

data

on the movement of

persons

simplified

to

passenger

kilometer

figures.

This includes

railroad,

air,

and

automo-

bile

transportation.

In the case of

automobiles,

we

use an

estimate of

passenger

kilometers

by

multiplying

the number

of

automobiles

for each state

by

the

1970

respect

to

pre-

and

post-Stalin periods. Also,

Philip

Hanson,

The

Consumer

in

The

Soviet

Economy

(London: Macmillan,

1968),

pp.

48-82;

Willem

Keizer,

The Soviet

Quest

for

Economic

Rationality (Rotterdam:

University

Press,

1971), pp.

91-94;

and

on

the earlier

period

of Soviet

development,

Naum

Jasny,

Soviet Industrialization

1928-

1952

(Chicago:

University

of

Chicago Press,

1961),

pp.

366-68,

particularly;

and

also

Nicolas Spulber,The State and EconomicDevelopmentin EasternEurope (New York:

Random

House,

1966),

pp.

31,

76-81;

and his earlier

The Economics

of

Communist

East

Europe

(New

York:

Wiley,

1957),

ch.

9, pp.

306-80;

Stanislaw

Wellisz,

The

Economics

of

The

Soviet Bloc

(New

York:

McGraw-Hill, 1964),

ch.

3, pp. 53-98;

Alfred

Zauberman,

Industrial

Progress

in

Poland,

Czechoslovakia

and East

Germany,

1937-1962

(London:

Oxford

University

Press,

1964),

ch.

1, pp.

1-68.

8For

a

more

extended discussion

see

A.

J.

Groth, Comparative

Politics:

A

Distributive

Ap-

proach

(New

York:

Macmillan,

1971);

see

also Gabriel A.

Almond, ed., Comparative

Politics

Today:

A

World

View

(Boston:

Little,

Brown,

1974),

pp.

34-35;

Karl

W.

Deutsch,

Politics

and

Government:

How

People

Decide

Their

Fate,

2nd

ed.

(Boston:

Houghton-Mifflin,

1974),

pp.

360-62;

on

the

theme that

policies

are

basically

structured

by

levels

of economic

development,

see Thomas R.

Dye, Understanding

Public

Policy

Englewood

Cliffs:

Prentice

Hall,

1972),

and

Frederic

L.

Pryor,

Public

Expenditures

n

Communist

and

Capitalist

Nations

(Homewood,

Ill.:

Irwin, 1968).

United

Nations,

Statistical

Yearbook 1971

(New

York: Statistical Office of The United

Nations, Department

of

Economic

and Social

Affairs,

1972),

pp.

398-401;

410-16;

439-57,

in

relation

to

transportation;

pp.

477-90 on

communication.

Our

source

of

GNP

estimates

is International Institute

for

Strategic Studies,

The

Military

Balance

1971-1972

(London, 1971).

There

are alternative

indicators

of

economic

development

which

yield

similar

rankings.

In

1970

in world-wide

terms

G.D.R. ranked

8th in

the

proportion

of urban

population;

Czechoslovakia

15th;

U.S.S.R.

17th;

Bulgaria

20th;

Poland

22nd; Hungary

27th;

Romania

33rd.

In

proportion

of

work

force outside

agri-

culture,

G.D.R.

ranked

10th;

Czechoslovakia

14th;

Hungary

18th;

U.S.S.R.

19th;

Bul-

garia

21st;

Poland

22nd;

Romania

25th.

Among

the

world's

top

steel

producers

in

1970

U.S.S.R.

ranked

2nd;

Czechoslovakia

10th;

Poland

11th;

Romania

15th;

G.D.R.

19th; Hungary

24th;

Bulgaria

26th.

See

Glowny

Urzad

Statystyczny,

Rocznik

Staty-

styczny (Warsaw, 1973),

pp. 635,

647,

and 659.



228

Western

Political

Quarterly

United

States

passenger

km.

figure (1.9

passengers

carried an

average

of

9,978

miles);

this works out

to

30,000

rounded

off.10

The

second

part

of

our data com-

bines the various forms of

messages

sent

and

received

-

mail

flows,

domestic

and

foreign telegrams, and telephone calls. We thus have two composite indices of

social

communication.

One

basic

problem

with

the data

is

its

regrettably very aggregate

character.

We have

no

breakdown

within such

categories

of

information

as "railroad

pas-

senger

miles,"

"telephone messages,"

and

"items mailed."

Thus,

we

necessarily

lump

together

official,

public

uses

of

the

transportation

and communication

systems

with

purely private

ones;

the

utilization

of these facilities

by foreign

nationals

and

their

usage by

the

indigenous population;

the

exchange

of

messages among govern-

mental officials and

the

exchange

of

letters and

packages among

private

citizens;

and local

calls

with

long

distance

ones.

Our

capacity

for

inference,

therefore,

is

necessarily imited to aggregatecategories."'

ANALYTIC

METHODS

One

objective

of this

study,

as

previously

indicated,

is

to assess

the

relationship

between

type

of

political

system

and

its

social

communication

profile.

Another

objective

is to

weigh

the

relative

explanatory

power

of

alternative

predictors

of

social communication such

as

level

of economic

development, area,

and

population.

Bivariate

correlation

analysis

and

step-wise multiple

regression

are the chosen

analytic

techniques.

The

former

provides

a

single summary

statistic

describing

the

strength

of association

between

the two

variables.

The

latter,

a

powerful

variation of multiple regression,is a technique for constructing a multiple regres-

sion

equation

through

the successive

choice

of those

predictor

variables which

explain

the most

variance in the

dependent

variable,

after

accounting

for the

variance

explained

by

the

previously

selected

variable.

As our

step-wise

regression

ndicates that a variable

other than

political system

is

the best

predictor

of level

of

social

communication,

we

carry

the

analysis

one

step

further. First

we divide

our

pool

of nations

into

two

categories:

communist

and non-communist states. The best

predictor

in the

step-wise

regressionequation

then

is

regressed

against

our two indices

of social communication.

This,

in

turn

enables

us to

construct

regression

equations

for

estimating

the level

of

social com-

municationin both WarsawPact and non-communist states.

FINDINGS

Tables

1

and

2

present

the

rankings

of nations on the two

composite

indices

of

social

communication.

Table

3

presents

the

correlation coefficients

describing

the

association

among type

of

political

system, population,

area,

GNP

per capita

and

our

two

composite

indices of

social communication labeled "kilometers"and

"messages,"respectively.

Tables

4

and 5

present

the

findings

from

the

step-wise

multiple regression.

We find

that of the

112

states for which automobile

data is

available,

the

U.S.S.R. ranked 81st, just behind Paraguay and ahead of Cameroon, with only

one

automobile

for

147

inhabitants.'2

East

Germany

ranked

highest

among

the

0

The source

for

this

estimate is

Motor

Vehicle

Manufacturers

Association

of

the

U.S.

Inc.,

1972 Automobile

Facts

and

Figures

(Detroit,

1972),

pp.

35

and

51.

Data

gathering

difficulties

precluded

inclusion

of informations on

motorcycle

and

bicycle

mileage,

on

private aircraft, passenger

ships,

boats,

buses,

streetcars,

and

horsedrawn

transport

as

well

as

on

communication

through

messengers.

In

relation

to

personal

mobility,

our

findings

are

foreshadowed

by

the

paucity

of

automobiles

among

the

War-

saw

Pact

states,

and

in relation

to

communication

by

the

paucity

of

telephones.

12

For

reasons

of

space

the individual

indicators

(e.g.,

automobiles and

telephones)

have

been

omitted.

See footnote 9 for

sources.



Personal

Mobility

and Communication

229

TABLE

1.

PASSENGER

KILOMETERS

AUTO,

TRAIN,

AIR)

PER

CAPITA

Rank

Country*

Variable

Valuet

Rank

Country*

Variable

Valuet

1

United

States

2

Australia

3

New

Zealand

4

Canada

5

Sweden

6

Luxembourg

7 Switzerland

8

France

9

FRG

(West)

10 Denmark

11

Belgium

12

United

Kingdom

13

Netherlands

14 Norway

15

Italy

16

Austria

17

Japan

18

Finland

19

Ireland

20 GDR

(East)

21

CZECHOSLOVAKIA

22

Spain

23 Israel

24

Argentina

25

Portugal

26 HUNGARY

27

Lebanon

28 Yugoslavia29 Venezuela

30

U.S.S.R.

31

POLAND

32 'BULGARIA

33 Greece

34

ROMANIA

35

Brazil

36 Mexico

37 Chile

38

'Costa

Rica

14125

11967

10271

10143

9436

8970

8796

8639

7602

7595

7493

7263

6819

6777

6511

5796

5493

5177

4816

3294

2970

2679

2543

2516

2433

1948

1773

1637

1627

1621

1503

1410

1177

1089

918

906

868

802

39

Taiwan

40

Ivory

Coast

41 Peru

42

Nicaragua

43 Tunisia

44

Morocco

45

Ceylon

46

Senegal

47

Algeria

48

Korea

South

49

Iran

50

Egypt

51 Colombia

52 Saudi Arabia

53

Turkey

54

Philippines

55

Iraq

56

Thailand

57

Madagascar

58 Ecuador

59 India

60 Cameroon

61

Ghana

62

Syria

63 Bolivia

64 Pakistan

65

Togo

66 Dahomey67 Zaire

68 Burma

69

Vietnam

(South)

70 Indonesia

71

Ethiopia

72 Mauritania

73

Mali

74

Malawi

75

Nigeria

*

Warsaw

Pact states

are in

capital

letters.

t

There is

incomplete

information on

some

of the

indicators for:

Angola; Burundi; Chad; Congo PR; Gabon; Kenya; Liberia; Mazambique; Nigeria; Rwanda; Sierra Leone;

Somalia;

S.

Africa;

S.

Rhodesia;

Sudan;

Swaziland; Uganda;

Zambia;

Bahamas;

Cuba;

Dominican

Republic;

El

Salvador;

Guatemala;

Haiti;

Honduras;

Jamaica;

Panama-

Trinidad-T;

Guyana; Paraguay;

Uruguay;

Af-

ghanistan;

China

(P.R.C.);

Cyprus;

Jordan;

Khmer

Rep;

Korea

North;

Kuwait; Laos;

Mongolia;

Nepal;

Singapore; Vietnam

North;

Albania;

iceland;

Malta.

Warsaw Pact

states,

followed

by

Czechoslovakiaat

15 and

18 inhabitants

per

auto-

mobile,

respectively.

But even these most advanced

communist

states ranked

28th

and

33rd

internationally,

lagging

behind

all

of

their

economically

comparable

counterparts.

Hungary

ranked

48th;

Poland

55th;

Romania

and

Bulgaria

82nd

and

84th

respectively.

The

communist states

also

ranked low in

air

passenger

travel. The

U.S.S.R.

was admittedly a laudable 16th, and first among the Warsaw Pact countries, in

this

category

of

transport.

It

outperformed

a

number

of wealthier

states,

among

them

Sweden,

France,

Belgium,

Finland and

West

Germany.

But

the

remainder

of

the

Pact nations ranked

very

low,

in no

case

matching

or

surpassing

their

GNP

rankings:

Czechoslovakia

46th;

G.D.R.

52nd;

Bulgaria

59th;

Hungary

65th;

Romania

82nd;

Poland 83rd.

The

Warsaw

Pact

states

were

among

the world leaders in

railway

passenger

traffic.

Hungary,

Czechoslovakia,

U.S.S.R.,

G.D.R.,

Poland,

and

Romania

were

4th

through

9th

in world

rankings

of

80

nations

for

which

information

was avail-

able.

Bulgaria

was

13th.

617

615

585

571

521

484

453

395

393

377

370

344

322

322

301

283

274

270

267

253

252

216

198

197

190

178

176

173

130

123

103

98

72

62

61

57

43



230 Western Political

Quarterly

TABLE

2.

PERSONAL

MESSAGES

PER CAPITA

Country*

I

United States

Sweden

Iceland

Switzerland

New Zealand

Denmark

Japan

Luxembourg

Netherlands

Australia

Belgium

United

Kingdom

Norway

F.R.G.

(West)

Austria

Finland

Italy

France

Ireland

S.

Africa

Greece

Israel

CZECHOSLOVAKIA

Spain

Cyprus

VariableValuet

1255

914

715

680

634

580

520

494

483

465

418

416

400

376

352

346

324

312

279

273

264

255

254

244

201

Rank

26

27

28

29

30

31

32

33

34

35

36

37

38

39

40

41

42

43

44

45

46

47

48

49

50

Country*

G.D.R. (EAST)

HUNGARY

Lebanon

Portugal

Yugoslavia

POLAND

U.S.S.R.

ROMANIA

Ceylon

Zambia

Turkey

Ghana

Syria

India

Madagascar

Angola

Kenya

Mozambique

Thailand

Vietnam

(South)

Pakistan

Uganda

Nigeria

Burma

Indonesia

*

Warsaw Pact states are in

capital

letters.

t

There

is

incomplete

information

on

some

of

the indicators

for

Algeria; Burundi;

Cameroon;

Chad;

Congo P R;

Dahomey;

Egypt; Ethiopia; Gabon; Ivory Coast; Liberia; Libya; Malawi; Mali; Mauritania;

Morocco;

Nigeria;

Rwanda;

Senegal;

Sierra

Leone;

Somalia;

S.

Rhodesia;

Sudan;

Swaziland[

Togo;

Tunisia;

Zaire; Bahamas;

Canada;

Costa

Rica;

CUBA;

Dominican

Republic;

El

Salvador; Guatemala; iHaiti;

Honduras;

Jamaica; Mexico;

Nicaragua;

Panama;

Trinidad-T;

Argentina;

Bolivia;

Brazil;

Chile;

Columbia;

Ecuador;

Guyana;

Paraguay;

Peru;

Uruguay;

Venezuela;

Afghanistan;

China

(P.R.C.);

Taiwan;

Iran;

Iraq; Jordan;

Khmer

Rep;

Korea

North;

Korea

South;

Kuwait;

Laos;

Mongolia;

Nepal; Philippines;

Saudi

Arabia; Singa-

pore;

Vietnam

N;

Albania;

BULGARIA;

Malta.

TABLE

3.

CORRELATION

ATRIX

FOR 6 VARIABLES

Po

Sys

Pop

Area

GNP/capita

Miles

Messages

Political

System

..........

1,000

-0.001 0.188

-0.066

-0.235 -0.223

Population

.................. -0.001 1.000

0.493*

-0.085

-0.098 -0.057

Area ............................ 0.188 0.493* 1.000 0.196 0.116 0.095

GNP/capita

................ -0.066 -0.085 0.196

1.000 0.906*

0.891*

Miles ..........................

-0.235

-0.098

0.116

0.906* 1.000

0.911*

Messages

....................

-0.223

-0.057

0.095

0.891*

0.911* 1.000

*

Valuesare

significant

t

the .05

level.

TABLE

4. STEP-WISEMULTIPLE

REGRESSION

OR

4 VARIABLES

(KILOMETERS

DEPENDENT

VARIABLE)

Independent

variables

Multiple

Rt

R

Squaret

RSQ

Changet

Bt

Betat

GNP/capita

.................. 0.906

0.820

0.820

2.817

0.900

Political

System

............ 0.922

0.851

0.031

-1438.410

-0.170

Population*

...................

Area

..............................

0.923

0.852

0.001

0.000

-0.028

(Constant)

..............

-47.958

*

There

are

no

reported

values

for

population

as

an

independent

ariable ince

the

"level of tolerance"

used to calculate the

step-wise

multiple

regression

coefficients

fell

below the

minimum

specified

in

the

com-

puter

program.

f

The

Multiple

R measures the total

effect of

all the

independent

variables

upon

the

dependent

one.

R

Square

(r2)

may

be

interpreted

as

the

proportion

of

the total variation

in the

dependent

variable

explained

by

the

independent

variable.

RSQ

Change represents

the

change

in r2

from the

value of

the

previous step.

B and

Beta

represent

the

regular

and

normalized

regression

coefficients,

respectively.

Rank

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

Variable Valuet

198

172

171

121

115

83

69

48

45

38

37

35

31

17

16

15

13

11

11

11

8

6

6

4

3



Personal

Mobility

and

Communication 231

TABLE

5. STEP-WISE MULTIPLE REGRESSION

FOR 4 VARIABLES

(MESSAGES

=

DEPENDENT

VARIABLE)

Independentvariables Mulitple R R Square RSQ Change B Beta

GNP/capita

......................

0.891 0.794

0.794

0.200

0.903

Political

System

................ 0.906

0.821

0.027

-88.202

-0.148

Area

.............................

0.907 0.823

0.002 0.000

-0.085

Population

..................... 0.909

0.826

0.003

0.000

0.061

(Constant)

........................

-24.480

The

clustering

of the

communist

states in

this

category

of

travel

suggests

a

pattern

of

transportation

policy

for these

states;

it

is

particularly

remarkable

in

light

of

the low

railway

passenger mileage

of

some of the more advanced

states,

such as the U.S., a mere 48th, the Scandinavian nations, France, West Germany,

Italy,

Ireland

and

Canada.

It

appears

that

this

form of

transportation,

long

on

decline in some of the

developed

western

nations,

has

been

a

mainstay

of

Warsaw

Pact

passenger

traffic.

(The

data for

railroad

freight

also underscore

the

remark-

ably

uniform

Warsaw

Pact

commitment to

this

form of

transportation.

The

U.S.S.R. led

the

world in this

category

in

1970,

1st

among

84

states with

available

information,

followed

by

Czechoslovakia

at 4th

place;

G.D.R.

6th;

Poland

7th;

Romania

8th;

Hungary

11th;

Bulgaria

12th).

One

can

certainly

speak

of

a

partial

substitution

in the

Warsaw Pact states

of

rail

for

road

and air

transport.

When

account

is

taken

of

all

three forms

of

passenger

transportation

rail,

air

and

automobile,however,

all of

the Pact states

fall

behind the

per capita passen-

ger

kilometer

figures

for

economically

comparable

countries.

The

highest

ranking

communist

state, G.D.R.,

at

3,294

passenger

kilometers

(pkm) per

inhabitant,

as

well

as the

lowest,

Romania

at

1,089,

both fall

well

behind

their non-communist

GNP

per capita

counterparts.

Illustratively,

the

total

3-index

"mileage"

of

the

U.S.S.R. was

388.6 billion

pkm

for a

population

of

242

million,

while

it

was

451.8

billion

for

West

Germany's

59

million

people

and

411.4

billion

for

Britain's

55

million

people

East

Germany's

total

mileage

of

52.4

billion

pkm

for

16.2

million

people

was exceeded

by

Sweden's 75.9

for

8.04.

The U.S. total exceeded Russian

mileage

by

a ratio

of

more than

9

to 1.

It

is

possible,

but

not

likely,

that this

general

order of

relationships

is altered

by information not covered in this paper. The U.S.S.R., e.g., possessed4.6 million

trucks and

buses

in

1970

whose

unknown

mileage may

be

weighed

against

19.1 mil-

lion

in

the U.S.

East

Germany

had

245,000

trucks and

buses

against

1,228,406

in

West

Germany.

It would

appear

that

even

if

a

larger

proportion

of Warsaw

Pact

commercial

vehicles consisted

of

buses,

more

heavily

used,

the

total

advantage

of

the

non-communist

states

would

not

likely

be overcome. Our

data for commercial

vehicles

per

inhabitant indicate that

the

Warsaw

Pact states

have made

only

some-

uwhat

more

generous

allocations to

this form

of

transport.

G.D.R.

led

the

Warsaw

Pact

countries,

22nd

among

112

world states in

com-

mercial

vehicles

per

inhabitant;

Hungary

was

25th;

U.S.S.R.

33rd;

Czechoslovakia

40th; Romania 47th; Poland 52nd and Bulgaria76th.

There

is a similar

case

with

motorcycles.

Poland,

for

example,

reported

1,789,000

motorcycles

in

addition

to

its

479,000

automobiles

in

1970.

It

was

thus

ahead

of

Spain

with

about

the

same

population

and

only

1,267,000

motorcycles.

But

where allowance is made

for

Spain's

2,378,000

automobiles,

or

roughly

five

times

as

many,

the

advantage

does not

seem

significant."3

In

the

area

of

communication,

we have

examined four

kinds of information

relating

to the

conveyance

of

messages among

individuals:

mail

flows,

domestic

13

See

Statystyczny,

Rocznik,

p.

700,

Table 106

(1006).



232

Western

Political

Quarterly

and

foreign, telegrams

n both

categories,

the number of

telephones

in

each

country,

and in

most

cases,

also

the number of actual

telephone

conversations.14

We

have

not

examined

centrally

disseminated information

flows,

such

as

newspapers,

radio,

television,cinemasand the like.'5

On

the

whole,

Warsaw

Pact

states

ranked

conspicuously high

in

one

category

of

interpersonal

communication,

however,

which accounts

for

relatively

few mes-

sages:

domestic

telegrams.

Here,

the

U.S.S.R.

ranked 3rd

among

72

states with

available

information.

Bulgaria

was

5th;

Czechoslovakia

6th;

Hungary

8th;

G.D.R.

16th;

Romania

21st and Poland

23rd.

On

the other

hand,

these

states

ranked

relatively

low

in

telegrams

sent

abroad,

and,

much more

significantly,

low in the

domestic

and

foreign

volume of mail.

In

1970,

in

likely

connection

with East-West

German

rapprochement,

the

volume

of

foreign

mail sent

and

received

in

the

G.D.R.

placed

it

6th

among

72

states with relevant information. Hungary, however, ranked 28th; Poland 44th;

Romania

50th;

there was no information

on

Bulgaria.

Czechoslovakia and

the

U.S.S.R.

reported

their

domestic

and

foreign

mail

in

one

category.

The

general

communication

lag

of the Warsaw

Pact states was

principally

accounted for

by

the

sparse deployment

and use

of

telephones.

In the number

of

telephones per capita,

Czechoslovakia was

23rd;

G.D.R.

25th;

Hungary

32nd;

Bulgaria

40th;

Poland

42nd;

Romania

49th

and

the U.S.S.R.

an

amazing

87th

among

116 states

reporting

such data.

The U.S.S.R. ranked

behind

Ceylon

and

ahead of

Angola

in this

category

of

communication.

The

seriousness

of

the War-

saw

Pact's

apparent lag

is seen when

allowance

is made

for

the

very

substantial

use

generally

made

of

telephones

-

ranging

from

about 700

to more than

4,000

messages

per

telephone exchanged

annually

in different

areas of the world.'6When

we

combine the

various forms of communication

into

a

number of

messages

con-

veyed,

the

U.S.S.R.,

with

some 16.5 billion

for

a

population

of

242

million,

lagged

almost

20-fold

behind the

United

States

with

its

258

billion

messages

and

a

popula-

tion

of

205

million

in

1970

As is

evident

from our

rankings

of

GNP

per

capita

and

the total

messages

per capita,

no

Warsaw Pact

state

matched

the

level

of communication

among

other

comparably

wealthy

states.

Indeed,

this is

true

in

both

categories

examined in

our

paper: passenger

kilometers

per capita

and

messages

exchanged

per

capita.

An

examination of the included

tables,

as

well

as the tables

on

the

separate

constituent elements of the passengerkilometer and personal message composites,

shows that

of

all the Warsaw

Pact

states,

the U.S.S.R.

lags

farthest

behind

eco-

nomically

comparable

non-communist

states.

Thus,

if we look

at

states which

range

within,

e.g., $300

GNP

per capita

above

and

below

the

U.S.S.R.,

we find

that

the differences

between

it

and

the other states

in

passenger

kilometers

and

in

messages

per

capita

are in

virtually

all

cases differ-

ences

of several

magnitudes.

The Soviet

figure

of

1,621

passenger

kilometers

per

capita may

be

compared

with

a

figure

of

5,796

for

Austria;

5,493

for

Japan;

5,177

for Finland:

7,263

for

the

United

Kingdom;

10,271

for

New

Zealand;

and

6,511

for

Italy;

only

Israel

with a figureof 2,543 is relativelyclose to the U.S.S.R. The Soviet Union actually

14

See American

Telephone

and

Telegraph

Company,

The

World's

Telephones

(New

York,

1973)

Table

4,

pp.

11-12

and

26.

Based

upon

averages

for several

European

and Latin

American

tates

reported

n

this

source,

we estimate

he

probable

umber f

messages

in severalcases

where

only

the

number

of

telephones

s

known.

'5

See Charles L.

Taylor

and

Michael

C.

Hudson,

eds.,

World

Handbook

of

Political and

Social

Indicators,

2nd

ed.

(New

Haven:

Yale

University

Press,

1972);

Ellen

Mickiewicz,

ed.,

Handbook

of

Soviet Social

Science

Data

(New

York:

Free

Press,

1973).

l'

Brazil

registered

a remarkable

12,637,834,000

calls on

2,000,726

telephones.

Netherlands

had

3,409,842

telephones

but recorded

only

2,879,212,000

conversations. See

AT&T

Co.,

The

World's

Telephones,

pp.

4, 11,

12.



Personal

Mobility

and Communication

233

ranks

behind such

relatively

poor

states

as

Portugal,

Lebanon,

Yugoslavia

and

Venezuela,

and

among

non-Warsaw Pact

states,

modestly

ahead of

Greece

and

Brazil.

An even greater magnitude of differences holds true in messages per capita.

The

U.S.S.R.

is

ahead

of

but

far

closer

in

this

category

of

communication

to

Cey-

lon,

Zambia

and

Turkey

than

it

is

to

Austria,

Finland,

Italy,

Israel,

or

Japan.

It

may

also be

observed

that

all

non-Warsaw

Pact

countries

in the

$2,000

GNP

per

capita

category

-

or

even its reasonable

vicinity

-

range

above

250

messages

per

capita;

the Soviet

Union's 69

messages

per

capita

amount

to

approximately

one-

fourth

of

that

figure.

As

Tables

4 and

5

indicate, GNP/capita

is

by

far

the best

international

pre-

dictor

of

social

communication

outputs, accounting

for

82

percent

and

79

percent

of the

explained

variance

in the two indices of


(kilometers

and messages). Political system, although the second best of our four predictor

variables,

adds

only

3

percent

to

the

explained

variance for both

indices.

A somewhat different

picture

of the

relationship

among

GNP/capita (our

indicator

of

level

of economic

development),

political

system,

and

level

of social

communication

emerges

from

the

secondary

regression equations.

The

results

of

regressing

GNP/capita

against

"kilometers"

and

"messages"

for

both

non-com-

munist and Warsaw Pact

states

are

presented

n Table 6.

TABLE 6.

NON-COMMUNIST STATES WARSAWPACT STATES

Independent

variable

r rs

B r

r2

B

Kilometers

=

Dependent

Variable

GNP/Capita

..............

0.935 0.845

2.881

0.780 0.624 1.452

(Constant)

................

-91.756 -325.023

Messages

=

Dependent

Variable

GNP/Capita

............

0.920

0.847 0.200

0.614 0.377

0.107

(Constant) ....--........-

-16.837

-38.971

The regressionresults summarized in Table 6, among other things, indicate

that

GNP/capita

is

a

better

predictor

of

social

communication

outputs

in

non-

communist

as

opposed

to

Warsaw

Pact states. The

data in Table

6 also

enables

one

to

construct

regression

equations

predicting

the


profile

of

Warsaw Pact

and

non-communist states

knowing

their

level

of economic

de-

velopment

as

indicated

by

GNP/capita.

The

regression

equations

are

as

follows:

A.

Non-Communist

States

Kilometers

=-91.756

+

(2.881)

(GNP/capita)

Messages

=-16.837

+

(.200)

(GNP/capita)

B.

Warsaw

Pact

States

Kilometers

=

-325.023

+

(1.452) (GNP/capita)

Messages

=

-38.971

+

(0.107)

(GNP/capita)

Our

two

equations

relating

GNP/capita

with

passenger

kilometer

per capita

and

messages

per

capita

indicate a

general

"underperformance"

or

the

Warsaw

Pact

states. The

differences

however,

are

not uniform.

The

"underperformance,"

is

clearly

less

for

Czechoslovakia and

East

Germany,

and,

considering

available

wealth,

also for

Poland,

Hungary,

Romania

and

Bulgaria,

than it is for

the

U.S.S.R.

communication in the warsaw pact states.pdf

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