Eastern Europe is, to state the
obvious, the eastern part of
the continent of
Europe. The eastern geographic boundary of Europe is
generally agreed to be at the
Ural Mountains, but delimiting the
dividing line between East and West Europe has always been an exercise
in
politics, not
geography.
Cold War Era
During the
Cold War, there was an unambiguous
divide -- the
Iron Curtain -- between the
capitalists, who were
West, and the
communists,
who were
East. Eastern Europe thus consisted of:
Countries like
Finland,
Greece and
Cyprus, while geographically
to the east of many of these, were not communist so they were considered
a part of Western Europe. With the exception of Turkey, which is
mostly in
Asia anyway, there was very little gray area in between.
Post-Cold War
The collapse of the
Soviet Union threw these neat categories (and
the countries themselves) into disarray.
Some ten years later,
the area has fractured into at least three separate regions, only
one of which is universally still called Eastern Europe.
Central Europe
These days, the better developed ex-communist countries -- now clearly
marked as future members of the European Union -- prefer to be
called Central Europe:
For obvious geographic reasons, Austria is also often included in
this group, but nobody calls it Eastern Europe. The German
Democratic Republic was swallowed by Germany and is now firmly a
part of Western Europe, although a slowly fading distinction between
Wessis and Ossis remains.
It may not be entirely coincidental that these countries are largely Roman Catholic, not Orthodox.
Baltics
The three former
Soviet republics bordering the
Baltic Sea,
which are also well on their way to the EU, are
now commonly known by the obvious moniker the
Baltics. More northeastern
than central, they remain more likely to be lumped into
Eastern Europe, but
Estonia in particular much prefers to belong
to
Northern Europe.
The odd man out is the last of these, the Russian
Kaliningrad enclave wedged between
Lithuania and
Poland. Geographically it's Baltic alright, but politically and economically it remains firmly Russian.
Eastern Europe, Version 2
And it is thus the leftover
detritus that is stuck with the label
Eastern Europe:
Geography and
religion would tend to place Croatia
in the Central block, but politically it will remain East
until it joins the EU -- which won't happen for some time.
Ex-Yugoslav politicians are now floating the term
Southeastern Europe as a sunnier alternative to the
Balkans, but this has yet to take off elsewhere.
Some other former Soviet republics, notably Georgia and Kazakhstan,
are also arguably in geographical Europe -- but they are rarely
considered a part of Eastern Europe per se.
The Future
It remains to be seen how this
nomenclature will change if
Romania and
Bulgaria, and perhaps even
Turkey, some day join
the
EU; the label
Central Europe seems improbable, but then
again, that label would have seemed downright impossible for
the eastern half of
Czechoslovakia less than 15 years ago. Odds
are some handy terms will be developed for "EU" and "not-EU".
References
Rand McNally's Europe atlas (1988)
shallot's handy listing in Europe (and /msg'd commentary)