The years from 1991 to 1998 have witnessed deep and radical changes in Albanian society, most memorably manifested in the «period of dark forces* surrounding the transition from Communist rule to a democratically elected government in 1990 — 1992, and in the «period of anarchy» which paved the way for the second transition in Albania, when the compromised regime of the Democratic Party was elected from power in June 1997. News coverage of these events focused on boats heavy with desperate refugees and small children touting Kalashnikov assault rifles, but at the source of the troubles in 1992 and 1997 is a culture of corruption and authoritarianism that has survived from the Hoxha-era. (Preface, fragment)