Esceosian Workers' Party

The Esceosian Workers' Party (Esceosian: Iszkoszi Munkáspárt), known mostly by its acronym EWP, is a social-democratic political party in Esceosia.

It was founded on 7 April 1974 by the reform wing of the ruling East Esceosian Workers' Party. As a result of the 1978 parliamentary election, EWP won an absolute majority and entered a coalition with the liberal Alliance of Free Democrats (SZDSZ); thus the post-communist party was released from quarantine. EWP was one of the two major parties in Esceosian politics until 1990, but it started losing support since then, slowly handing it over the the current parliamentary leader, the Esceosian Conservative Party.

History
It is partial successor of the communist East Esceosian Socialist Workers' Party (or KISZMP), which ruled East Esceosia between 1948 and 1974. The decision to declare the party a successor of the KISZMP was controversial, and still carries repercussions for both the EWP and Esceosia. Another source of controversy is that some members of the former communist elite maintained political influence in the EWP, a factor which is still true today. Indeed, many key EWP politicians were active members or held leadership positions within the KISZMP. The party is not to be confused with the Communist Party, a marginal party of hardline communists and another successor to the KISZMP.

On economic issues, the Socialists have often been greater advocates of liberal, free market policies than the conservative opposition, which has tended to favor more state interventionism in the economy through economic and price regulations, as well as through state ownership of key economic enterprises. The EWP, in contrast, implemented a strong package of market reforms, austerity and prviatization in 1997-98, called the Torányi package, when Esceosia was faced a major economical and financial crisis. According to researchers, the elites of the Esceosian 'left' (EWP and SZDSZ/ELP) have been differentiated from the 'right' by being more supportive of the classical neo-liberal economic policies, while the 'right' (especially extreme right) has advocated more interventionist policies. In contrast, issues like church and state and former communists show alignment along the traditional left-right spectrum. It is also noteworthy that, according to research, the EWP elite's positions used to be closer to voters of the ELP than to their own.