LAW OF A "SHUFFLED DECK OF CARDS"

The society of European periphery bore resemblance to decks of cards, shuffled at an angle: the upper cards came very close to or almost reached the line, touched by the decks of the central societies. The cards at the bottom of the deck either remained in the same place, or were only slightly shifted forward. Lithuania was the last country to have joined the European periphery. When it happened, a wide gap had to be bridged. The old countries of the periphery were lagging behind the centre, whereas Lithuania was lagging behind the above mentioned periphery. Lithuania could merely follow the peripheral model of European civilization. Under the circumstances, the Germans turned out to be the carriers of skills and culture. However, it was the the Poles who were at their best to play this role. The same ethnic and cultural collision, which was experienced by the old countries of the periphery, was a much more painful and bitter experience to Lithuania. The Lithuanian deck of cards was shuffled by far at the biggest possible angle.

Lithuania had to adjust itself. It had to take over a whole set of values in order to be ready for the adjustment process. As the usual experience was, a top down approach was applied. The process of taking over the values was super superficial and was merely introduced at the lowest level. However, it should be noted that the process of development in Lithuania was relatively very speedy.