EASTERN EUROPE: NOT ONE, BUT SEVERAL TRANSITIONS: Dumitru Sandu: Spațiul social al tranziției [The Social Space of Transition], Iasi: Polirom, 1999, 232 pages (original) (raw)
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The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics and the Law, 2002
The relatively bloodless economic and political collapse of the former Soviet bloc has been surprising in many respects. The political disaster of the communist empire was deep and spread rapidly to a large number of countries; but it came rather unexpectedly. Post-communist leaders made frequent public statements about their commitment to free-market principles, but transition towards the free-market model kept encountering impediments. Recommendations and suggestions for policymaking have been offered in great quantity by scholars as well as by development experts at think tanks and international agencies, but their policies have produced disappointing results. More generally, despite the huge literature which has been flourishing since the early 1990s, the origins and unfolding of transition remain unclear, and most of the proposed solutions to the economic problems related to "transition" continue to be debated. Part of the problem may be due to the fact that the collapse of the communist empire was not a traditional political crisis. The incumbent rulers were not voted out of power, as in a democracy. But it is also hard to claim that some kind of popular revolt against the communist leaders occurred. In fact, most of those very leaders are still in key positions today, often with substantial and diffused support. This is important, for it reveals some neglected and yet critical features of most Eastern-European transition countries in these years. In particular, these countries have not generated a new cohort of political leaders legitimized by their competence and technical expertise. Strong commitment to freemarket economic principles has not been enough to gather consensus, and may even be counterproductive. And the reluctance to get rid of the old élite demonstrates that personal ties and informal institutional structures have remained of the greatest political importance. In many situations a deep involvement with past planning and political practices is still an asset, both for politicians and for managers, rather than a cause for shame and disgrace. These points are of particular relevance for the law-and-economics interpretation of transition in Eastern Europe, which attributes particular importance to the origins of the crisis. The system of property-rights in a market-economy is the critical issue for understanding the nature of institutional change and the chances for successful transition towards a free-market model. More precisely, the appropriate assessment of the consensus-or lack of it-about the system of property-rights to be employed and about the process through which the new property-rights structure should be defined and monitored, and about the role of government in the process will determine the kind of transition an economy will experience. This is clearly in contrast with the standard view, which takes for granted that the pattern of property rights emblematic of a planned economy have been rejected by the vast majority of the
Central and Eastern Europe in transition: an unfinished process?
European View, Dec. 2014, pg.1-10, DOI: 10.1007/s12290-014-0329-z, Springer Berlin Heidelberg
Since 1989 the former socialist countries of Central and Eastern Europe have been undergoing a transition from a more or less totalitarian political regime, planned economy and socialism towards a democratic regime, market economy and capitalism. This article examines the indicators that are used to measure the success or failure of a transition and compares them to the outcomes of democratic processes and economic performance. Five Central and Eastern European countries are studied: Slovenia, Hungary, Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Poland. The article concludes that the countries that opted for a ‘big-bang’ approach to transition are either completing this process (the Czech Republic and Poland) or are well on track to concluding it (Slovakia), while the countries that missed the moment and opted for a gradualist approach (Hungary and Slovenia) lag behind and may even find stability in a form of deficient democracy.
After Twenty Years – Reasons and Consequences of the Transformation in Central and Eastern Europe
The Majority of the papers in the present volume are the result of a series of seminars which took place between autumn 2007 and spring 2009 at the Department of the History of Eastern Europe at Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, headed by Dr. Tamás Krausz, under the auspices of the doctoral programme entitled ‘The History of Eastern Europe first in a wider historical context and then concentrating on the processes of the past twenty years. "The project helps young researchers to join in with the international debate on their subject matter and to foster the emergence of a common discourse. We believe it is important that the young generation of historians born around or after the transition who did not live through the pre-1989 period as children or young contemporaries should come to play an increasing role in this discourse. A certain distance in time is an important condition for a deeper understanding of the events and processes of the time. Not only do we gain access to the sources for this exciting sequence of historical phenomena – a distance in time also allows the subject matter to shift from the boundary zone between political sciences and history clearly into the sphere of the latter, thus becoming free of daily political interests. We trust that the authors of the present volume will become active participants in shaping this process."
Central and Eastern Europe in Transition
Contemporary Economic Policy, 1992
zur Erlangung des akademischen Grades doctor rerum politicarum (dr. rer. pol.) im Fach Volkswirtschaftslehre eingereicht an der Wirtschaftswissenschaftlichen Fakultät
The Transition in Eastern Europe, Volume 2: Restructuring
When communism fell in 1989, the question for most Eastern European countries was not whether to go to a market economy, but how to get there. Several years later, the difficult process of privatization and restructuring continues to concern the countries of the region. The Transition in Eastern Europe, Volumes 1 and 2 is an analysis of the experiences of various countries making the transition to market economies and examines the most important challenges still in store. Volume 1, Country Studies, gives an in-depth, country-by-country analysis of various reform experiences, including historical backgrounds and discussions of policies and results to date. The countries analyzed are Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, eastern Germany, Slovenia, and Russia. Written by leading economists, some of whom helped shape local and national reforms, this volume identifies common progress, common difficulties, and tentative solutions to the problems of economic transition. Volume 2, Restructuring,...
Advances in Spatial Science, 1999
Eight years after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the Iron Curtain economic and political cleavages are still visible in Europe. With respect to social and economic transition the saliency of the problems seem to increase, as the efforts to solve the problems become the common business of governments and international organizations. Regional economic and political integration have significant impacts on this process, namely through the European Union programs for restructuring and development. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the main problems in the process of transition and reintegration has to so overcome from a theoretical and conceptual point of view. The theoretical anchors political and economic theories of regional integration. After a period with declining attention, regional integration has again become topic in various parts of the world. Concepts of integration are still pivotal in Europe, partly regarding the internal development of the European Union, partly as a framework of cooperation between the EU and the rest of Europe. Based on the analysis of the concepts of Regional Economic Cooperation in Europe, the links between international economic integration and internal development are analyzed. The relationship between macroeconomic integration and the necessary of providing instruments to cover specific areas or sector from significant adverse effects of this process is given special attention in the analysis. This part of the analysis will focus on the needs for restructuring of existing EU-policies to meet the challenges of the next enlargements. The theoretical concepts will be used for a principal evaluation of the needs for a future regional policy for an enlarged community. The process of transition and recovery in East Europe has been challenged not only by the regained influence of traditional political groups in East Europe but also through the reluctance of the EU to open their markets in sectors where the former CMEA-countries are competitive. To avoid further drawbacks it seems necessary to establish a self sustainable economic system able to handle external (i.e. the process of enlargement) as well as internal (i.e. the structural funds) demands for restructuring. The first precondition is the opening of western markets. The second is to provide a reliable regime for development and knowledge transfer. Last but not least, the paper stress' the need to establish a reasonable framework for cooperation until the East and Central Europe can participate on equal terms in the mainstream of European Integration, and to handle the different waves of membership negotiations in a reliable way.