Money and Plan. Financial Aspects of East European Economic Reforms

Our knowledge of the operations of the centrally planned East European economies has become increasingly detailed; unfortunately, this accumulating scholarship has led to a certain disregard for some of the larger issues, especially concerning long-term developmental trends. The adverse results of this loss of focus have become quite apparent from the discussions about Soviet and East European economic problems—occasioned by the deaths of Leonid Brezhnev and Yuri Andropov—in the popular and semi-popular press. Most of the sweeping generalizations presented to the public were at considerable variance with scholarly assessments tucked away in publications for specialists. Further, many of the important empirical lessons in earlier comparative studies of long-term growth in East and West (for example, the remarkable survey by Bergson)1 appear to have been forgotten; and U.S. governmental policy statements often appear to be based on false assumptions about what actually happened.

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East European Economic Reform: Are New Institutions Emerging?

Journal of Economic Issues ◽

10.1080/00213624.1991.11505191 ◽

1991 ◽

Vol 25 (2) ◽

pp. 589-595 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Roger L. Adkins

Keyword(s):

Economic Reform ◽

European Economic ◽

East European ◽

New Institutions

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Back to the Future: The Politics of Economic Reform under the Kim Dae-Jung Presidency

Journal of East Asian Studies ◽

10.1017/s1598240800000242 ◽

2001 ◽

Vol 1 (1) ◽

pp. 53-90 ◽

Cited By ~ 6

Author(s):

Kyung Hoon Leem

Keyword(s):

Economic Reform ◽

Economic Reforms ◽

Sustainable Growth ◽

South American ◽

Quality Of Democracy ◽

East European ◽

Reform Program ◽

Capital Outflows ◽

Shaped Pattern

On the eve of the tenth anniversary of its democratization, Korea was hit by an unprecedented financial crisis marked by massive capital outflows, a sharp depreciation of the won and severe distress in the corporate and financial sectors. Korea's anniversary gift from the interntional community was an IMF conditionality program that imposed a comprehensive package of neoliberal economic reforms. Compared with the South American and East European experiences, economic reform in Korea has been implemented without significant policy obstructions, political instability or social disruptions. Despite much skepticism, the backbreaking reforms quickly began to pay off. The reforms created a V-shaped (rather than U-shaped) pattern of recovery, though more determined financial and corporate restructuring is needed in order for the nation to achieve sustainable growth. And, the quality of democracy has not deteriorated because of conflicts resulting from the economic reform program (neither, however, has it improved).

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What Happened in East European (Political) Economies?

East European Politics and Societies and Cultures ◽

10.1177/0888325409342109 ◽

2009 ◽

Vol 23 (4) ◽

pp. 479-490 ◽

Cited By ~ 20

Author(s):

Mitchell A. Orenstein

Keyword(s):

Economic Growth ◽

Economic Reforms ◽

The European Union ◽

Economic Relations ◽

East European ◽

Neoliberal Reform ◽

Radical Reform ◽

Rapid Economic Growth ◽

Economic Production ◽

Political Economies

Assessing the results of neoliberal reform remains controversial even twenty years after 1989. While neoliberal reform programs appeared to have finally produced rapid economic growth in the 2000s after a long transitional recession, the 2008 global economic meltdown plunged Central and East European countries back into crisis. This article offers a mixed assessment of the results of neoliberal economic reforms and questions the easy compatibility of democracy and radical reform observed during the 1990s. Since the 2000s, both democratic and authoritarian countries in Eastern Europe have experienced rapid growth. Geopolitics, more than reform or democracy, seems to separate the winners from the losers. Successful countries are those that either joined the European Union or developed close political and economic relations with Russia. Those betwixt and between and those suffering internal strife (or both) still have not reached 1989 levels of economic production.

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