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"There is no denying that achieving social and political stability and sustainable development will take years for most countries. Nor will progress towards these goals be smooth or automatic. Several factors indicate how difficult this road will be." The past decade of transition and conflict has left the South East European region with a legacy of inadequate growth and declining living standards. In the past several years, overall growth has declined, increasing the gap between these economies and the rest of Europe. More alarming is that there has been a deterioration in living standards, as evidenced by higher poverty, inequality, and unemployment. The reasons for the poor economic performance are varied. The most destabilizing factor, of course, has been the regional conflicts, which have devastated the area, undermined structural reform policies, and discouraged foreign investment. Much of the economic development, social inclusion, regional stability in South Eastern Europe will depend on strengthening of institutions, governance, and a lowering of the level of corruption. This report, prepared in response to the mandate given to the World Bank and the European Commission under Article 41 of the Stability Pact to coordinate a regional approach to South Eastern Europe, outlines four broad thrusts for action. These actions are intended to support the achievement of the goals of peace, stability, and prosperity. They include moving rapidly towards trade integration with the EU and within the region, fostering social inclusion and social change to reduce tensions, improving institution capacity and governance structures, and investing in regional infrastructure to integrate the region physically within Europe.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• Editors' Note Map: National Frontiers and Capital Cities in Central and Eastern Europe Context and Prospects Poland Andrew H. Dawson Hungary Mark Pittaway The Baltic States Wayne C. Thompson The Czech Republic and Slovakia Martin Myant Bulgaria John Bristow Romania David Turnock Communism in Yugoslavia and Albania Will Bartlett Serbia and Montenegro Will Bartlett Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Macedonia Gavin Gray Albania Shinasi A. Rama Economic and Social Issues Sources and Uses of energy Tamas Novak Agriculture Andrew H. Dawson The Transformation of Manufacturing Tamas Novak and Csaba Novak Banking and Other Financial Services Lukasz Konopielko Economic Relations with Russia Kalman Dezseri Regional Development David Turnock Minorities, States, and Conflict Boian Koulov International Relations Relations with the Wider Europe Bogdan Szajkowski and Nieves Perez-Solorzano Borragan Appendices Chronology Personalities Political and Economic Institutions Ethnic Groups Bibliography Index.
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Each volume in the Regional Handbooks of Economic Development series examines key issues affecting the economic growth of the region. The series is designed to help the general reader understand a variety of complex factors -- social, political and economic -- that will bear on a region's economic growth. The Handbooks begin with two to three chapters that situate a region's economic conditions and initiatives within an historical and political context. There follow some 20 chapter-length essays, each prepared by a recognised expert in the field, analysing such factors as population, natural resources, foreign trade, banking and financial structure, as well as the role of multinational corporations, the labour situation and distribution of wealth within the region. Each volume closes with a series of appendices that include a detailed chronology of events in the region; a glossary of terms; biographical entries on key personalities; an annotated bibliography of further reading; and an index.
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Although the West promised billions of dollars in aid when the communist East Bloc collapsed, reforms financed by Western taxpayers did little to help the nations of the region reconstruct themselves as free-market states. This work explains where the Western dollars went, why Western nations did s.
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Why did Eastern Europeans protest less about the brutal social consequences of systematic change than the people of Latin America a decade earlier? Why has the regionwide authoritarian or populist turnabout not occured? Why has democracy in these countries proved to be crisis-proof? In what ways has the economic crisis impacted on the politics of the region? In addressing these questions, this text uses a comparative analysis of the structures, institutions, cultures, and actors shaping both the Eastern European and the Latin American transformations, and argues that structural, institutional, and cultural factors have put a brake on destabilizing collective actions and have paved the way for the emergence of the enduring, low-level equilibrium between incomplete democracy and imperfect market economy which seems set to characterize the Eastern European experience for the foreseeable future.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

Thirteen essays by acknowledged economic experts discuss political and economic freedom, monetary control and privatizations, labor markets and social safety nets, and taxation and crime in the transition economies.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• v. 1. Economic structure and performance between the two wars / edited by M.C. Kaser and E.A. Radice.

The third volume presents the process of economic change in the same countries. The main emphasis of the book is on institutions: on the changes in economic mechanism and their consequences for the position of the household both as a supplier of labour and as a consumer unit. The process of institutional change is examined at all stages against the background of planned and actual economic dynamics and in the interaction with political developments and social transformations.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)
This is the first of a five-volume series offering a definitive analysis of the economic development of eastern Europe from the dismemberment of the great nineteenth-century empires in 1919 to the 1975 Act of Helsinki which confirmed the boundaries of the east-west division. Volume I provides a general survey of the demographic and social structure of eight communist countries - Albania, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, the German Democratic Republic, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and Yugoslavia - as well as a description of their economic structure. There are chapters on agriculture, raw materials and energy, industry, infrastructure, foreign trade, and national income and product.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

This book is one of the first single-authored critical analyses of the transition to the market in Eastern Europe and Russia. It assesses the outcomes of the reform process during the years following the fall of the Berlin Wall, looking at a number of important questions: why was stabilisation so difficult to achieve and the recovery following so late?; why are structural reforms progressing so slowly?; how are these economies to be integrated into the international economy, and what will be the consequences? The book provides a comparative approach to transformation and supplies a large amount of factual and statistical information. It will be of great interest to students, specialists and practitioners, and its simple non-technical approach makes it appropriate for all those interested in the issues of transition.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)
This highly acclaimed text is both a vital guide and a valuable critical analysis. The book provides a contemporary comparative approach to the process of transformation of the economies of Eastern Europe and Russia. Supplying a large amount of factual and statistical information it also includes consideration of recent progress in the areas of macro-economic-stabilisation, micro-economic restructuring and integration into the world economy. .
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• Eastern Europe on a Road toward Radical Change-- Economic Transformation in Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union-- Economic Reform and Political Change-- Economic Development Strategies-- Currency Convertibility in the Post-Communist Economies.
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This work presents background information on, and analysis of, the economic and political changes that are taking place in Central and Eastern Europe. The author's work is based on research conducted at the Department of Economics at Harvard University. The book provides the basis for future evaluation of the changes in post-Communist economies. It discusses the radical change in Europe, economic reforms in Eastern Europe and the former USSR, economic development strategies, and theoretical and policy issues on currency convertibility in post-Communist economies.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• Introduction-- L.Paganetto -
• PART 1: AN OVERVIEW OF ON-GOING AND PROPOSED PROCESSES - Privatization Processes in Eastern Europe: Theoretical Foundations and Empirical Results-- L.Dini - Proposed Reforms of the Economic System of Information and Decision in the USSR: Commentary and Advice-- K.J.Arrow & E.S.Phelps - Privatization in Central Europe and the Soviet Union-- C.Boffito - Evolution and Design in the East European Transition-- R.Frydman & A.Rapaczynaki - Evolution and Design in Eastern European Transition: Comment-- R.Bonavoglia -
• PART 2: THEORETICAL FOUNDATIONS OF PRIVATIZATION PROCESSES: FINANCIAL MARKETS, INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS AND FOREIGN TRADE - Privatization and the Risk of Expropriation-- J.Vickers - Privatization and Competitive Behaviour: Endogenous Objectives, Efficiency and Growth-- L.Paganetto & P.L.Scandizzo - Some Theoretical Aspects of the Privatization: Applications to Eastern Europe-- J.E.Stiglitz - Is there an Option to the Denationalization of Eastern European Enterprises?-- B.Jossa - Foreign Trade, Foreign Direct Investments and Privatization in Eastern Europe-- D.Salvatore -
• PART 3: AN OVERALL EVALUATION OF PRIVATIZATION PROCESSES IN EASTERN EUROPE - How Not to Privatize-- M.L.Weitzman - Concluding Remarks-- E.S.Phelps.
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This study examines how, in Eastern Europe, privatizing firms and liberalizing their market environment generates a variety of problems, many of which are not common to the analogous attempts in industrial countries. A first difference between the two experiences resides in establishing the value of the firm or of the assets that are being privatized. A second main difference concerns the lack of the record of market performance for the firm. The book explores these open questions through an overview of on-going and proposed processes in Part 1. In Part 2 theoretical foundations of privatization processes are proposed with respect to the financial market, industrial relations and foreign trade. A final key question is faced in Part 3 - "Is there any alternative to privatization?".
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• The failures of communism-- outline of a new society-- the capacity to change-- how great?-- relevant analogies in economic history-- sequencing - shock therapy versus gradualism-- internal liberalization-- opening the economy-- currency reform-- macroeconomic stabilization-- privatization.
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This is an examination of the economic achievements and failures in a number of former communist-bloc countries, focusing on the common issues and the available options. It covers developments in Russia, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, Romania and Albania, as well as the economic transformations in China and Vietnam. The book also puts forward policy recommendations for the future. One of the author's conclusions is that, the slower a country's process of democratization, the costlier its economic transformation is likely to be.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)