Acta Oeconomica 45. (1993)

1993 / 1-2. szám - Szamuely László: Transition from State Socialism: Whereto and Hon? (Comments on the Inquiry Conducted by Acta Oeconomica)

31 5 9 5 6 Acta Oeconomica, Vol. 45 (1-2), TV- 1-22 (1993) TRANSITION FROM STATE SOCIALISM: WHERETO AND HOW? (COMMENTS ON THE INQUIRY CONDUCTED BY ACTA OECONOMICAУ L. SZAMUELY In 1992 Acta Oeconomica conducted an international inquiry on the problems of transition of post-communist economies to a market economy. Thirty answers by distinguished scholars and experts were published in Vol. 44. Nos 3-4. of the journal. The author of this study analyses both the answers of some respondents and the crucial problems of the present situation in the countries of Central and Eastern Europe earlier belonging to the now defunct Soviet bloc. He discusses the content of transformation consisting of a number of simultaneous but different processes that demand different treatment. The requirements of macroeconomic stabilization sometimes collide with the needs of systemic change. The social consensus which is so important for the process of peaceful transition cannot be maintained by the fashionable blueprints of the neo-liberal school of thought either. The prospects for the future are rather bleak but different for the various parts of the region. Question : What can be worse than communism? Answer: What comes after. (Common saying nowadays in Eastern Europe, quoted—inter alia—by François Fejtő (1992)). The bicentennial of the Great French Revolution, the annus mirabilis of 1989, promised to become a prologue to the regeneration of the Central and Eastern European societies situated on the eastern side of the former Iron Curtain. Though the promise is still there, a great deal of hope has gone sour. The area of the now defunct CMEA/COMECON has turned into a crisis zone of the world economy. The GDP of these countries in 1992 was at least one third below the level of 1989. (Even in the relatively better-off Hungary the fall was about 20 percent.) According to a comparison made by experts of the U. N. Economic Commission for Europe the present fall in the GDP of six Central and East European countries (without the former Soviet Union and Albania, but including Yugoslavia) is deeper than it was during the Great Depression of 1929-34 (ECE 1992, p. 44). This region has never suffered such a big loss of national income in peacetime (this statement is * 1 *The author is indebted to A. Köves for this helpful comments on the first draft of this essay. Most of his valuable remarks have already been taken into account in the present version. Nevertheless, the study expresses the strictly personal views of the author. Acta Oeconomica 45, 1993 Akadémiai Kiadó, Budapest

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