The New Hungarian Quarterly, 1986 (27. évfolyam, 104. szám)

BOOKS AND AUTHORS - Csaba László: The Hungarian Economy - A Major Reassessment (István Pető - Sándor Szakács)

THE HUNGARIAN ECONOMY — A MAJOR REASSESSMENT Iván Pető-Sándor Szakács: A hazai gazdaság négy évtizedének története (1945— 1985) (A History of four decades of the Hungarian economy, 1945-1985), (Volume i: Az_ újjáépítés és a tervutasításos irányítás 1945-1968) (Reconstruc­tion and mandatory planning, 1945-1968), Közgazdasági és Jogi Könyvkiadó, Budapest, 1985. 764 pp. This first volume of the new Hungarian economic history, published early in 1986, must be welcomed as a lasting achievement. One had wondered if there was anything new to be said today of the period between 1945 and 1968, lived through by most of us, and reported on by so many from such a va­riety of viewpoints. In fact, writings on eco­nomics and social sciences, articles presenting the details of this or that period, assessments within the history of economic theory and economic policy, works of fiction and socio­­graphy, all on this period, have been appear­ing in an unceasing stream. Indeed, in recent years, the genre of personal memoirs has gain­ed currency. The value judgement of official circles must be regarded as definitive. Con­fining myself to history and economics, and making no claims for completeness, let me refer just to the publications of Sándor Ausch, Tamás Bauer, György Ránki, Sándor Balogh, Lajos Izsák, István Vida, István Friss and his team, László Szamuely, Iván Schweitz­er and Éva Voszka. The writings by the economic historian Iván T. Berend, President of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, which have had such a wide response in both public opinion and science policy, are worthy of special mention. The question that suggests itself, after all this, is whether it is worth while to devote more than seven-hundred pages to a subject that seems to have been fully cleared up. At a first glance, one would hesitate a lot to give an answer in the affirmative. In real­ity, however, one probably cannot do greater justice to a work of this size than by saying that it is not long at all. The authors have approached their subject with a great deal of self-discipline: none of the topics addressed is overwritten. Their writing is encyclopedic in the original sense of the term, a compre­hensive, rounded-off, complete creation, en­joyable even to the non-specialist reader be­cause every page turns up one or several im­portant new facts or interpretation. The essence and main merit of the book is that it compels a rethinking of the entre body of ideas in common currency relating ito the period, both as a whole and in details. It upsets a number of taboos without forsaking scholarly discipline by recourse to over-em­phatic formulation or sensationalism. On the contrary, the authors’ lean, accurate style and exemplary handling of sources run through­out the book with its incredibly rich crop of newly disclosed fact. The results of their research some of which will be novel even to the specialist reader, lay a sound foundation for a system of evaluation which, differing in many respects from conventional wisdom, makes the volume truly exhilerating read. What is the secret of all this? Over and above the by no means inessential new details secured by the underlying research, the book also paints a comprehensive image of one of the basic elements of national self-appraisal. The vicissitudes of the recent past, exper­ienced at the personal level, boiled down into opinions and statements and sometimes jelled into official or semi-official judgements, in­evitably has to be measured against the ob­jective yardsticks of History. And even though it may often be painful to follow at the per­sonal level the road taken by Pető and Sza­kács it is the only feasible scholarly road. The

Next