East European Economies Research Articles

Les transformations du marché du travail en Europe de l'Est

The prospects of the labour markets linked to the political changes and to the mutation of the economic system are studied in Hungary, Poland and Czechoslovakia. Whereas these countries experienced manpower shortages in the past, unemployment seems to be unescapable for the future. First, it will be made up of structural unemployment in connection with the deep changes of the interindustry structure of employment wich remained stiff under the Soviet type system. Second, unemployment will also be brought by the "systemic mutation," i.e. the end centralization and "paternalism" of the State Administration. However East European economies could benefit from some advantages to cope with these mutations. The internal organization of enterprises, which rests on patterns which are close to those prevailing in West, and education and training systems which are relatively well developped could make the tions easier.

Structural Change: Toward the 19th Century?

Why do East European economies have such over‐large manufacturing sectors? Jan Winiecki, of the Institute of Labour Economics in Warsaw, argues that this characteristic of 19th century economies is caused by defects in the framework within which industry operates.

On Markets and Pseudo‐Markets in Socialist Economies

Liberalisation of East European economies is desirable. But, as Professor Jan Winiecki of Warsaw University points out, there are reforms and psuedo‐reforms.

La modernisation structurelle d'une agriculture privée en économie socialisée : le tournant polonais

The modernization of private agriculture in a socialized economy : the Polish policy turn After forty years of consolidation and functioning of a soviet-type economy in Poland, individual farming remains its key source of agricultural and food products. However, a lasting discriminatory policy towards it, and multiform attempts of socializing it, have delayed and hindered its modernization and seemed so far to show its structural incompatibility with this system, then the necessary liquidation, or substantial reduction, of this phenomenon, atypical in the east european economies. Moreover the west european scenario of agricultural modernization, where the money-market self- regulation has played the crucial role (even though it was complicated by the interference of a considerable state-corporate apparatus), has proved, for this reason, to be inassimilable by Poland. Yet the recent developments suggest another view of this long and difficult coexistence, namely a slow learning process by trial and error, of a specific and historically unprecedented way of selective modernization of individual farms, and of their integration into the global economy and society, quite consistent with the « distributive » logic of the latters. The new Polish farm policy in the 80s, that the national economic depression seems to have freed from the previous inhibiting commitment to the « necessary » agricultural socialization, and its first productive and economic results, tend to confirm the reality and pertinence of a turning point in this direction. But simultaneously they show the need for its strenthening, towards a true structural mutation of the modernized farms, especially their specialisation, and the difficulty of such a mutation in the present state of their relations with the agricultural administration.

The Economic Crisis in Eastern Europe

How far is it possible to speak of an economic crisis in Eastern Europe? If the answer is in the positive, then how do societies dominated by planned economies ever come to be- in a state of crisis? Do the East European economies suffer from inflation, unemployment and recession? What is the role of corruption and to what extent does it affect productivity? Or efficiency? Is the widely acclaimed Hungarian model only an exception which merely confirms the rule? Further, is it Poland that will ultimately show the way? These are some of the many stimulating questions which this slim volume attempts to answer. The result is a brief yet original account of the nature of the crisis obtaining on the economic front both in the Soviet Union and Eastern Eurore and in this attempt remains one of the few of its kind.

Growth and Fluctuations of Production in O.E.C.D. and East European Countries

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.

Some Issues Concerning Economic Rationality in USSR and East European Countries

The purpose of this paper is to examine in the context of Soviet and East European economies, a few issues and instruments of rationality of the post-reform period. The main emphasis has been to understand the socialist point/s of view regarding economic rationality. The description part of prices, cost etc. has been included for identifying the supra-institutional and intra-institutional components of these parameters and also for identifying the conceptual foundation. A few issues of value-price debate have been included for the same purpose. The role of the state and also of the party as superstructure in relation to the economy, that is, the base in socialist countries in the light of experiences has also been attempted to understand the importance of the base-superstructure nexus for ensuring economic rationality in socialism. The paper is divided into two sections seemingly detached thematically but an important connection could be found to identify the author's contention.

Crisis in the East European Economy: The Spread of the Polish Disease. Edited by Jan Drewnowski. London and Canberra: Croom Helm/New York: St. Martin's Press, 1982. 177 pp. Tables. $22.50.

Crisis in the East European Economy: The Spread of the Polish Disease. Edited by Jan Drewnowski. London and Canberra: Croom Helm/New York: St. Martin's Press, 1982. 177 pp. Tables. $22.50.

The USSR's External Economic Relations and Japan

In 1979-1982 — the last years of the late Leonid Brezhnev — the Soviet economic environment at home and abroad was taking a turn for the worse. At home, agriculture was in poor shape for four years in a row, and industrial growth slowed markedly. As for external relations, the slump of the East European economies, as was clear from the confusion in Poland, brought a heavy burden to the Soviet economy, and the Western camp led by the United States embarked on relentless anti-Soviet economic sanctions.

Crisis in the East European economy

Crisis in the East European economy Get access Crisis in the East European economy. Edited by Jan Drewnowski. London, Canberra: Croom Helm. 1982. 177 pp. Index. £11.95. V. Sobell V. Sobell 1St Antony's College, Oxford Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar International Affairs, Volume 60, Issue 1, Winter 1983, Pages 152–153, https://doi.org/10.2307/2618997 Published: 01 January 1983

Crisis in the East European Economy

Crisis in the East European Economy

Book Reviews : The East European Economies in the 1970s Edited by Alec Nove, Hans-Hermann Hohmann, Gertraud Seidenstecher. The Butterworth Group. £19.50. This book is one of the Butterworth Studies in International Political Economy whose General Editor is Professor Susan Strange

Book Reviews : The East European Economies in the 1970s Edited by Alec Nove, Hans-Hermann Hohmann, Gertraud Seidenstecher. The Butterworth Group. £19.50. This book is one of the Butterworth Studies in International Political Economy whose General Editor is Professor Susan Strange

Effects of the World Economic Crisis on the East European Economies

The World EconomyVolume 3, Issue 1 p. 13-52 Effects of the World Economic Crisis on the East European Economies Richard Portes, Richard PortesSearch for more papers by this author Richard Portes, Richard PortesSearch for more papers by this author First published: June 1980 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9701.1980.tb00287.xCitations: 9Read the full textAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditWechat Citing Literature Volume3, Issue1June 1980Pages 13-52 RelatedInformation

The Autonomy of the PCI

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size Additional informationNotes on contributorsRenato MieliRenato Mieli is a journalist and scholar currently living in Milan, Italy, where he directs a research institute dealing with East European economies. He is a former member of the PCI (Italian Communist Party) and editor of its major newspaper, l'Unità. Translated from the Italian by Michael Ledeen.

Obstacles to the liberalization of relations between E.E.C. and Comecon

The integrated external commercial policy envisaged by the Treaty of Rome is of special significance for the state-trading countries of Eastern Europe. To a far greater extent than the market economies of the West, the East European economies depend upon trade agreements and quotas to establish the volume and composition of their external trade. These are the usual instruments of negotiation among the countries of the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (Comecon) themselves. Within the European Economic Community, under the terms of the Treaty of Rome, these instruments of negotiation are to be placed in the hands of the Community as a whole after 1969. On commercial grounds, therefore, the argument for appointing permanent missions to Brussels would appear to be stronger for the East than for the West European states. Yet the Comecon countries have hitherto refused to follow suit. Their refusal reflects the Soviet view that the E.E.C. is a monopolistic arrangement of West European capitalists with its political edge clearly directed against the socialist countries. This theme runs through all Soviet pronouncements on the issue. . . . the formation of the Common Market was dictated in the first place by the striving to strengthen capitalism's positions in its struggle against the socialist countries and this, in fact, is the chief class content of so-called West European integration . . . The main idea is that the E.E.C. countries will act in a single front in economic relations with the socialist countries, while the latter are to act each in isolation; that at least is what West Germany is striving for, with the support of the integration champions in other Common Market countries. ''1 Moreover, since the political integration of the Six could only be furthered by their closer economic integration, the U.S.S.R. would obviously wish to

Personal Consumption in Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and Poland, 1950-1960: A Comparison

Personal consumption is usually viewed as the major factor determining the standard of living of a population. Furthermore, to borrow Janet Chapman's phrase, it is “one of the grand criteria on which the performance of [an] economy will be judged.” To facilitate such an evaluation of East European economies, which have been operating to the present on the principles of Soviet-type planning, we have assembled in this paper the results of a statistical investigation of personal consumption in Czechoslovakia, Poland, and Hungary. Following the principle that context and comparison alone bring out meaning, we have selected those aspects that lend themselves most naturally to international confrontation: rates of growth and absolute levels of per capita consumption, changes in the relative share of personal consumption in total output, and changes in the structure of consumption by major categories.