1st Edition

Political Economy of Transition Opportunities and Limits of Transformation

By Jozef M. van Brabant Copyright 1998

    This book addresses the policy questions surrounding the challenge of transforming eastern European economies from their planned, administrative past to vibrant market-based entities.
    Jozef van Brabant considers in turn, the wider set of challenges facing these economies - stabilization, privatization, liberalization, institution building, and developing and maintaining the sociopolitical consensus - before examining the evolving role of the state.
    Using concrete examples from the eastern European countries throughout, including the Czech Republic and Bulgaria, this work systematically examines, in a society-wide context, the initial conditions of transformation, the policy tasks ahead and the manner in which policies have been pursued.

    Introduction; Part 1 History, Starting Conditions, and Transformation Tasks; Chapter 1 Historical Backdrop; Chapter 2 Reform Tinkering and the Starting Conditions of Transition; Chapter 3 The Market Economy and the Transformation Agenda; Part 2 Components of the Transformation Agenda; Chapter 4 Stabilization As an Early Policy Task; Chapter 5 Internal and External Liberalization; Chapter 6 Privatization and the Market Economy; Chapter 7 The Role of Institutions in a Market Economy; Chapter 8 Transformation and the Sociopolitical Consensus; Chapter 9 The Evolving Role of the State During Transformation; Part 3 Toward Sustainable Growth And global Integration; Chapter 10 Transformation and Integration into the World Economy; Chapter 11 Transformation and International Assistance; Chapter 12 Sustainability of the Transformation;

    Biography

    Jozef M.van Brabant is currently Principal Economic Affairs Officer at the Secretariat of the United Nations in New York. His major academic interest is in the economics of the planned and now the transition economies and, recently, in the economic aspects of remaking Europe.