Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-fscjk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-28T00:17:53.259Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Postsocialist transition: an overall survey*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 July 2009

János Kornai
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The lecture outlines a conceptual framework for the analysis of changes in those countries going through the transformation from a socialist economy to a market economy. It takes a positive predictive approach. It describes seven tendencies which are very likely to apply.

(1) Marketization replacing the command economy.

(2) The evolution of the private sector—a broad new middle class will develop.

(3) Reproduction of macrodisequilibria. The inherited imbalance, namely chronic and intensive shortage will be eliminated, but inflation, budget deficit, unemployment and foreign indebtedness will remain in various configurations.

(4) Development of a constitutional state.

(5) Development of democratic institutions.

(6) The redefinition of a national community—which tendency might be accompanied by severe tensions and conflicts.

(7) Unequal increase of welfare.

Finally the paper discusses the role of academics in the process of transformation.

Type
Research Article
Information
European Review , Volume 1 , Issue 1 , January 1993 , pp. 53 - 64
Copyright
Copyright © Academia Europaea 1993

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1.Kornai, J. (1990) The Road to a Free Economy. Shifting from a Socialist System: The Example of Hungary. New York: W. W. Norton [1989].Google Scholar
2.United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (1992) Economic Survey of Europe in 1991–1992. New York.Google Scholar
3.Kornai, J. (1992) The Socialist Syste. The Political Economy of Communism. Princeton: Princeton University Press and Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
4.von Mises, L. (1920) Economic calculations in the socialist commonwealth. In Collectivist Economic Planning. Edited by Hayek, F. A.. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1935, 87–130.Google Scholar
5.Hayek, F. A. (Ed) (1935) Collectivist Economic Planning. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.Google Scholar
6.Murrell, P. (1992) Evolutionary and radical approaches to economic reform. Economics of Planning, 25 (1), 79–95.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
7.Poznanski, K. (1992) Market alternative to state activism in restoring the capitalist economy. Economics of Planning, 25 (1), 55–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
8.Marx, K. and Engels, F. (1988) Manifesto of the Communist Party. In Karl Marx and Frederick Engels. Selected Works. Moscow: Progress Publishers (1970), 35–63.Google Scholar
9.Illés, I., Mizsei, K. and Szegvári, I. (1991) Válaszúton a közép-európai gazdasági együttmüködés (Central-European economic cooperation at the crossroads), Európa Fórum, 1 (2), 28–42.Google Scholar
10.Kenen, P. B. (1991) Transitional arrangements for trade and payments among the CMEA countries. IMF Staff Papers, 38 (2), 235–267.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
11.Lindbeck, A. (1990) The Swedish experience. Seminar Paper, Dec. 1990, no. 482, Institute for International Economic Studies, Stockholm University.Google Scholar
12.Erasmus, D. (1510) Instituti Principis Christiani (The Education of the Christian Prince).Google Scholar