Transforming Post-Communist Political Economies (1998) / Chapter Skim
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Research Priorities for Post-Communist Economies
Research Priorities for Post-Communist Economies
Pages 471-490
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VI Research Priorities for Post-Communist Economies
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A similar determinism is characteristic of thinking about the future of the postcommunist successor states: it is widely presumed that their political and economic systems will evolve into close approximations of those of the most powerful members of the existing state system. Characteristically, there were many for whom Central and Eastern Europe and the New Independent States seemed to constitute a slate on which, once rubbed clean, leaders and planners could draw the designs they preferred.
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But they can offer only limited guidance as post-communist countries move beyond stabilization and liberalization to rebuild sectoral institutions. These conditions challenged the task force to seek more penetrating and provocative analytical frameworks, better documentation and explanation of current changes, more accurate identification of potential risks, and more nuanced guidance for policy interventions than were currently available.
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The task force emphasizes the institutional change approach in this volume because we found it offered particular potential to improve understanding of economies undergoing transformation, as well as an appropriately broad and cohesive framework for analysis, and because this approach has been relatively neglected by those working in the field.
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Their behavior is then shaped and channeled by the institutions that have changed, those that have not changed, and the tensions between the two. The task force concluded that research applying the institutional change perspective can enhance understanding of the transformation of the economies of Central and Eastern Europe and the New Independent States along a number of key dimensions.
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The institutional change perspective alerts researchers to the possible effects of the perspectives, values, and identities of different social and ethnic groups on their responses to changes in economic conditions. As North notes in his framework essay for this volume, economic change draws on (and is bounded by)
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Few analysts have made serious attempts to utilize an institutional change framework or to apply the insights of the new institutional economics to transforming economies. Although the potential rewards may seem self-evident, efforts to measure transactions costs or to determine the extent to which property rights have become secure confront a complex situation.
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Panel studies such as the Russian Longitudinal Monitoring Survey and annual surveys being carried out in Central and Eastern Europe, particularly those conducted under the Luxembourg Income Survey, represent unique data sources that should be supported and expanded. PRIORITY RESEARCH AREAS The task force focused its attention on four key components of political, economic, and social systems: · Institutional change, property rights, and corruption · Management, labor, and production · Social trends, household behavior, and social-sector policies · The changing role of the state While these four areas do not exhaust the possibilities, they should nevertheless appear on any list of major issues involved in the transformation process.
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There is abundant evidence that property rights are changing in former areas of state socialism, with deliberate programs of privatization accounting for only some of the change, and often having consequences other than widespread property holding and investment by members of the general population. There is also good reason to believe that the sorts of property rights that emerge in Central and Eastern Europe and the New Independent States will (1)
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· To what extent are underground activities reflected in the observed increased use of cocirculating currencies, such as the dollar and D-mark, and can observation of these monetary flows be used as an indicator of corruption, organized crime, and capital flight? · How have different land tenure patterns and ownership rights affected productivity in different transitional economies?
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What institutional changes are needed to allow financial institutions to bring savers and investors together in well-functioning financial markets? · Are the institutional changes being introduced in stock exchanges and other mechanisms for financial mediation creating more transparent and ac
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To what extent have the liberalization of international trade and consequent international competition induced changes in domestic institutional infrastructures? Social Trends, Household Behavior, and Social-Sector Policies What institutional changes are taking place at the household level?
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What are the major factors influencing local responses? · In view of fiscal constraints (including the need to contain or reduce overall social expenditures in some Eastern European countries and weak revenue capabilities throughout the New Independent States)
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· How does a society assure itself of an honest and competent civil service? What institutional changes are required to this end?
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Although the growing body of work on democratization and other comparative aspects of transformation is producing valuable insights on Central and Eastern Europe and the New Independent States for analysts, policymakers, and practitioners, the particularities of the post-communist transformation have yet to be effectively integrated into this literature. Somewhat paradoxically, after decades of having to search painstakingly for nuggets of information, post-Soviet and Central and Eastern European
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focusing attention on a particularly fruitful conceptual framework the new institutional economics. A cohesive research program can not only maximize the utility of increasingly scarce research dollars, but also enable analysts to concentrate on particularly salient aspects of transformation.
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Soviet and East European Research, and the Joint Committees of the Social Science Research Council and the American Council of Learned Societies, as well as the leading foundations supporting work in these fields. One beneficial by-product of the Cold War is the substantial existing infrastructure of research centers devoted to the study of Central and Eastern Europe and the New Independent States.
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The following guidelines can help ensure the success of this proposed research program: · Funding should be made available in 3- to 5-year increments so that institutions, research teams, and researchers can make the necessary substantial investments of time, energy, and resources. · Research teams should not only be interdisciplinary but also, whenever possible, include researchers from Central and Eastern Europe and the New Independent States.
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Reasonable assumptions and widely accepted theories can and have been proven false, and strategies that have succeeded in one set of circumstances may fail in others. Important work needs to be done on the post-communist economies of Central and Eastern Europe and the New Independent States.
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