Democratization and Revolution in the USSR, 1985-1991 presents a strikingly new view of the Gorbachev era and the reasons for the collapse of the Soviet Union. Written by one of America's most distinguished specialists on the former Soviet Union, this is the first comprehensive overview of the Gorbachev period, which it describes as a real revolution; not mere \"reform.\" According to Hough, despite Mikhail Gorbachev's talk of a regulated market, he never understood that a market must be created on a solid institutional and legal base. Hough explains that Gorbachev was not alone in thinking that the destruction of old institutions was enough to unleash a market. Westerners also talked of leaping a chasm in a single jump, as if democratic and market institutions existed precreated on the other side. But precisely because Gorbachev (and later Boris Yeltsin) was encouraged in all his worst mistakes by Western advice, his failure has crucial implications for Western thinking about the process of democratization and marketization. This unprecedented book explores those implications in depth.

Postcommunist Economic Reform through a Russian Lens

Democratization and Revolution in the U.S.S.R., 1985-1991

The Great Transformation

The quest for freedom from hunger and repression has triggered in recent years a dramatic, worldwide reform of political and economic systems. Never have so many people enjoyed, or at least experimented with democratic institutions. However, many strategies for economic development in Eastern Europe and Latin America have failed with the result that entire economic systems on both continents are being transformed. This major book analyzes recent transitions to democracy and market-oriented economic reforms in Eastern Europe and Latin America. Drawing in a quite distinctive way on models derived from political philosophy, economics, and game theory, Professor Przeworski also considers specific data on individual countries. Among the questions raised by the book are: What should we expect from these experiments in democracy and market economy? What new economic systems will emerge? Will these transitions result in new democracies or old dictatorships?

Democracy and the Market: Political and Economic Reforms in Eastern Europe and Latin America

Conventional models of the politics of economic reform tend to be
 based on an assumption about the costs and benefits of reform,
 known informally as the J-curve. Reforms are expected to make
 things worse before they get better. This presents a classic time
 inconsistency dilemma for reformist governments forced to demand
 severe sacrifices from the public in the short term for the mere
 promise of future gains. In response, political economy models of
 the reform process have tended to stress the importance of
 insulating governments from the pressures of the short-term losers
 until a sufficient constituency of winners has been created with a
 stake in supporting and enhancing the reforms. Based on evidence from the postcommunist transitions, this article
 suggests that the most serious political obstacles to the process of
 economic reform have come not from the short-term losers but from
 the short-term winners. Groups that gain substantial rents from the
 early distortions of a partially reformed economy have a stake in
 maintaining a partial reform equilibrium that generates high private
 gains, but at a considerable social cost. In these countries, the
 main political challenge has been, not to marginalize the losers, but
 to restrain the winners. This explains the paradoxical outcome of
 the postcommunist transitions: that political systems which are
 more inclusive of the losers have been able to adopt and sustain
 more comprehensive economic reforms than states insulated from
 popular pressures.

/pdf/winners-take-all-the-politics-of-partial-reform-in-4v0y80v9nd.pdf

Postcommunist Economic Reform through a Russian Lens

Citations

Democratization and Revolution in the U.S.S.R., 1985-1991

References

The Great Transformation

The Great Transformation

Democracy and the Market: Political and Economic Reforms in Eastern Europe and Latin America

Winners Take All: The Politics of Partial Reform in Postcommunist Transitions

Democracy and the Market: Political and Economic Reforms in Eastern Europe and