Strategic Issues of Financing Sustainable Development in Transforming Economics: the Case of Central Europe
One of the major challenges facing transforming economies is designing appropriate institutions that will integrate economic, social and environmental goals, and secure sustainable development through appropriate financing. Four Central European countries-Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia (often called Visegrad countries-VG4-from the name of a free trade zone they created)-entered the transformation process from centrally planned to market economy with democratic institutions at the beginning of the 1990s. The VG4 presented radical reform programs compared to the rest of transforming economies in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) and in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). The paper will reveal the background influencing the choice of a strategy for sustainable development and its necessary institutions and policies, summarize the 16 year period of designing the process and its implementation, and will evaluate its performance and suggest some recommendations from the Central European lessons.All of the CEE countries and CIS experienced political, economic and ecological crises. Very often, the first two absorbed so much of the societal resources that the country could not make any significant efforts to reform environmental institutions. The paper will explain how the VG4 treated the environment in the transformation process and what did motivate them to deal with the environment differently than most of CEEC and CIS.The decline of the previous central planning system and autocratic regimes created a vacuum for new institutions in those countries. Did they embrace mechanically the Western experience or did they invent new institutions and policy instruments? Did they design sustainable institutions mat could support its existence by themselves? Do these institutions contribute to environmental sustainability or sustainable development? These are a few of the other questions that the paper will address, focusing on the VG4 experience. Although a significant body of literature describes the transformation process and assesses economic and social consequences of the transition to market economy, there are a limited number of publications dealing with the strategic issues of the design of major institutions impact of transformation on the environment. For economies in transition, such as those in Central and Eastern Europe countries (CEEC) and in the CIS, assessing the outcomes of environmental and other policies designed to promote environmentally sound restructuring is particularly important. Equally important is assessing the environmental effects of structural change in the economy (rising personal consumption, rapid transition to market-oriented economies, and increased openness in trade and investment). Despite many differences among the original VG4 countries, they followed relatively fast transition paths compared to most of the other 21 countries from Albania to Uzbekistan. The pace of transition to a free-market system in terms of liberalization of markets, stabilization of the economy, privatization of assets and industry, and reform of financial institutions affects the economic, environmental, and social sustainability in these countries. A comparison of these countries according to these parameters will show how far the VG4 moved ahead of the rest of CEE and NIS, and how much they still need to progress with restructuring to secure more sustainable development.Finally, the paper will address the critical lessens learned from the VG4 experience and recommendations for those that are still tacking the transformational issues.
Integrative Approach to Economic Market-based Mechanisms Liberalization Central Europe Sustainability Financing
Zbigniew Bochniarz
University of Minnesota Minneapolis, MN 55454, U.S.A.
国际会议
2007 International Conference on Dtrategic Management（2007年战略管理国际会议）
成都
英文
1029-1049
2007-04-19（万方平台首次上网日期，不代表论文的发表时间）