Danielle Garcia

Eco 357L

Charles Gati, “East-Central Europe: The Morning After,” Foreign Affairs, Winter 1990

I. Six formerly Eastern European Soviet allies, Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Bulgaria and Romania, are now East-Central Europe and closer in ideology to the West. All are now independent and embracing of free enterprise. Their transition has left a trail of confusion, due to a struggle among us rather than between “us” and “them;” division, confrontation of their pre-communist strengths and weaknesses combined with the discovery of their new identities in a new Europe; and disappointment, their slowing economic change a reflection of anxiety about short-term effects of the market economy. Most of this negativity is attributable to the sudden gain of freedom.

II. Despite the defeat of communism in central Europe, its impact will linger and the adoption of democratic values will be slow since “no magic wand can suddenly erase the habits and customs of four decades of communist rule.”

III. The pre-communist history of the nineteenth and twentieth century east-central Europe and its present applicable uses, vary significantly. Some of east-central Europe’s peoples are susceptible to nationalist passion and authoritarian impulse, while others are not. A new mentality should take hold, one that embraces the new Western Europe without borders and its historical traditions.

IV. Economic distress could impede and stifle democratic evolution. All of the region’s economies are in various stages of recession with no immediate future promises, and the new governments are taking an indecisive stance, perhaps in hopes of finding a “third way.” The long term goals are privatization, freeing of prices, and currency convertibility. The region is proceeding slowly toward a market economy, debating the pros and cons along the way, and implementing only some of what has been decided. In the short run, changes in the foreign economic environment, the new dollar-based system of trade with the Soviet Union, the sudden rise in the price of oil, and the loss of established markets, presents a new dilemma for the economies of east-central Europe; with a solution to be found through the adoption of conservation measures. The essential question is this: In what condition will the region emerge after the present oil crisis is over?

V. Western policy objectives towards the former communist Eastern Europe was to weaken the Soviet bloc and the Warsaw Pact; with that accomplished it has focused its attention on the establishment of democracy. In order to be prosperous, the new European structure must include a prosperous and increasingly democratic east-central Europe. The main tasks of the West are to remove the barriers to expanded trade relations, to energize diplomatic activity on behalf of the region’s democratic evolution, and to encourage regional cooperation.