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on Confederation of Independent States |
| By: | Steven Rosefielde |
| Abstract: | Andrei Shleifer and Daniel Treisman recently rendered a summary verdict on the post Soviet Russian transition experience finding that the Federation had become a normal country with the west's assistance, and predicting that it would liberalize and develop further like other successful nations of its type. This essay demonstrates that they are mistaken on the first count, and are likely to be wrong on the second too. It shows factually, and on the norms elaborated by Pareto, Arrow and Bergson that Russia is an abnormal political economy unlikely to democratize, westernize or embrace free enterprise any time soon |
| JEL: | P40 P51 P52 P30 |
| Date: | 2005–06–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:liu:liucej:12&r=cis |
| By: | Stefan Hedlund |
| Abstract: | Ongoing discussions between Russia and the EU on the formation of a Common European Economic Space bring back to mind Alexander Gerschenkron's classic essay on economic backwardness in historical perspective. This paper argues that the institutions that once produced a specific kind of catch-up economics in Czarist Russia still remain largely the same. Unless negotiations between Moscow and Brussels take into consideration such fundamental institutional incompatibility, attempts at harmonization, expressed by Brussels as an attempt tp spread Western values, will be doomed to fail. A cynical conlusion views potential convergence as adaptation by Brussels to traditional Russian institutional patterns of rule evasion, rather than a Westernization of Russia |
| JEL: | P26 N23 P52 P48 |
| Date: | 2006–06–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:liu:liucej:27&r=cis |
| By: | Bernardina Algieri |
| Abstract: | The paper gauges export demand elasticities for Russia using an Error Correction technique within a cointegration framework. An extended version of the Imperfect Substitutes Model has been implemented to estimate the sensitivity of Russian exports without oil components to price and to Russian and world income. Our results suggest a robust and negative long run cointegration relationship between the real effective exchange rate, defined as the weighted average of the rouble's exchange rates versus a basket of the three currencies with the largest share in the trade turnover adjusted to incorporate inflation rate differences (the ratio of the domestic price indices to the foreign price indices), and Russian exports. An increase in exports by 24 % is caused by a real depreciation by 10 %. Furthermore, a 10 % growth in world income leads to a 33 % rise in exports. Finally, exports drop by 14 % whenever a 10 % increase in domestic income occurs. |
| JEL: | F19 P27 C22 |
| Date: | 2004–12–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:liu:liucej:8&r=cis |
| By: | Jean-Francois Nivet |
| Abstract: | Post-socialist transition raises crucial issues about the institutional setting of a market economy. The priority has been given to property rights, and privatization has been advocated as a means to depoliticize economic activities. The dismissal of external interventions, allied with the attraction to the American model and Hayekian ideas, often led to the introduction of minimal laws and wait for their evolutionary development. The failure of corporate and public governance, notably in Russia, helps to show why, on the contrary, democratically established legal rules are essential. Legislation should not only protect corporate shareholders and stakeholders, but more fundamentally all citizens against predatory collusive behavior of political, economic and criminal elites |
| JEL: | D23 K2 P3 |
| Date: | 2004–12–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:liu:liucej:7&r=cis |
| By: | Alexander Pivovarsky |
| Abstract: | This paper investigates the relationship between ownership concentration and enterprise performance in Ukraine. Using data on 376 medium and large enterprises, it finds that ownership concentration is positively associated with enterprise performance in Ukraine. The paper also finds that concentration of ownership by foreign companies and banks is associated with better performance than ownership concentrated by the domestic owners. Ownership by Ukrainian investment funds and holding companies does not have a positive effect on performance. In contrast to predictions by many observers of early transition, privatization methods had a lasting effect on ownership structure in Ukraine. |
| Keywords: | Privatization , Ukraine , Governance , Transition economies , |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:imf:imfwpa:01/42&r=cis |
| By: | Timothy Frye; ; |
| Abstract: | Are property rights obtained through legally dubious means forever tainted with original sin or can rightholders make their ill-gotten gains legitimate by doing good works?2 This is a critical question for developing countries (and Russia in particular) where privatization is often opaque and businesspeople may receive property, but remain unwilling to use it productively due to concerns about the vulnerability of their rights to political challenge. Using a survey of 660 businesspeople conducted in Russia in February 2005, I find that the original sin of an illegal privatization is difficult to expunge. Businesspeople, however, can improve the perceived legitimacy of property rights by doing good works, such as investing in the firm and by providing public goods for the region. Finally, managers that provide public goods for their region are more likely to invest in their firms than those who did not. The finding that public goods providers invest at higher rates is at odds with standard economic logic, but fits well with the more political view of property rights developed here. These findings have implications for political economy and contemporary Russia. |
| Keywords: | Property Rights, Transition, Rule of Law, Privatization |
| JEL: | K11 P14 P16 |
| Date: | 2005–09–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wdi:papers:2005-801&r=cis |