Political and economic alternatives for the Central and East European Region and China

A successful transition process may be treated as a tool for the economic development of a country. There is a common consensus that the implication of a market-oriented transition might be deemed as a political development because of the robust relationship existing between the political and economic reforms. Studying the reform policies in a democracy and/or in a market economy, we observed both similar and different characteristics among transition procedures, institutional reforms and macroeconomic performance among the countries in question. Thus, we introduced nine general reform paths with regard to the way that the reform from communism to democracy and/or to market economy was achieved. We concluded that countries, which have followed or were forced to follow reform paths, such as the disguised, belligerent and violent, have limited economic growth and not only lag behind the other transition countries in the region, but also, as of today, have not even reached the levels they had attained in 1989.