On December 16, 1991 Poland signed an Association Agreement with the European Communities which came into force on February 1, 1994. The remaining countries of the Wyshegrad Group (Hungary, and the Czech and Slovak Republics) also signed such agreements with the European Union. It is...

This paper aims at comparing the uneven process of changes in competitiveness among three accession countries' manufacturing industries, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland, during the period prior to their EU membership (1996-2003). It demonstrates that the three countries improved...

The paper concentrates on economic developments; it does not treat issues related to domestic and foreign policy. It may well be the case that in the latter fields the trends are not encouraging, but these problems are beyond the focus of our paper. One of the major points we wish to demonstrate...