This policy note argues that the current global economic crisis enforces an adjustment process in the countries of Central, Eastern and Southeastern Europe (CEE and SEE) in the form of real exchange rate depreciation. Because of the weakness of financial institutions and built-up foreign...

This piece argues that three specific policy issues need to be addressed urgently in Central, Eastern and Southeastern Europe in order to avoid a sustained period of recession or depression (i) orderly exchange rate adjustment (ii) fiscal stress and (iii) financial sector vulnerability. The G-20...

The pressures on fiscal consolidation have mounted dramatically in the wake of the Greek and then the 'contagion' crisis which followed it (across the so-called 'weakest links' Portugal, Spain, Italy, Ireland). It led to the setting-up of the 750 billion euro stabilisation package widely seen as...

Economic outcomes before and after the break-up of Yugoslavia What are the costs of nationalistic policies? The expectations may be more optimistic than is warranted as the example of the breakup of Yugoslavia suggests. Assuming that nationalists expected that economic results would be better...

One year after the onset of the Arab Spring, the transition is clearly at its very beginning. In that, it does not compare with the onset of transition in Central, East and Southeast Europe (CESEE) in 1989 or 1990, which was a kind of breakthrough and provided a clear discontinuity with the past...

Research findings of the latest round of the wiiw-GDN project on development in the Balkans are surveyed. Historical and structural deficiencies of development in the Balkan countries are discussed in detail with emphasis of the role of investment, integration, and structural and policy...