The transition to market-based economic systems in the countries of Central and Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union involves fundamental shifts in the allocation of resources and deep changes in the structure of production and employment. This paper uses a simple model of economic...

This paper reports the findings of a survey of more than 3,000 firms in 20 transition countries. It shows that barter and other non-monetary transactions (including the use of bills of exchange, debt swaps, barter chains, and the redemption of debt in goods) are an important phenomenon in Russia...

This paper uses a survey of 3,300 firms in 25 transition countries to shed light on the factors that influence restructuring by firms and their subsequent performance as measured by growth in sales and in sales per employee over a three-year period. We begin by surveying what a decade of...

This paper investigates the relative importance of three sets of factors – initial conditions, macroeconomic stabilisation and structural reforms – as determinants of growth in transition economies during the first 10 years. The paper has two main results. First, average growth over the last...

This paper uses data from a large survey of firms across 26 transition countries to examine the determinants of trust in the transition process. We first introduce a new measure of trust between firms: the level of prepayment demanded by suppliers from their customers in advance of delivery....

This paper provides what we believe to be the first collection of data on social capital in the transition countries of central/eastern Europe and of the former Soviet Union. Using data from the World Values Survey 1990 and 1995 we document the degree of trust and of civic participation and find...

This paper investigates the barriers to trade in Central Asia. While much of the existing literature on international integration of former Soviet Union countries has focussed on the quantities traded, this paper uses relative prices to shed some light on impediments to trade. It finds that the...

This paper offers a first comprehensive analysis of legal change in shareholder and creditor rights protection in transition economies and its impact on the propensity of firms to raise external finance. The paper uses the investor rights indices developed by La Porta et al. (1998) as a starting...