The paper investigates per capita income convergence across Chinese provinces over 1978-1992 period. If confirms previous studies which find a reduction in inter-regional income inequality over the course of economic reforms. However, the rate of convergence has declined since 1985 as a result...

Contagion from East Asia imposed a severe "stress test" on the market-oriented reforms of transition economies. We find that the portfolio reallocations of investors differentiated sharply among these economies at the height of the East Asian turmoil, appearing clearly in the relative movements...

This paper offers the first comprehensive analysis of legal change in the protection of shareholder and creditor rights in transition economies and its impact on the propensity of firms to raise external finance. Following La Porta et al. (1998), the paper constructs an expanded set of legal...

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 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 ten years. We ask whether countries that defied the odds, given by their initial...

The 15 newly independent states that emerged from the breakdown of the Soviet Union are now celebrating their 10th anniversary of independence. This paper looks back over the first decade and draws some lessons from the experience made to date. It focuses on the energy-rich states of the...

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...