Typology of the transition Process of Russia and Eastern European Countries from the Viewpoint of the Liberalization of Foreign Trade

Abstract

Russia and Eastern European countries (excluding Albania and former Yugoslav states) can be divided into three groups. The first group includes Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia, which have successfully coordinated macro economic stabilization and liberalization of foreign trade. The second group includes Bulgaria and Romania, where half measures of liberalization have been adopted under the circumstance of vicious spiral of inflation and depreciation of currency. The third group consists of Russia. Russia keeps old complicated organizations in the half liberalized system. One interesting point here is that the first and the third group experienced real currency appreciation in the first years of the transition whereas the currencies of the second group were depreciated considerably.