Neoliberalism, gradualism and some typical ambiguities and confusions in the transformation debate

New Political Economy

Volumn 2, Issue 2, 1997, Pages 221-235

  Pickel, Andreas ^a  

^a TRENT UNIVERSITY   (Canada)

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 0007267163     PISSN: 13563467     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/13563469708406298     Document Type: Review

References (45)

1. See, for example, Peter Rutland, 'Thatcherism, Czech-style: Transition to Capitalism in the Czech Republic', Telos, Vol. 94 (1993); and Mitchell Orenstein, Out of the Red: Building Capitalism and Democracy in Post-Communist Europe, PhD dissertation, Yale University, May 1996.
2. See, for example, Peter Rutland, 'Thatcherism, Czech-style: Transition to Capitalism in the Czech Republic', Telos, Vol. 94 (1993); and Mitchell Orenstein, Out of the Red: Building Capitalism and Democracy in Post-Communist Europe, PhD dissertation, Yale University, May 1996.
3. See, as a recent representative example of the continuing significance of this distinction in the debate, the volume edited by Beverly Crawford, Markets, States, and Democracy: The Political Economy of Post-Communist Economic Transformation (Westview Press, 1995), especially her introduction, 'Post-communist political economy: a framework for the analysis of reform', pp. 3-42.
4. The thumbnail sketches of the basic positions I provide under the headings of theory, strategy and ideology are designed for illustrative purposes. While I have tried to capture the 'essence' of these two positions in the debate as I see them, they are obviously highly simplified. For this reason, I do not cite individual authors unless I am dealing with specific arguments.
5. Douglass C. North, Institutions, Institutional Change and Economic Performance (Cambridge University Press, 1990).
6. One might think of W.W. Rostows' The Stages of Economic Growth: A Non-Communist Manifesto (Cambridge University Press, 1960).
7. Kazimierz Z. Poznanski (Ed.), The Evolutionary Transition to Capitalism (Westview Press, 1995), p. ix; for an ambitious attempt, see Laszlo Csaba, The Capitalist Revolution in Eastern Europe: A Contribution to the Economic Theory of System Change (Edward Elgar, 1995).
8. Kazimierz Z. Poznanski (Ed.), The Evolutionary Transition to Capitalism (Westview Press, 1995), p. ix; for an ambitious attempt, see Laszlo Csaba, The Capitalist Revolution in Eastern Europe: A Contribution to the Economic Theory of System Change (Edward Elgar, 1995).
9. See, for example, O. Williamson, The Economic Institutions of Capitalism (Free Press, 1985); and North, Institutions, Institutional Change and Economic Performance.
10. See, for example, O. Williamson, The Economic Institutions of Capitalism (Free Press, 1985); and North, Institutions, Institutional Change and Economic Performance.
11. Adam Przeworski, Democracy and the Market (Cambridge University Press, 1991).
12. See, for example, Karl Popper, The Poverty of Historicism (Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1976).
13. Friedrich A. von Hayek, Collected Works, Vol. I, The Fatal Conceit: The Errors of Socialism, Ed. William W. Bartley III (Routledge, 1989).
14. My three standards for evaluation are informed by the critical rationalist's non-justificationist and non-foundationalist tools 'for eliminating error by criticising our conjectures or speculations'. See, for example, William W. Bartley, III, The Retreat to Commitment (Open Court, 1984), esp. p. 127.
15. The failure to be clear on the distinction between means and ends as a source of confusion in the transformation debate is analysed by Ben Slay, 'The Dilemmas of Economic Liberalism in Poland', Europe-Asia Studies, Vol. 45, No. 2 (1993), pp. 237-57.
16. Andreas Pickel, 'Authoritarianism or Democracy? Marketization as a Political Problem', Policy Sciences, Vol. 26, No. 3 (1993), pp. 139-63.
17. Josef C. Brada, 'A critique of the evolutionary approach to the economic transition from communism to capitalism', in: Poznanski, Evolutionary Transition, pp. 183-210.
18. See, for example, Peter Murrell, 'What is Shock Therapy? What Did it Do in Poland and Russia?', Post-Soviet Affairs, Vol. 9, No. 2 (1993), pp. 111-40.
19. Alec Nove, 'Economics of transition: some gaps and illusions', in: Crawford, Markets, States and Democracy, pp. 227-45.
20. Jeffrey D. Sachs & Wing Thye Woo, 'Structural Factors in the Economic Reforms of China, Eastern Europe, and the Former Soviet Union', Economic Policy, Vol. 18 (1994), pp. 101-45.
21. This argument is discussed by Poznanski, Evolutionary Transition, p. xxii.
22. For further examples, see Andrew Janos, 'Continuity and change in Eastern Europe: strategies of post-communist politics', in: Crawford, Markets, States and Democracy, pp. 150-74.
23. Ivan T. Berend, 'Alternatives of transformation: choices and determinants - East-Central Europe in the 1990s', in: Crawford, Markets, States, and Democracy, pp. 130-149.
24. Possible exceptions include Russia and Ukraine.
25. Again, this can be said with more conviction about some countries than others.
26. Alexander Gerschenkron, Economic Backwardness in Historical Perspective (Praeger, 1962). I develop this argument further in Official ideology? The role of neoliberal reform doctrines in postcommunist transformation,' in: Andreas Pickel & Helmut Wiesenthal, The Grand Experiment: Shock Therapy, Transition Theory and the East German Case (Westview Press, 1997), ch. 11.
27. Alexander Gerschenkron, Economic Backwardness in Historical Perspective (Praeger, 1962). I develop this argument further in Official ideology? The role of neoliberal reform doctrines in postcommunist transformation,' in: Andreas Pickel & Helmut Wiesenthal, The Grand Experiment: Shock Therapy, Transition Theory and the East German Case (Westview Press, 1997), ch. 11.
28. Edmund Mokrzycki, 'The Social Limits of East European Economic Reforms', Journal of Socio-Economics, Vol. 22, No. 1 (1993), pp. 23-30.
29. Edmund Mokrzycki, 'A new middle class?', in: R. Kilminster & I. Varcoe (Eds), Beyond Modernity (Routledge, 1994).
30. Lena Kolarska-Bobinska, Aspirations, Values and Interests: Poland 1989-1994 (CBOS, 1994).
31. Dariusz Aleksandrowicz, 'Freiheit, Konformität, Unterwerfung', Berliner Debatte INITIAL, No. 6 (1994), pp. 14-20; and Petr Mareš, Libor Musil & Ladislav Rabušic, 'Values and the welfare state in Czechoslovakia', in: C.G.A. Bryant & E. Mokrzycki (Eds), The New Great Transformation? Change and Continuity in East-Central Europe (Routledge, 1994), pp. 78-98. I have elsewhere (see note 23) concluded that for this and other reasons neoliberalism has become what in the context of Marxist-Leninist states was called an Official ideology', that is, a set of doctrines that has lost much of its practical policy significance but continues to reign as symbolic discourse at the political level.
32. Dariusz Aleksandrowicz, 'Freiheit, Konformität, Unterwerfung', Berliner Debatte INITIAL, No. 6 (1994), pp. 14-20; and Petr Mareš, Libor Musil & Ladislav Rabušic, 'Values and the welfare state in Czechoslovakia', in: C.G.A. Bryant & E. Mokrzycki (Eds), The New Great Transformation? Change and Continuity in East-Central Europe (Routledge, 1994), pp. 78-98. I have elsewhere (see note 23) concluded that for this and other reasons neoliberalism has become what in the context of Marxist-Leninist states was called an Official ideology', that is, a set of doctrines that has lost much of its practical policy significance but continues to reign as symbolic discourse at the political level.
33. Thus in a piece published in 1994, he offers the following 'gradualist's' reflection on policy strategy that contrasts sharply with his full-mouthed neoliberal rhetoric: 'The reforming politician must take into account the fact that radical transformation of any society is a complex and dynamic process, not merely an exercise in applied economics or political science. [It] takes years to complete; it cannot be accomplished merely with some sort of overnight shock-therapy.' V. Klaus, The Economist, 10 September 1994, p. 57.
34. Kazimierz Z. Poznanski, 'Political economy of privatization in Eastern Europe', in: Crawford, Markets, States and Democracy, p. 206.
35. Peter Murrell, 'Reform's rhetoric-realization relationship: the experience of Mongolia', in: Poznanski, Evolutionary Transition, p. 79.
36. This is precisely the point that Karl Popper, who is frequently invoked by gradualists, makes when he writes that the 'difference between Utopian and piecemeal social engineering turns out, in practice, to be a difference not so much in scale and scope as in caution and preparedness for unavoidable surprises'. Popper, Poverty of Historicism, p. 69.
37. Irene Grosfeld, 'Triggering evolution: the case for a breakthrough in privatization', in: Poznanski, Evolutional Transition, pp. 211-28. See also Harry Eckstein, 'A culturalist theory of political change', in his Regarding Politics: Essays on Political Theory, Stability, and Change (University of California Press, 1992), pp. 280-81.
38. Irene Grosfeld, 'Triggering evolution: the case for a breakthrough in privatization', in: Poznanski, Evolutional Transition, pp. 211-28. See also Harry Eckstein, 'A culturalist theory of political change', in his Regarding Politics: Essays on Political Theory, Stability, and Change (University of California Press, 1992), pp. 280-81.
39. A particularly striking example is provided by Murrell ('Rhetoric's reform-realization relationship', esp. pp. 88-9), which recounts the peculiar 'indigenisation' of radical reform ideology and practice in Mongolia.
40. A claim advanced by Murrell in ibid.
41. It is beyond the scope of this analysis to explore the ways in which ideology and strategy are and are not linked. This distinction underlies a number of studies that have explored such links in a variety of contexts. A classic treatment of the relationship between Marxist-Leninist ideology and policy practice is Barrington Moore, Soviet Politics: The Dilemma of Power (Harper & Row, 1965). For the Western context, see, for example, Peter Hall (Ed.), The Political Power of Economic Ideas: Keynesianism across Nations (Princeton University Press, 1989).
42. It is beyond the scope of this analysis to explore the ways in which ideology and strategy are and are not linked. This distinction underlies a number of studies that have explored such links in a variety of contexts. A classic treatment of the relationship between Marxist-Leninist ideology and policy practice is Barrington Moore, Soviet Politics: The Dilemma of Power (Harper & Row, 1965). For the Western context, see, for example, Peter Hall (Ed.), The Political Power of Economic Ideas: Keynesianism across Nations (Princeton University Press, 1989).
43. Thus a recent 12-country survey of people's attitude towards the pace of economic reform in their country would suggest that neoliberal ideology, with its emphasis on reform speed, still enjoys significant popularity. See The Economist, 22 July 1995, p. 52.
44. See Klaus Grimm, 'Neoclassical economics in the transformation process in Central and Eastern Europe - some methodological remarks', in: J. Hausner & G. Mosur (Eds), Transformation Processes in Eastern Europe: Western Perspectives and the Polish Experience (Polish Academy of Sciences/Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, 1993); and Brada, 'Critique of the evolutionary approach'.
45. See Klaus Grimm, 'Neoclassical economics in the transformation process in Central and Eastern Europe - some methodological remarks', in: J. Hausner & G. Mosur (Eds), Transformation Processes in Eastern Europe: Western Perspectives and the Polish Experience (Polish Academy of Sciences/Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, 1993); and Brada, 'Critique of the evolutionary approach'.