Economic Transformation in Eastern Europe: Its Genesis,Adjustment Process,and Impact on Developing Countries

ABSTRACT Increasing strains on self-sufficiency within the block of East European command economies resulted in the dramatic decision to change over to an economic system largely based on market forces. The painfulness of the ensuing transformation process will be mitigated somewhat by supportive economic policies of the West, including the European Community which is itself aiming at complete economic integration by the end of 1992. The consequences for the developing countries of these far-reaching policy changes in East and West are likely to be negative, at least in the immediate future. This is true for the volume of development assistance given by East and West, as well as for the export prospects of developing countries. Favourable effects might at best be expected in the longer run.     

RESEARCH BRIEFING: EU accession and the Bulgarian real estate market

Accession of Bulgaria to the European Union (EU) is expected to result in an increase in the prices of all types of real estate as changes are expected to differ across the segments of the national real-estate market. Property prices have been influenced primarily by local demand, government policies and the perception that EU accession is promoting investment. It is likely that prices of flats will further differentiate, the market for office space will stabilize, the provision of infrastructure will importantly influence prices in holiday resorts and of industrial estates, and agricultural land prices will upsurge initially.     

Reproduction in transition: cross-border egg donation,biodesirability and new reproductive subjectivities on the European fertility market

Today, there should be little doubt that new reproductive technologies have ‘diversified, globalized, and denaturalized’ human reproduction (Inhorn and Birenbaum-Carmeli 2008). Not only have assisted reproductive technologies developed and spread throughout the world at a rapid pace, but this significant development has also given rise to a global market of cross-border reproductive care (CBRC). This article seeks to investigate CBRC between Sweden and the Baltic states, in which Swedish infertility patients travel to private fertility clinics as recipients of egg donation. This article argues that the restructuring of the European space (occurring in and through both the so-called ‘transition’ of the former Eastern Bloc and the expansion of the European Union) constitutes crucial conditions of emergence for the trans-European market of infertility care, which not only results in new modalities of reproductive mobility but also articulates a new set of interrelated European gendered reproductive subjectivities. Particular attention will be paid to the ways in which such ‘new reproductive subjectivities’ – here exemplified by a sample of cross-border donor egg recipients – are articulated in relation to notions of ‘choice’ and what I call ‘biodesirability’, and how such notions cannot be exempt from its specific post-socialist European context.     

The Regional Impact of EU Eastern Enlargement: A View from Germany

Based on a relational concept of regional analysis this contribution emphasizes that European Union (EU) Eastern enlargement will primarily lead to a restructuring or intensification of interregional economic relations. However, it rejects the widespread view that at first the border regions at the present EU Eastern boundary would be affected by Eastern enlargement. This view relies on the problematic assumption that the regions' transnational relations are subject to a logic of geographical nearness. The most important nodes of transnational economic relations in an enlarged EU are not the border regions, but certain regional development centres in the interior of the European economic space. Thus the regional impact of EU Eastern enlargement should be differentiated with regard to different types of regions: Particular advantages come towards the structurally strong regions in the interior of the present EU as well as the accession countries, whereas the structurally weak regions at the present EU Eastern boundary can gain advantages from Eastern enlargement only to the extent that they manage to overcome their endogenous blockades concerning cross-border economic cooperation and a positive attitude of the regions' population towards European integration.     

环境史中的欧洲特殊道路问题

欧洲为什么率先进行工业革命是一个永恒的问题,从东西方环境史比较的角度可能会对此得出独特的解释。当然,这种比较必须建立在坚实的实地研究的基础上。本文要分析的十个问题是：谨慎对待精神观点,环境史的制度分析,耕地与牧场的平衡与失衡,西欧的婚姻模式,延续、持续性和自给自足,森林和权力,欧洲多中心主义的优势,魏特夫“亚细亚生产方式”的绿色复兴,欧洲殖民主义的环境影响,环境史上是否存在一个“欧洲奇迹”。从这十方面的比较中会对“环境史中的欧洲特殊道路问题”有更清楚的把握,进而揭示出一个辩证的历史逻辑,即“长期的成功恰恰加剧了危机”。这或许就是东方前现代的繁荣昭示给现在西方文明的前景。     

Rural Agricultural Economies and Military Provisioning at Roman Gordion (Central Turkey)

Roman Gordion, on the Anatolian plateau, is the only excavated rural military settlement in a pacified territory in the Roman East, providing a unique opportunity to investigate the agricultural economy of a permanent Roman garrison. We present combined results of archaeobotanical and zooarchaeological analyses, assessing several hypotheses regarding Roman military provisioning. The garrison adapted its dietary preferences to local agricultural systems, but maintained its traditional meat supply of pork, beef, and chickens as well. There is evidence for economic interdependence with local farmers and cattle herders, self-sufficiency in pork and chicken production, and complex relationships with autonomous sheep and goat herders who pursued their own economic goals. If the Roman military in Gordion exercised a command economy, they were able to implement that control only on specific components of the agricultural sector, especially cereal farming. The sheep and goat herding system remained unaltered, targeting secondary products for a market economy and/or broader provincial taxation authorities. The garrison introduced new elements to the animal economy of the Gordion region, including a new pig husbandry system. Comparison with contemporary non-military settlements suggests both similarities and differences with urban meat economies of Roman Anatolia.     

Trends in African Agricultural Trade

Sub-Saharan agriculture, with few exceptions, has stagnated despite official goals of achieving self-sufficiency and increasing export earnings. African agriculture has suffered deteriorating terms of trade, inadequate technology and infrastructure, and policies which severely discourage agricultural enterprise. In some countries structural adjustment and policy reform are occurring, and there remains great potential for agricultural development due in part to prospective advantages in natural resources and abundant labor. Discussed here are a specific set of institutional reforms needed to mobilize agricultural entrepreneurship.     

Communism and Museums in Bulgaria

Despite the growing interest in Eastern European countries since the fall of the communist regimes in the late 1980s, they still remain obscure to Western Europeans. Media information on Eastern Europe focuses mainly on politics or the attractions of holiday resorts and, consequently, the history and local customs of the countries, their cultural affairs and different cultural institutions are little known. This paper describes the way Bulgarian museums developed during the governance of the Bulgarian Communist Party (1946–1989). It is hoped that revealing information on their operations within a broad historical and social context will lead to a better understanding of the country’s cultural affairs at a time when Bulgaria has become the latest member of the European Union. The findings are a result of PhD research.     

Domestic Pigs in Africa

The history of African pig breeds is still controversial due to the relative scarcity of archaeological and genetic data clarifying their origins. While these breeds might descend from Near Eastern pigs entering the continent via Egypt during the Neolithic, Africa may be a primary domestication locus for pigs, as indicated for other species such as cattle and donkeys. In this regard, characterisation of the mitochondrial gene pool of African pig breeds has revealed a very low frequency of Near Eastern alleles, suggesting that, if Fertile Crescent pigs played a part in the foundation of African breeds, their genetic signature has been substantially erased. Interestingly, genetic analysis of western and eastern African pig breeds has revealed a strong phylogeographic pattern, with the latter harbouring Far Eastern alleles at high frequencies. This finding is consistent with data obtained for chickens and confirms that livestock was transported in ancient times, from the Far East to Africa as a consequence of the Indian Ocean trade. European colonisation of Africa also involved the introduction of exotic swine breeds such as Iberian pigs. The confluence of the highly divergent European and Far Eastern Sus scrofa gene pools contributed to significantly enrich the genetic reservoir of African swine breeds, favouring their adaptation to environmental conditions that are often harsh. Conservation of this genetic legacy will be of utmost importance to ensure the prosperity of current resource-based subsistence farming systems in Africa.     

Drivers and difficulties in the economic relationship between Australia and the European Union: from conflict to cooperation

ABSTRACT

Economic relations between Australia and the European Union (EU) have always been strong, but they have not always been easy. They have been difficult for Australia because it associated the EU with the loss of the UK preferential export market on its entry into the then European Economic Community. And because Australia associated the EU with the original Common Agricultural Policy, which combined subsidies for agricultural production and high agricultural tariffs to make Australian agricultural exports not competitive. They have been difficult for the EU also. Australia developed a biosecurity system to protect its agricultural sector: quarantine requirements and food safety standards made the importation of EU plant and animal products too costly. Yet Australia and the EU need each other. The EU, which is Australia’s largest services trade and investment partner, supplies the business services that drive a knowledge economy and provides the credit to finance economic development. Correspondingly, the EU needs Australia both as a commercial base in Asia and as a reliable energy supplier. This article analyses the drivers and difficulties in the economic relationship between Australia and the EU as they start negotiations for a free trade agreement.     

论19、20世纪之交东欧犹太移民在美国的群体互助

从19世纪80年代持续到一战后初期,东欧犹太人为逃避俄国及其周边国家的反犹迫害浪潮而大批涌向美国。他们在老一辈美国犹太人的慷慨资助下渡过最初的困境后,就着手调动自己有限的资源创立帮助犹太新移民的慈善组织,并且按照乡镇或地区来源建立同乡会共渡生活难关。他们还将欧洲犹太社区中久已存在的无息贷款社移植到美国,无偿为有志创业者提供小额资金。这些互助组织有效地保障了整个东欧犹太移民群体在美国的生存和发展。     

Optimizing the Spatial Structure of the Agricultural Production Function

Important characteristics of spatial agricultural production functions are derived by introducing a non‐negative curvilinear spatial demand function for production input intensities. Given the usual neoclassical rationale assumptions of spatial demand for capital and labor inputs under competitive environment of farming in developing agricultural economies, the optimal production levels are determined by optimizing spatial demand for production inputs. Decreasing price‐to‐transport costs ratio (that is, decrease in the prices of capital goods or increase in freight rates) and increasing wage‐to‐travel costs ratio (that is, increase in labor wages or decrease in the travel rate) expand the limits of the (spatial) optimal boundary of the demand for agricultural capital goods and labor input respectively. These effects occur on account of the operation of (positive) spatial price gradient and (negative) wage‐gradient in the market region. It may be noted that elasticities of demand for production factors are spatially variant and have significant effects on the alterations in the structure of agricultural production. However, the spatial optimal solution of production has a complicated relationship with them. The price elasticity has negative and wage elasticity has positive spatial gradients in the market region. Farmers located in the periphery of the market region are not much affected by the proportionate changes occurring in the prices of agricultural capital goods but are more sensitive to the proportional changes in labor wages. Because of a decreasing trend in capital input demand and increase in labor input with distance from the market, capital‐product diminishes with a decreasing rate and labor‐product increases with an increasing rate in the spatial structure of agricultural production. As a result, capital‐labor ratio falls toward zero, which raises profit rate per unit of capital investment especially in the outer part of the market region. The equilibria of optimal production with price elasticity as well as of capital intensity with labor employment (that is, capital‐labor ratio as unity) determine spatial limits of the optimal production zone which is shifted outward subject to the provision of cheap transportation, stabilizing market prices and/or increasing wage rate at the market center. It will help in extending outwardly the optimal spatial limits of capital investment and will mobilize capital resources of farmers in the periphery for efficient and competitive capital‐dominated farming.     

中世纪晚期西欧乡村工业及乡村纺织业的兴起

中世纪晚期西欧乡村工业的发展蔚为壮观,其时乡村工业主要有家庭副业、家庭作坊和分散的手工工场等形式。西欧乡村工业的重心是在不断变迁的,其生产规模也在不断扩大;以市场为中心、以利润为目标使乡村工业逐渐从农业中脱离出来,这样与所谓的“原工业”相连接了。西欧乡村工业中最为突出的是纺织业,自然资源、技术与分工、农业商品化、乡村劳动力、市场需求等因素都是乡村纺织工业勃兴的原因。中世纪晚期西欧乡村工业的发展是西欧社会工业化或现代化的前奏。     

Land Abandonment in Russia

Field observations in two regions of European Russia (Kostroma and Samara oblasts) in summer 2010, reinforced by satellite imagery, provide a basis for a team of U.S. and Russian geographers to investigate ongoing changes in agricultural land use since the early 1990s. The authors highlight the contrasting situations in Kostroma (northern European Russia), where agriculture is limited and in retreat beyond relatively small scale operations in suburbia, and Samara (southern European Russia), where agricultural activity appears to be sustainable, albeit on a somewhat less extensive spatial scale than in the past. The comparison suggests that the change from central planning to unregulated market has not been popular, and that crop farming in both regions has better prospects than animal husbandry. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: O130, P320, Q150, R140. 1 table, 17 figures, 21 references.     

20世纪60年代中加小麦贸易对中国的重要意义

1960年中国首次从加拿大进口粮食度荒,并由此改变此前的粮食自给自足现状。中 加小麦贸易不仅可以巩固粮食安全、促进农业改革,也可使中国重返加拿大与西方市场,使外贸渠 道多样化,同时还促进了中加建交、打破美国的封锁孤立政策。     

Commerce and morality in eighteenth-century Italy

This paper would like to discuss some aspects of current trends in studies on eighteenth-century Eastern Europe. In the first part it addresses recent approaches devoted to the reconstruction of the conceptualization of Eastern Europe at the time of the Enlightenment, which have often been inspired by the work of Edward Said and Martin Bernal. These include Larry Woolf's Inventing Eastern Europe (1994). Michael Confino has provided a detailed critique of Woolf's approach. It can be argued that Woolf is in fact projecting Cold War divisions back into the eighteenth century.

The article argues in favour of a less “Orientalising” approach to the history of Eastern Europe, by proving an alternative overview of the historical dimensions of the eastern (and northern) regions of Europe in the eighteenth century. Eastern Europe was inextricably connected to its western European neighbours. Without Eastern Europe, European history is incomplete and incomprehensible.

In the third part the article argues that the interpretative framework of the “first crisis of the Old Regime”, which Franco Venturi outlined in his Settecento riformatore in the 19870s and 1980s represented a subtle rejection of the East/West dichotomy, and in fact foreshadowed the eventual reunification of Europe after the end of the Cold War.     

Restructuring the Post-Cold War World Economy: Perspectives and a Prognosis

In exploring the consequences of changes in Eastern Europe for Western Europe, the Third World and the global economic order, this article examines the need for economic management which is more solidly based on the new theory of international trade, and which extends beyond the national level. The rapidly deteriorating situation in Eastern Europe and the Gulf crisis both form valuable examples of the problems and opportunities ahead. There is a clear move towards the formation of regional blocs such as the European Community, the intention of which is to strengthen the industrial countries against the uncertainties and risks involved in the current reshaping of the world order by multipolarity, as well as in the growing nationalist tensions and movements for national independence. This article will argue that bloc formation is bound to either further marginalize the majority of developing countries, or increase their dependence on the few regional centres that are emerging.     

State,Industrialization and Agricultural Policy in Korea

Analyses of Korean (Republic of Korea) development point to the strong role of the state in directing the industrialization process. State intervention has also been pronounced in agriculture, as state agents have mobilized bureaucratic resources to direct agricultural production activities in support of the national development project through the creation of strategic agroindustrial linkages. The Korean green revolution campaign to achieve rice self-sufficiency is used to illustrate the state's role in fostering intersectoral linkages. Agriculture is brought back into the debate about Korean development.     

From The Iron Curtain to Franco’s Spain: Right-Wing Central Europeans in Exile

After the Second World War, anti-communists of different backgrounds from Central and Eastern European countries decided to settle in Franco’s Spain, where they sought safety and a place to live during the Cold War. This article will provide an overview of their political profiles and assess the reasons these exiles chose Spain, a country excluded from the United Nations until 1955 and led by Francisco Franco. The article also shows how they settled in the dictatorship linked to the Nazis and Italian Fascists, and the ways in which they continued their struggles against Communism with public and private resources.     

EUROPEAN BRIEFING

Much has been made of completing the Single European Market in Europe. Despite movements towards more advanced levels of integration such as currency union, there remains several grey areas in specific industries that are not allowing for open access to the market. These areas include government activities such as electricity and gas along with other industries such as telecommunications. This article sets out to examine whether there is likely to be a free market in these sectors and assesses the progress being made since the introduction of a number of procurement directives post-1998. This will therefore have an influence on land use planning. The article draws on the literature of regulation and industrial organization as well as European integration in order to demonstrate the complexities of these industries and the problems of full compliance with the single market.