Since its velvet revolution in late 1989, the Czech and Slovak Federal Republic (CSFR) has moved steadily to create the conditions for developing a private market economy. Not only has the CSFR freed up the conditions for entry of new private firms, but it has also taken far-reaching steps to...

The economies of Central and Eastern Europe are in the midst of a historic transition from central planning and state ownership to development of a market-driven private sector. This transition requires comprehensive changes in"rules of the game"- including the legal framework for economic...

As socialist countries move toward market systems, fiscal policy is an important part of their reform agenda. First, they need to reorient public spending to focus more on the provision of"public"goods. Second, they need to adopt more selective, predictable, and nondiscretionary means to finance...

Institutional weakness is a critical constraint to economic development. The goal of this paper is to review the design of recent Bank projects to assess the quality of their institutional development (ID) components and the factors that may affect that quality. A major focus is Bank staffing...

The basic economic challenge in the transition from socialism to capitalism is creating incentive structures and institutions that promote enterprise change and restructuring. This is the motivation for most of the reforms debated during the transition - whether privatization, demonopolization,...

One of the most remarkable developments in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) has been the region's opening to foreign direct investment. CEE states saw foreign investment climb from minuscule amounts in 1989 to more than $7 billion in 1992. All CEE states have enacted new laws on foreign...

As the economies of Central and Eastern Europe move from central planning and state ownership to market-driven development of private sector activity, they are undertaking comprehensive change in the"rules of the game", the legal framework for economic activity. The authors analyze the evolving...

Westeners often complain that laws are not enforced in developing countries."Good"laws are on the books, but in reality individuals and firms evade them with impunity. For example taxes are uncollected, bankruptcy laws unenforced, environmental controls ignored and trade restrictions evaded....

Of all taxes, income taxes are the most difficult to implement. Developing countries are usually able to generate large amounts of income tax revenue only from large corporations or foreign investments. They are rarely effective in taxing wealthy individuals or small or medium-size businesses....