Soft budget constraints (SBCs) can be said to exist in situations where governments rescue loss-making firms in order to guarantee their survival by means of either a direct or an indirect injection of credit. The credit markets of the former socialist economies of Central and Eastern Europe...

This book, based upon a large-scale research project, examines alternative types of exchange rate policies being pursued and the changing nature of exchange rate policy during the transition process in four countries, Slovenia, Bulgaria, Poland and the Czech Republic. The book brings together a...

This paper develops a model of a representative transition economy to explain the stylised facts of output declines and real exchange rate appreciation in the early stages of transformation. These facts can be explained by supply-side shocks, interest rate liberalisation or a reduction in core...