Publisher's Synopsis
Almost as soon as ?shock therapy? was applied in Poland in 1990 a newly established independent research organization, the Gdansk Institute for Market Economies (GIME), began painstakingly to monitor its economic impact. The Institute made its business to get to the heart of the transformation process through a unique series of investigations observing at first hand change and development. This volume, the first collection of ?Gdansk Papers?, brings to a wider audience the real impact of the transformation under way in Poland. Researchers, students, journalists and business people will find in this book a unique account of four years of momentous change, material tracing the big issues ? ?state first? behaviour, privatization, the development of the small business sector, banking reform and bad debts, Poland and Europe ? which will lead to a better understanding of the transformation process not only in Poland but, given the commonality of problems, across the region.