Leszek Balcerowicz, professor at the Warsaw School of Economics, was deputy premier and finance minister in the first Solidarity-led government of Poland. The principal architect of the stabilization and postcommunist transformation of the Polish economy, he has published extensively on economic questions both in Poland and abroad. In 1992, he received the Ludwig Erhard Prize from the Ludwig Erhard Foundation.
Is the challenge of building and consolidating democracy under postcommunist conditions unique, or can one apply lessons learned from other new democracies? The essays collected in this volume explore these questions, while tracing how the countries of Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union have fared in the decade following the fall of communism.
