Abstract
Due to the collapse of the former Soviet Empire, new market economies experienced a large-scale loss of external markets, the loss of former economic relations, that is, a devastating external shock. The transformation shock led to escalating internal and external debts, double-digit inflation, asset devaluation, and the capital loss of the corporate, and the financial sectors. This chapter gives a short economic history of the Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries since the transition of 1990 and details the precrisis political and economic environment in Hungary, with special regard for the fiscal alcoholism and the crisis of the socialist government 2002–2010.
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Notes
- 1.
Fidesz is the abbreviation of the Alliance of Young Democrats. It was founded in 1988 as a young liberal party. After the poor results of the 1994 elections, the party leader, Viktor Orbán, made a political U-turn and transformed his party into a conservative nationalistic formation. In 1998–2002 Fidesz was the ruling party and Orbán the prime minister, but in 2002 he lost power. In opposition he was a crude enemy of the ruling socialist–liberal coalition, declaring that “the homeland cannot be in opposition,” i.e., those who are not with Fidesz are not real Hungarians. After the crisis, in 2010 Fidesz regained power with an overwhelming two thirds majority.
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Király, J. (2020). A Short Postcommunist Economic History of Emerging Europe. In: Hungary and Other Emerging EU Countries in the Financial Storm. Financial and Monetary Policy Studies, vol 49. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-49544-2_1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-49544-2_1
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