Structural Sources of Post-Communist Market Reform: Economic Structure, Political Culture, and War

Why did some post-communist countries implement more thorough market reforms than others? Four different structural explanations are considered: (1) relative size of economic interest group coalitions hurt by market reform; (2) predominant religious traditions, which may incorporate norms and institutions more or less favorable to market reform; (3) variation in historically based national economic and political expectations, in which greater pre-communist political and economic achievements may create collective rationales for more aggressive institutional and policy reforms; and (4) duration of large-scale military conflict, which may distract and undermine reformist governments. These explanations are tested both directly, and mediated through plausible process predictors—democratization, party ideological moderation or extremism, strength of the presidency, and party system concentration. The 28 post-communist countries are examined over shorter and longer time spans—2 years after the fall of the old regime and a decade or so after the fall. The two political culture variables—predominant religious tradition and national economic and political expectations—provide the most statistically significant and powerful predictors. War is also a significant and powerful predictor. Relative size of economic interest group coalitions is estimated to have little impact. Among the process variables, democratization and party ideological moderation have the most consistently significant and powerful impacts. One implication is that middle-range theories of political culture, which can be more firmly grounded in rational calculation and historical context, may be a promising way to remedy the weaknesses of political culture theories operating at the broader level of religion or civilization.