IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/bol/bodewp/wp771.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Did Growth and Reforms Increase Citizens Support for the Transition?

Author

Listed:
  • R. Golinelli
  • R. Rovelli

Abstract

How did post-communist transformations affect people s perceptions of their economic and political systems? We model a pseudo-panel with 89 country-year clusters, based on 13 countries observed between 1991 and 2004, to identify the macro and institutional drivers of the public opinion. Our main findings are: (i) When the economy is growing, on average people appreciate more extensive reforms; they dislike unbalanced reforms. (ii) Worsening of income distribution and higher inflation interact with an increasing share of the private sector in aggravating nostalgia for the past regime. (iii) Cross-country differences in the attitudes towards the present and future (both in the economic and political dimensions) are largely explained by differences in the institutional indicators for the rule of law and corruption. (iv) Cross-country differences in the extent of nostalgia towards the past are mainly related to differences in the deterioration of standards of living.

Suggested Citation

  • R. Golinelli & R. Rovelli, 2011. "Did Growth and Reforms Increase Citizens Support for the Transition?," Working Papers wp771, Dipartimento Scienze Economiche, Universita' di Bologna.
    • Handle: RePEc:bol:bodewp:wp771
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://amsacta.unibo.it/4468/1/WP771.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Irina Denisova & Markus Eller & Ekaterina Zhuravskaya, 2010. "What do Russians think about transition?1," The Economics of Transition, The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, vol. 18(2), pages 249-280, April.
    2. Dewatripont, Mathias & Roland, Gerard, 1995. "The Design of Reform Packages under Uncertainty," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 85(5), pages 1207-1223, December.
    3. Simon G�chter & Arno Riedl, "undated". "Moral Property Rights in Bargaining," IEW - Working Papers 113, Institute for Empirical Research in Economics - University of Zurich.
    4. Philippe Aghion & Olivier Jean Blanchard, 1994. "On the Speed of Transition in Central Europe," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 1994, Volume 9, pages 283-330, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Verbeek, Marno & Nijman, Theo, 1992. "Can Cohort Data Be Treated as Genuine Panel Data?," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 17(1), pages 9-23.
    6. Denisova, Irina & Eller, Markus & Frye, Timothy & Zhuravskaya, Ekaterina, 2009. "Who Wants To Revise Privatization? The Complementarity of Market Skills and Institutions," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 103(2), pages 284-304, May.
    7. Augustin Landier & David Thesmar & Mathias Thoenig, 2008. "Investigating capitalism aversion [‘Why not a political Coase theorem? Social conflict, commitment and politics’]," Economic Policy, CEPR, CESifo, Sciences Po;CES;MSH, vol. 23(55), pages 466-497.
    8. Sergei Guriev & Ekaterina Zhuravskaya, 2009. "(Un)happiness in Transition," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 23(2), pages 143-168, Spring.
    9. R. Rovelli & A. Zaiceva, 2011. "Individual support for economic and political changes: Evidence from transition countries, 1991-2004," Working Papers wp736, Dipartimento Scienze Economiche, Universita' di Bologna.
    10. Karsten Staehr, 2006. "Linkages between Political and Economic Reforms in Post-Communist Countries," Nordic Journal of Political Economy, Nordic Journal of Political Economy, vol. 32, pages 113-138.
    11. Irina Denisova & Markus Eller & Timothy Frye & Ekaterina Zhuravskaya, 2007. "Who Wants to Revise Privatization and Why? Evidence from 28 Post-Communist Countries," Working Papers w0105, New Economic School (NES).
    12. Nauro F. Campos & Abrizio Coricelli, 2002. "Growth in Transition: What We Know, What We Don't, and What We Should," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 40(3), pages 793-836, September.
    13. Karsten Staehr, 2005. "Reforms and Economic Growth in Transition Economies: Complementarity, Sequencing and Speed," European Journal of Comparative Economics, Cattaneo University (LIUC), vol. 2(2), pages 177-202, December.
    14. Milanovic, Branko & Ersado, Lire, 2008. "Reform and inequality during the transition: An analysis using panel household survey data, 1990-2005," MPRA Paper 7459, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    15. Fidrmuc, Jan, 2000. "Political support for reforms: Economics of voting in transition countries," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 44(8), pages 1491-1513, August.
    16. Atkinson,Anthony Barnes & Micklewright,John, 1992. "Economic Transformation in Eastern Europe and the Distribution of Income," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521433297.
    17. Tito Boeri & Katherine Terrell, 2002. "Institutional Determinants of Labor Reallocation in Transition," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 16(1), pages 51-76, Winter.
    18. Bjørnskov, Christian & Dreher, Axel & Fischer, Justina A.V., 2010. "Formal institutions and subjective well-being: Revisiting the cross-country evidence," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 26(4), pages 419-430, December.
    19. Hyman P. Minsky, 1996. "Uncertainty and the Institutional Structure of Capitalist Economies," Journal of Economic Issues, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 30(2), pages 357-368, June.
    20. Hayo, Bernd, 2004. "Public support for creating a market economy in Eastern Europe," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(4), pages 720-744, December.
    21. Easterlin, Richard A., 2009. "Lost in transition: Life satisfaction on the road to capitalism," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 71(2), pages 130-145, August.
    22. repec:dau:papers:123456789/7960 is not listed on IDEAS
    23. Jorge Braga de Macedo & Joaquim Oliveira Martins, 2006. "Growth, Reform Indicators and Policy Complementaries," NBER Working Papers 12544, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    24. White, Halbert, 1980. "A Heteroskedasticity-Consistent Covariance Matrix Estimator and a Direct Test for Heteroskedasticity," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 48(4), pages 817-838, May.
    25. Campos, Nauro F. & Horváth, Roman, 2012. "Reform redux: Measurement, determinants and growth implications," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 28(2), pages 227-237.
    26. Laura Langbein & Stephen Knack, 2010. "The Worldwide Governance Indicators: Six, One, or None?," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 46(2), pages 350-370.
    27. Jan Svejnar, 2002. "Transition Economies: Performance and Challenges," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 16(1), pages 3-28, Winter.
    28. Kim, Byung-Yeon & Pirttila, Jukka, 2006. "Political constraints and economic reform: Empirical evidence from the post-communist transition in the 1990s," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 34(3), pages 446-466, September.
    29. Stanley Fischer & Alan Gelb, 1991. "The Process of Socialist Economic Transformation," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 5(4), pages 91-105, Fall.
    30. Branko Milanovic, 1999. "Explaining the increase in inequality during transition," The Economics of Transition, The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, vol. 7(2), pages 299-341, July.
    31. Aristei, David & Perugini, Cristiano, 2012. "Inequality and reforms in transition countries," Economic Systems, Elsevier, vol. 36(1), pages 2-10.
    32. Hillman, Arye L., 1993. "Socialist clubs : A perspective on the transition," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 9(3), pages 307-319, August.
    33. Babecký, Jan & Campos, Nauro F., 2011. "Does reform work? An econometric survey of the reform-growth puzzle," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 39(2), pages 140-158, June.
    34. Hillman, Arye L., 1994. "The transition from socialism: An overview from a political economy perspective," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 10(1), pages 191-225, May.
    35. Simon Gächter & Arno Riedl, 2005. "Moral Property Rights in Bargaining with Infeasible Claims," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 51(2), pages 249-263, February.
    36. Gérard Roland, 2002. "The Political Economy of Transition," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 16(1), pages 29-50, Winter.
    37. Begovic, Boris & Paunovic, Marko, 2011. "Political support for enterprise restructuring and voting in Serbia," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 27(1), pages 171-180, March.
    38. Jorge Braga De Macedo & Joaquim Oliveira Martins, 2008. "Growth, reform indicators and policy complementarities1," The Economics of Transition, The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, vol. 16(2), pages 141-164, April.
    39. Riccardo Rovelli & Anzelika Zaiceva, 2013. "Did support for economic and political reforms increase during the post-communist transition, and if so, why?," The Economics of Transition, The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, vol. 21(2), pages 193-240, April.
    40. Fernandez, Raquel & Rodrik, Dani, 1991. "Resistance to Reform: Status Quo Bias in the Presence of Individual-Specific Uncertainty," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 81(5), pages 1146-1155, December.
    41. Verbeek, M.J.C.M. & Nijman, T.E., 1992. "Can cohort data be treated as genuine panel data?," Other publications TiSEM d4eada8f-b91c-4fe7-a58c-7, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    42. Hillman, Arye L., 2010. "Expressive behavior in economics and politics," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 26(4), pages 403-418, December.
    43. Hinds, Manuel & Pohl, Gerhard, 1991. "Going to market : privatization in Central and Eastern Market Europe," Policy Research Working Paper Series 768, The World Bank.
    44. Wagner, Alexander F. & Schneider, Friedrich & Halla, Martin, 2009. "The quality of institutions and satisfaction with democracy in Western Europe -- A panel analysis," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 25(1), pages 30-41, March.
    45. Rovelli, Riccardo & Zaiceva, Anzelika, 2009. "Transition Fatigue? Cross-Country Evidence from Micro Data," IZA Discussion Papers 4224, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Sergei Guriev & Ekaterina Zhuravskaya, 2009. "(Un)happiness in Transition," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 23(2), pages 143-168, Spring.
    2. Askarov, Zohid & Doucouliagos, Hristos, 2015. "Aid and institutions in transition economies," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 38(C), pages 55-70.
    3. Friedrichsen, Jana & Zahn, Philipp, 2014. "Political support in hard times: Do people care about national welfare?," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 35(C), pages 23-37.
    4. Irina Denisova, 2016. "Institutions and the support for market reforms," IZA World of Labor, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA), pages 258-258, May.
    5. Romain Duval & Davide Furceri & Jakob Miethe, 2021. "Robust political economy correlates of major product and labor market reforms in advanced economies: Evidence from BAMLE for logit models," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 36(1), pages 98-124, January.
    6. Agnello, Luca & Castro, Vitor & Jalles, João Tovar & Sousa, Ricardo M., 2015. "What determines the likelihood of structural reforms?," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 129-145.
    7. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/7fst0pcf5j8cr99e1nuobt97rn is not listed on IDEAS
    8. Sirovátka, Tomáš & Guzi, Martin & Saxonberg, Steve, 2019. "Support for Market Economy Principles in European Post-Communist Countries during 1999–2008," MPRA Paper 97585, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    9. Nikolova, Milena, 2016. "Minding the happiness gap: Political institutions and perceived quality of life in transition," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 45(S), pages 129-148.
    10. Rieth, Malte & Wittich, Jana, 2020. "The impact of ECB policy on structural reforms," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 122(C).
    11. Rieth, Malte & Wittich, Jana, 2020. "The impact of ECB policy on structural reforms," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 122.
    12. Salih BARIŞIK & Kubilay ERGEN, 2023. "Heterogenous Effects of the Determinants of Pro-market Reforms: Panel Quantile Estimation for OECD Countries," Journal for Economic Forecasting, Institute for Economic Forecasting, vol. 0(2), pages 36-51, June.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Riccardo Rovelli & Anzelika Zaiceva, 2013. "Did support for economic and political reforms increase during the post-communist transition, and if so, why?," The Economics of Transition, The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, vol. 21(2), pages 193-240, April.
    2. Neher, Frank, 2011. "Markets wanted: Expectation overshooting in transition," Discussion Papers 2011/1, Free University Berlin, School of Business & Economics.
    3. Frank Neher, 2013. "Markets wanted: expectation overshooting in transition economies," International Review of Economics, Springer;Happiness Economics and Interpersonal Relations (HEIRS), vol. 60(2), pages 187-219, June.
    4. Rovelli, Riccardo & Zaiceva, Anzelika, 2009. "Transition Fatigue? Cross-Country Evidence from Micro Data," IZA Discussion Papers 4224, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    5. Nauro F. Campos & Paul De Grauwe & Yuemei Ji, 2017. "Structural Reforms, Growth and Inequality: An Overview of Theory, Measurement and Evidence," CESifo Working Paper Series 6812, CESifo.
    6. Kim, Byung-Yeon & Pirttila, Jukka, 2006. "Political constraints and economic reform: Empirical evidence from the post-communist transition in the 1990s," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 34(3), pages 446-466, September.
    7. Campos, Nauro F. & Horváth, Roman, 2012. "Reform redux: Measurement, determinants and growth implications," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 28(2), pages 227-237.
    8. Kim, Byung-Yeon & Jukka Pirttila, 2003. "The Political Economy of Reforms: Empirical Evidence from Post-Communist Transition in the 1990s," Royal Economic Society Annual Conference 2003 120, Royal Economic Society.
    9. repec:zbw:bofitp:2003_004 is not listed on IDEAS
    10. Byung-Yeon Kim & Jukka Pirttilä, 2003. "The political economy of reforms: Empirical evidence from post- communist transition in the 1990s," Macroeconomics 0304009, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    11. Lucie Coufalová & Lenka Kolajtová & Libor Žídek, 2023. "Public support for economic transition," Economics of Transition and Institutional Change, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 31(1), pages 161-187, January.
    12. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/7fst0pcf5j8cr99e1nuobt97rn is not listed on IDEAS
    13. Jan Babecky & Tomas Havranek, 2013. "Structural Reforms and Growth in Transition: A Meta-Analysis," William Davidson Institute Working Papers Series wp1057, William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan.
    14. DELL'ANNO, Roberto & VILLA, Stefania, 2012. "Growth in Transition Countries: Big Bang versus Gradualism," CELPE Discussion Papers 122, CELPE - CEnter for Labor and Political Economics, University of Salerno, Italy.
    15. Sergei Guriev & Ekaterina Zhuravskaya, 2009. "(Un)happiness in Transition," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 23(2), pages 143-168, Spring.
    16. Facchini, Giovanni & Segnana, Maria Luigia, 2003. "Growth at the EU periphery: the next enlargement," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 43(5), pages 827-862.
    17. Jan Babecky & Tomas Havranek, 2014. "Structural reforms and growth in transition," The Economics of Transition, The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, vol. 22(1), pages 13-42, January.
    18. Agnello, Luca & Castro, Vitor & Jalles, João Tovar & Sousa, Ricardo M., 2015. "What determines the likelihood of structural reforms?," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 129-145.
    19. Ichiro Iwasaki & Taku Suzuki, 2016. "Radicalism Versus Gradualism: An Analytical Survey Of The Transition Strategy Debate," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(4), pages 807-834, September.
    20. Valev, Neven, 2004. "No pain, no gain: market reform, unemployment, and politics in Bulgaria," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(3), pages 409-425, September.
    21. Begovic, Boris & Paunovic, Marko, 2011. "Political support for enterprise restructuring and voting in Serbia," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 27(1), pages 171-180, March.
    22. David Aristei & Cristiano Perugini, 2014. "Speed and Sequencing of Transition Reforms and Income Inequality: A Panel Data Analysis," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 60(3), pages 542-570, September.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • O11 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Macroeconomic Analyses of Economic Development
    • O57 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economywide Country Studies - - - Comparative Studies of Countries
    • P2 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Socialist and Transition Economies
    • P36 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Socialist Institutions and Their Transitions - - - Consumer Economics; Health; Education and Training; Welfare, Income, Wealth, and Poverty
    • P52 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Comparative Economic Systems - - - Comparative Studies of Particular Economies

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bol:bodewp:wp771. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Dipartimento Scienze Economiche, Universita' di Bologna (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/sebolit.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.