Word: communisme
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...Solidarity, there were more than 400 underground periodicals appearing in Poland, some with a circulation that exceeded 30,000. Books and pamphlets challenging the authority of the communist government were printed by the thousands. Comic books for children recast Polish fables and legends, with Jaruzelski pictured as the villain, communism as the red dragon and Walesa as the heroic knight. In church basements and homes, millions of viewers watched documentary videos produced and screened on the equipment smuggled into the country...
What, then, would a Polish pessimist predict? About what is expected by gloomy counterparts in Hungary, Czechoslovakia and the other Soviet satellites that broke free of communism in 1989. Standards of living will drop so low and for so long that the populace may rebel, not just against capitalism and free- market economics but against democracy as well. Possible result: the accession to power of "the man on the horse" -- a dictator...
...former Soviet bloc. Exports to Russia and other once communist countries have shriveled faster than new markets can be developed in the West, and imports of Russian oil now have to be paid for in scarce hard currency. Czechoslovak production fell 16% last year; unemployment, officially zero under communism, has risen to 8% and is certain to go higher, bringing some of the same calls heard in Poland for pumping more money into sick state enterprises...
HUNGARY. Former boss Janos Kadar's "goulash communism" allowed some privatization of industry (15% by 1989) and considerable self-management by state-owned enterprises. So when communism was overthrown, the new government saw no need for shock treatment; officials could institute a more gradual process of lifting price controls and reducing or eliminating subsidies. As a result, Hungary has experienced the smallest drop in production in Eastern Europe (6.5% last year) and the lowest inflation (34% for all 1991, about a third of that at year's end). Hungary has been especially successful in attracting foreign investment; it has formed...
...SOUTHERN TIER. The government of Romania looks to many critics like a continuation of communism without Nicolae Ceausescu, the dictator executed in 1989. Not much has changed for the better in this benighted land. The government has passed some privatization laws, but quasi-communists within the ruling National Salvation Front have blocked any deeper reform. The moves so far have served mainly to spur inflation and unemployment without easing the severe shortages of all consumer goods, including food. Bulgaria at least has enough to eat, thanks largely to the fertility of its soil and the skill of its farmers...