Word: east
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1980-1989
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...using it now instead of "East Europeans." East Europe was the geopolitical designation for a reality that is now disappearing...
Because events in Eastern Europe sometimes appear to be spinning out of control, the need grows more urgent to perceive and outline even the vaguest contours of the reshaped Continent to come. The crumbling of Communism in the East carries risks that might be avoided and offers opportunities to choose policies most likely to bring stability to a new European order...
...Western Europe should not be tempted into slowing or diluting its program of economic integration scheduled to culminate in 1992. The European Community must remain a beacon and a model for reformist leaderships in the East...
Admitting that it was relatively easy to change the constitution and restore democracy in a small country like Hungary, Jeszenszky said the economic challenge faced by East European nations was formidable but not impossible. "Miracles cannot be expected," he warned, with specific reference to Poland. Nonetheless, he urged the creation of "small islands of prosperity" in the reforming economies of Eastern Europe that would be attractive examples and inspire imitation. "A few years ago, people in Hungary were pessimistic," he said. "They thought reforms brought only inflation and trouble. But now, and in East Germany and Czechoslovakia as well...
Eastern Europe, Jeszenszky suggested, had already found a political form that made dramatic economic restructuring possible: the "grand national coalition," modeled on the government in Warsaw. "Poland's Solidarity movement set the pattern," he said, comparing loose non-Communist political groupings in Hungary, East Germany and Czechoslovakia to national coalitions formed in Western Europe after World War II. "We are emerging from 40 years of war against the people. Changes have to be made -- economic, political and moral ones. These new governments soon will have to make unpopular decisions, so it's best to have governments credible to all parties...