02 Jan 2016
Quo vadis, Ukraine? Is there a chance for success?
"If I were to say just one thing about Ukraine, I think I would have to stress it is the most underperforming country of all the countries I know. Ukraine has had, and indeed still does have, a lot of potential. In the beginning of 1990s, in 1992 to be precise, Deutsche Bank prepared an analysis of the chances for the former Soviet Union states to be reformed and developed successfully, and according to this analysis, Ukraine had the best chance among them all to be successful. We know that in reality the opposite happened, and Ukraine is in a very difficult situation now.
The main reason for this situation is that when at the beginning of 1990s communist countries collapsed, the old system in Ukraine was not replaced by a new one, one of functioning market economy. It was eroded, but not exactly replaced the way it happened for example in Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and the Baltic states. The country was captured by oligarchs, and a very strange, dysfunctional, and corrupted system was created instead." read more >>
