Ukraine: The Long, Rocky Road to a Liberal Market Economy
摘要
There are already numerous detailed analyses of Ukraine’s economic development. What has been missing so far, however, is a quantitative analysis of the post-communist reform pathway. In this chapter, the authors provide a quantitative and graphical overview of the country’s socio-economic development since 1991, drawing on the Liberalization Dataset by Armingeon et al. (2019), which covers legislative measures in 13 socio-economic policy areas (e.g. competition policy and market regulation, corporate governance, privatization) for 37 countries. The authors extend the dataset with an analysis of Ukraine’s liberalization and de-liberalization path from 1991 to 2024. Using the coding methods developed by Armingeon et al., they address the following questions: In which phases did liberalization surges take place and how far-reaching were they? To what extent did authoritarian or democratic Ukrainian governments pursue de-liberalization? What was the quantitative impact of critical political turning points (e.g. state independence, Orange Revolution, Euromaidan) on Ukraine’s socio-economic development pathway? What influence did the large-scale Russian invasion have on Ukraine’s economic policy? The authors analyze all laws passed by the Verkhovna Rada since 1991 in the 13 policy areas covered by the Liberalization Dataset and weight them quantitatively on the liberalization/de-liberalization dimension. This approach enables them to take a systematic “bird’s eye view” of the questions raised above and to provide direct insights into the legislative activity of the Verkhovna Rada.