The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) yesterday launched The Transition Report 2016-17 – Transition for All: Equal Opportunities in an Unequal World.
The Transition Report is a flagship EBRD publication that traces the state of affairs, reform progress and people’s attitudes in the transition region. The 2016-17 edition is based on the third round of the EBRD/World Bank Life in Transition Survey.
This EBRD report throws a spotlight on inequality and inclusion, explaining how a failure to deliver a fair distribution of the fruits of progress may lead to setbacks in political and economic development.
The report tracks the remarkable successes that have been achieved in post-communist societies and concludes that the “happiness gap” has finally closed with people on similar incomes in similar non-transition countries.
However, it reveals that not everyone has shared in this growing economic prosperity and analyses which people either are, or feel themselves to be, excluded and why.
The report delivers a stark warning: “Countries where the majority of people perceived reforms to be designed for somebody else’s gain saw the reversal of both political and economic transition.”
The latest annual analysis from the EBRD’s economists draws on a uniquely wide-ranging survey of people who experienced transition first hand, including those born at the time of tremendous political, social and economic upheaval – the children of transition. It reveals the true physical impact of that shock on people born at the height of this period.
This survey, the EBRD/World Bank’s third Life in Transition Survey, polled the views of more than 51,000 random households at 75 locations in each of the 34 countries included.
Key findings:
– The report tracks the remarkable successes that have been achieved in post-communist societies;
– It concludes that the “happiness gap” has finally closed with people on similar incomes in similar non-transition countries;
– Not everyone feels that they have shared in the fruits of transition, economic progress and growing economic prosperity. Inequality and perceptions of inequality remain;
– Governments need to put in place policies to combat persistent inequalities across emerging Europe that are holding back long-term economic growth and threatening to throw the transition process into reverse;
– The fact that the “happiness gap” lasted so long partly reflects the intensity of the initial transition shock;
– This report reveals the true physical impact of that shock on people born at the height of this period of economic, social and political upheaval;
– People born at that time are 1 cm shorter than those born just before or after – the impact of the deprivations of transition turmoil being similar to having been born in a war zone.
