Gertrude Enderle-Burcel, Dieter Stiefel, Alice Teichova (Hrsg.): Sonderband 9. „Zarte Bande” – Österreich und die europäischen planwirtschaftlichen Länder / „Delicate Relationships” – Austria and Europe’s Planned Economies (2006)
Damir Jelic: “Living in the neighbourhood” - Economic Relations between Capitalist Austria and Socialist Croatia in Historical Perspective
Damir Jelic Vienna’s position, as presented here, offered an excellent opportunity to Austrian small-scale industry - to recognise specific, usually high technology demands and do it at home. Most goods that Croatia bought in Austria were expensive, highly specialised and technologically advanced products.30 Is there a chance for a renaissance of the Danube economic region in the future? The question about future economic relations between Austria and Croatia has to be assessed from a historical perspective. The main economic advantages of Austria in the past were: • Economic and political control over the Danube economic region • Advantage in concentration of human capital During the era of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, Vienna was the economic and financial centre of the Danube economic region. Economic integration through the marketisation of the whole region was one “economic spurt that failed”. And it happened almost a century ago. It seems that the Danube region was too huge to be controlled by only one centre. The costs of a successful economic integration across the whole territory were too high, and centripetal forces were strong enough to break the common market of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. The collapse of the Monarchy resulted from the growing economic and intellectual strength of its sub- regions, which became independent later on, to a considerable extent, with the assistance of Austrian financial and human capital. The best asset, apart from the strategically good position of Vienna and Austria in the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, was human capital. That historical period taught Austrians much about how to intermediate in business affairs between different regions, how to develop networks of contacts and how to build up institutional frameworks. Austria’s human capital was then strong enough to keep good economic relations with its successor states, even during the inter-war years and the time of communism. On the one hand, there is a danger of failure for every economy whose international position is not based on real economic and political power. On the other hand, today, within the framework of the European Union, Austrians do not have to spend as many resources on political integration as they did during the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. And they do not have to spend as many resources on breaking through political barriers as they did during socialist times, either. Nevertheless, there are still obstacles for Austria but they are of different kinds. 30 I recall a situation in the printing and paper production industry: big machines from Germany, raw materials from Russia or Poland but some small, expensive but essential tools usually came from Austria. 264
