Hungarian Studies Newsletter, 1986 (14. évfolyam, 47-50. szám)
1986 / 49. szám
HUNGARIAN STUDIES NEWSLETTER No. 49 ISSN: 0194-164X AUTUMN, 1986 Published quarterly by the Hungarian Research Center of the American Hungarian Foundation: Winter, Spring (two numbers included), and Autumn. Founder and editor: Bela Charles Maday; Managing editor: August J. Molnár. Communications concerning content should be addressed to the Editor, 4528-49th Street, N.W., Washington, DC 20016. Communications concerning subscriptions, advertising, and circulation should be addressed to American Hungarian Foundation, 177 Somerset Street, P.O. Box 1084, New Brunswick, N.J. 08903. Annual Subscription in the U.S.A. $6.00. Abroad $8.00. Current single copy $3.00; back isues $3.50 each. BOOKS (Continued) decisions on regional development has become an urgent and indispensable social requirement.” Figures and maps relating to selected years in the 1970s and in 1981 assist in illustrating spatial locations and orders of magnitude. Burger, Anna, FOOD ECONOMICS. Budapest: Akadémiai kiadó, 1985.237 pages, tables, diagrams, biblio, index. $24.00 cloth. This volume is actually a textbook for specialists of agricultural economics, and for the general reader interested in the principles and practices of socialist economies in Europe. The book presents a synthesis of Marxist and neoclassical views and is based on the author’s own research and on Hungarian and foreign achievements in this field. Agriculture is an important sector of the Hungarian economy. It engages almost 20% of the labor force, produces 16% of the national income, and about 22% of the total value of exports. With the exception of a few products, which cannot be grown under the country’s climatic conditions, agriculture satisfies the food demand of the population. Some 66% of the agricultural output is consumed domestically, the remainder produces foreign exchange through export. The nineteen chapters of the book deal with production, planning and financing of production and with marketing. They characterize the mainstream of Hungarian agricultural development, comparing it with world agriculture. Stress is given to the incentive system and of a more decentralized management system incorporating greater responsibility for agricultural capital, including land and for its productivity. The title of the book has been chosen rather than the more common “agricultural economics” because the volume also deals with some aspects of food processing and marketing i.e. the economic problems of the world, supply and demand, and with some aspects of the overall national economy providing a frame for the sectoral activity. The author is prof, at the Horticultural U. in Budapest. Donner, K.O.and L. Páleds., SCIENCE ANDTECHNOLOGY POLICIES IN FINLAND AND HUNGARY; a comparative study. Budapest: Akadémiai kiadó, 1985. 372 pages, tables, charts, illus. $29.00 cloth. Thiscollection of essays written by Finnish and Hungarian authors, received its inspiration from the Days of Hungarian Science in Finland in 1981. The basic ideas and concepts of these essays were developed and specified by working groups in the Hungarian and Finnish academies of sciences. The fundamental principles designed to assure a balanced presentation were issued to the 31 scientists, who contributed to the volume. One outcome of the learning process, which writing the volume certainly involved, was the realization of the similarities of many fundamental elements and a better understanding of the differences, which characterize the policy making process. The authors do not offer a panacea for present ills and admit that difficulties and differences cannot be totally removed. Both countries have their entrenched institutionalized policy concepts, and differences in data base, reflecting the differences of their respective socio-economic systems. Hann, C[hristopher] M. A VILLAGE WITHOUT SOLIDARITY; Polish Peasants in Years of Crisis. Yale University Press, 92A Yale Station, New Haven, CT 06520, 1985. ix + 208 pages, tables, brief bibliography, extensive notes, illus. $15.95 cloth. This book is about the Polish peasantry’s role in the continuing social-economic crisis that plagued Poland for a good many years. It tries to inform the reader about the nature of Polish socialism and society at grassroot level. The book may be of interest to Hungarianists mainly, because of the comparative method applied to various actors and events related to the village in which the author conducted fieldwork for over one year (Wisfok, in Southern Poland) and the village he has thoroughly researched for an equally long period in central Hungary (Tázlár: a Village in Hungary, Cambridge U. Press, 1980.) “Hungary’s overall success with collectivization results from stimulating high levels of production on small, family managed plots. The comparison with Poland may be especially constructive, as the social structure of these states were fairly similar at the onset of the socialist period.” Central to the present monograph is the emergence of a new community in the socialist period. In both, the Tázlár and Wisfok studies, “the solidarity of the community could not been taken for granted as a legacy of the pre-socialist past.” The author states that in Hungary there is much less private property than in Poland, but Hungary makes much fuller use of market incentives, lacking in Poland. He then tries to answer the question: “Is Poland less of a socialist society than Hungary?” The author is research fellow at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, England. For report on his Tázlár book, see, HSN no. 26. p. 1. Köves, András, THE CMEA [Council of Mutual Economic Assistance] COUNTRIES IN THE WORLD ECONOMY: Turning Inwards or Turning Outwards. Budapest: Akadémiai kiadó, 1985. 248 pages, tables, biblio, index. $26.00 cloth. This book discusses the relationship between socialist economies and the world economy. Chapters 1 to 3 try to outline the historical setting from which the dilemma between “active economic policy” vs. “seclusion” developed. Chapters 4 to 10 deal with East-West trade since the early 1970s, including a survey article under the title of “Hungary and the changes in the world economy. "Chapters 11 and 12, discuss the Soviet Union’s role in East-West trade. Chapter 11 also discusses problems of Soviet - U S. economic relations. Chapter 13 focuses on the international division of labor, cooperation, and joint ventures. Finally, chapter 14 analyzes the CMEA, the Common Market, and some problems of European East-West trade, as well as discrimination in practice, the impact of the Common Market on East-West trade, and negotiations with it. The author identifies new trends in East-West relationships, and by examining the 2 No. 49. AUTUMN 1966, HUNGARIAN STUDIES NEWSLETTER
