The defence industry was one of the pillars of the command economy system in East Central Europe. After the end of the cold war the sector went through dramatic changes: it was radically downsized, reorganized and restructured according to the needs of the emerging new socio-economic systems. One of the major factors that shaped this adjustment was the enlargement of NATO and the European Union and the prospect of integration into these two organizations. The military establishments and defence industries became principal actors in the integration process, which helped them to acquire political legitimization and new economic resources. At the same time, integration presented unexpected challenges and constraints for the region's restructuring defence industry. This book presents a comparative analysis of the defence industries of six East Central European countries-Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Romania and Slovakia-describing how they adjusted to the changed political and economic environment in both the domestic and international contexts. After the cold war, arms makers in East Central Europe found themselves confronting a situation like that faced by many of today's industrial producers: a drastic change of the economic, political and social environment. Their experiences provide valuable lessons for governments and companies in the post-2008 global economy.
Reviews:
"(…) the first authoritative account of the adjustments in the East Central European defence industries in response to the changed political and economic environment of the post-Cold War era. (…) Yudit Kiss provides unique insights into the different strategies adopted by the countries ..(…)"
Henrik Heidenkamp , Royal United Services Institute, The RUSI Journal, , 160:2, 27 Apr 2015
"(…) a positive and important characteristic of Kiss' research and narrative ability is the entwining of historical and current economic and defence factors. (…) Kiss' work is a tremendous and remarkably well-constructed resource. Her analysis of arms transformation in Eastern Europe is not only highly useful for analysts, but is timely and relevant as well."
Nathaniel L. Moir, SUNY, University of Albany, Journal of Common Market Studies , Volume 53, Issue 6, November 2015.
The defense industry in East Central Europe. Restructuring and conversion, Oxford University Press, 1997
This study charts the development of the defense industries of the Visegrad countries--Czechoslovakia and its successor states, the Czech Republic and Slovakia; Poland; and Hungary. In the first part, national case studies underline the different approaches to reform adopted in the individual countries. The second part uses unique information derived from extensive interviews at enterprises in each of the four countries to examine the transformation of industry from a producer perspective.
Reviews:
“Yudit Kiss is a hard-working, perceptive and gently intrepid analyst of the political economics of our times. Her subject here (..) are the difficulties of the transformation of the arms industry from a command economy to a market economy system in four typical countries. (..) What she found is worthwhile to ponder and worry about. “
András Bródy, Buksz, Summer, 1998
"Highly descriptive, it provides good background information for historians, security theorists and comparativists alike ... What makes this book a 'pioneer' attempt is the research approach ... the methodological approach and the spelling-out of statistical difficulties is an important scholarly finding ... the book is an eye-opener and invites a serious reality-check."
Georgeta V. Pourchot, Center for Strategic and International Studies, Washington DC, European Security, Vol 7, no 3, Autumn 1998.
Yudit Kiss, The defense industry in East Central Europe. Restructuring and conversion. A review.
Hiromasa Nakayama, PRIME, International Peace Research Institute, Meiji Gakuin University, 13 July 1999
“Yudit Kiss gives a lucid description and analysis of this complex problem.”
Janos Matus, Defense analysis, Vol.15. No.2. Aug 1999
“She does, however, underline that ‘conversion is not a technical matter but one that requires changes in thought patterns and behavior to truly democratic policy making’ and her analysis reveals deficiencies in these respects as the main cause of the general failure with regard to conversion of the arms industries.”
NOD & conversion, Copenhagen Centre for Peace and Conflict Research at the University of CopenhagenBack to selected academic publications