Welfare implications of strategic economic policy in eastern Europe

This paper evaluates the welfare effects in a block of selected eastern European countries (Bulgaria, Romania, former Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland, and former Yugoslavia) emerging from the possibility to participate in the European integration process and to act as strategic players in dynamic games. The results of the cooperative and noncooperative dynamic game scenarios are compared with fixed policy solutions. The McKibbin-Sachs global model (MSG2 model), which incorporates rational expectations, is used as a framework. A global supply-side shock and a fixed exchange rate regime are considered under the alternative policy layouts. It is shown that international economic cooperation may be advantageous over noncooperation. For the anchor currency of the European Monetary Union (EMU), fixing the eastern European block currencies to the EMU may lead to significant destabilization.