About the wiiw BO Archives - wiiw Balkan Observatory

Shortly after the end of the Kosovo war, the last of the Yugoslav dissolution wars, the Balkan Reconstruction Observatory was set up jointly by the Hellenic Observatory, the Centre for the Study of Global Governance, both institutes at the London School of Economics (LSE), and the Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies (wiiw). A brainstorming meeting on Reconstruction and Regional Co-operation in the Balkans was held in Vouliagmeni on 8‑10 July 1999, covering the issues of security, democratisation, economic reconstruction and the role of civil society. It was attended by academics and policy makers from all the countries in the region, from a number of EU countries, from the European Commission, the USA and Russia. Based on ideas and discussions generated at this meeting, a policy paper on Balkan Reconstruction and European Integration was the product of a collaborative effort by the two LSE institutes and the wiiw. The paper was presented at a follow-up meeting on Reconstruction and Integration in Southeast Europe in Vienna on 12-13 November 1999, which focused on the economic aspects of the process of reconstruction in the Balkans. It is this policy paper that became the very first Working Paper of the wiiw Balkan Observatory Working Papers series. The Working Papers are published online at this website, the internet portal of the wiiw Balkan Observatory. It is a portal for research and communication in relation to economic developments in Southeast Europe maintained by the wiiw since 1999. Since 2000 it also serves as a forum for the Global Development Network Southeast Europe (GDN-SEE) project, which is based on an initiative by The World Bank with financial support from the Austrian Ministry of Finance and the Oesterreichische Nationalbank. The purpose of the GDN-SEE project is the creation of research networks throughout Southeast Europe in order to enhance the economic research capacity in Southeast Europe, to build new research capacities by mobilising young researchers, to promote knowledge transfer into the region, to facilitate networking between researchers within the region, and to assist in securing knowledge transfer from researchers to policy makers. The wiiw Balkan Observatory internet portal is a tool to achieve these objectives.

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GDN – SEE

Mario Holzner — Fri, 04 Mar 2011 12:24:58 +0000

The Global Development Network (GDN) is an International Organization of research and policy institutes promoting the generation, sharing and application to policy of multidisciplinary knowledge for the purpose of development. It was founded on the premise that good policy research, properly applied, can accelerate development and improve people’s lives. GDN’s approach to policy relevant research is a multidisciplinary one, in that efforts to address development challenges must be informed by knowledge based on a variety of methodological approaches.

Based on an initiative by The World Bank, the Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies started the Global Development Network Southeast Europe (GDN-SEE) project in January 2000 with financial support from The World Bank and the Austrian Ministry of Finance. Since 2002, the project is also supported by the Oesterreichische Nationalbank (Austrian Central Bank).
The purpose of the project is the creation of research networks throughout Southeast Europe in order
– to enhance the economic research capacity in South East Europe (SEE)
– to build new research capacities by mobilizing young researchers
– to promote knowledge transfer into the region
– to facilitate networking between researchers within the region (beyond country borders)
– to assist in securing knowledge transfer from researchers to policy makers.

In the first phase of the project (2000 – 2001) two research networks have been established, one dealing with the topic ” Prospects and policies for long-term development in Southeast Europe” and the other one ” Regionalism in Southeast Europe: Opportunities and Policies”. The second phase of the project started in 2002. It lasted until 2004 and consisted of four research areas: The path towards accession to the EU; Enterprise development and labour markets; Unilateral, bilateral and multilateral economic policy coordination; Understanding reform. In the third phase of the project in the period 2004 – 2006 the project had the following three research areas: Labour markets, migration ; FDI, trade, exchange rates; Foreign aid. The three research areas of the fourth phase of the project in the period 2007-2008 were: Inequality; Migration; Fiscal systems. The fifth phase of the project in the period 2009-2010 has specifically dealt with the issues of income distributions in transition countries with special interest in the role of fiscal redistribution. The sixth phase of the project in the period 2011-2013 has focused on the crisis effects and the related growth prospect, social impact and policy responses in SEE and CIS. In the seventh phase of the period 2014-2015 wiiw economists and research teams from the SEE region have been analysing the reasons for the lagging behind of Southeast Europe under the broad theoretical approach that can be characterised as that of the Austrian theory of development. This approach relies on the seminal work in development economics by Alexander Gerschenkron (the role of the state, firms and banks in pulling countries out of backwardness), Paul Rosenstein-Rodan (increasing returns and large scale infrastructure investment) and Albert Hirschman (induced industrialisation and its forward and backward linkages), accounting for a region’s development – or its failure.

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