Economic Institutions and Economic Growth in the Former Soviet Union Economies

The aim of this paper is to assess the importance of economic institutions, measured by an index built from the E.B.R.D. (European Bank for Reconstruction and Development) indicators, for the pattern of economic growth. Though it focuses on a particular set of transition economies, it is also related to the literature on institutional development and economic growth. Indeed it draws on the literature on the economics of transition, looking at the breakdown of the U.S.S.R. as an extremely powerful “natural” experiment. From an empirical point of view, the study takes into consideration the period between 1991 and 2008 for fifteen countries, namely the Former Soviet Union economies, and is performed by means of a panel model. The first part of the econometric analysis sees our index as the only independent variable. A static model and a dynamic one are specified and different estimation techniques used. The second phase includes other covariates, among which the classical determinants of growth, to test whether the institutional environment, that is to say, the economic institutions index, maintains the magnitude and has a major impact on the pattern of economic growth.