Lessons from the Failure of the Communist Economic System

Ladislov Rusmich received a B.A. from Moscow State Economic Institute in 1956, a Ph.D. from the Economic University of Prague in 1972, and was awarded the Dr.Sc. by the Czechoslovak Institute of Sciences in 1988. After serving in a number of industrial, economic administration and banking positions in Czechoslovakia, Dr. Rusmich became deeply involved in the economic and political reform efforts of the Prague Spring until the Russian Intervention of 1968. In 1967 he became Vice-Governor of the Czechoslovak State Bank, and was a member of the commission headed by Ota Sik to transform the Czechoslovak political-economic system to democracy and a market economy. He continued to be active in pursuing economic reform, especially after 1989, as an author and speaker at numerous international conferences. During the post-1989 period, he served as an economist at the Czech National Bank, until his retirement Stephen M. Sachs is professor emeritus of political science at IUPUI, where he taught from 1969 until 1992. He earned a BA from the University of Virginia in 1960, and A.M. and Ph.D. degrees in political science from the University of Chicago in 1962 and 1968. As an applied philosopher interested in democratic process and development, Professor Sachs served as Editor of Workplace Democracy from 1977-1986, and Senior Editor from 1986-1990. He was Welfare and Poverty Editor of the Policy Studies Journal from 1978-1982. He has been Coeditor of Nonviolent Change since 1986. Sachs has spent time in various countries in Eastern Europe, beginning in 1968. He undertook research into workers' self-management in Yugoslavia in 1972-1973, and studied the political and economic transformation of the Czech Republic, in Prague, while consulting with the Czech Federation of Trade Unions in 1995Rusmich, Ladislav is the author of 'Lessons from the Failure of the Communist Economic System' with ISBN 9780739105160 and ISBN 0739105167.