Chapter 19
Central and Eastern Europe
The Czech Republic
The Czech Republic
- Population Size: 10+ million
- Type of Government: Unitary Parliamentary
- Velvet Revolution: A revolution without bloodshed.
- Bohemia: Contains many resources and contains Czech's capital city Prague.
- Moravia: Too inefficient to compete in World Market.
- Challenge the country faces: Acid rain and industrial pollution destroyed forests.
Slovakia
- Independence: Became independent in 1993 when Czechoslovakia was divided.
- Population Size: 5+ million
- Collective Framing: Workers are being paid by the government and they share the profit from the products.
- Challenge the country faces: Their challenge deals with the economy.
Hungary
- Major ethnic group: Magyars
- Type of government: Non-communist government.
- Size of the country: Size of the state of Indiana.
- Country's nickname: "bread basket" of Europe
- Challenges the country faces: Unemployment, government in debt, and reducing government debt.
Romania
- Population Size: 23 million people
- Nicolae Ceausescu: Second leader, led nation to economic chaos, executed in 1989.
- Economic choas example: Energy was so scarce that television aired only 2 hours each day.
- American soft drink maker: Entrepreneurs have made small fortunes selling soft drinks in Romania.
- Multiplier effect: Eleven new jobs have been added to Romania's economy for each job that the soft drink company created.
- Challenges that the countries faces: Poverty.
Bulgaria
- Nickname: Garden of Eastern Europe
- Type of Government it once had: Communist, but now they have a democratic government.
- Challenges the countries faces: when they turned into a democratic government, their economy went into a tailspin.
Albania
- Population size: 3.5 million people
- Nickname: Europe's hermit
- Effect of isolation: Caused Albania to be one of the poorest nations in Europe.
- End of communism effect: Albania has received billions of dollars from foreign nations and from Albanians who relocated to live in other countries.
Yugoslavia
- Meaning of the name: Land of the southern Slavs.
- Effect of the communism ending: all that was left of Yugoslavia were the republics of Serbia and Montenegro.
- Why the country broke apart: The other Balkan Nations made themselves independent.
Serbia/Montenegro
- Physical Geography: Rugged peaks of Montenegro and the fertile plains and Serbia.
- Economic disaster: GDP reduced by half, unemployment raised, break up of Yugoslavia and wars that followed.
Croatia
- Population size: Nearly 5 million
- Conflict between the Croats and Serbs: The Serbs practice Eastern Orthodoxy and use the Cyrillic alphabet, whereas most Croats are Roman Catholics and use the Latin alphabet.
Slovenia
- Population: 2 million
- Impact of industry: Its solid industrial base, it would recover fast.
Bosnia/Herzegovina
- Independence: Yugoslav republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina declared itself independent in 1991.
- Conflict among peoples: Long-standing hostilities among different groups in Bosnia and Herzegovina erupted into war when Communist controlled ended.
- Resources: Iron ore and lead.
Macedonia
- Tensions among Greece/Albania: Complicated trade patterns and hampered the Macedonia economy.