Question

In the late 1980s and early 1990s many communist countries, such as Yugoslavia, Poland, Romania, and East Germany were suffering from weak economies. How might countries with free-market economic systems have influenced the revolutions that swept Europe in the late 1980s and early 1990s?

Answer 1

Countries with free-market economic systems influenced the revolutions that swept Europe in the late 1980s and early 1990s acting as "mirrors" or "models" upon which the revolutionary nations looked at themselves, seeking to compare their economies and quality of life. In other words, the free nations were the models that the citizens of the nations in revolution had: these revolutionaries sought to emulate the economic growth and political and social stability of these nations.