05/13/91

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Shultz encourages Eastern Europe's quest for freedom

STANFORD -- George P. Shultz on Friday, May 10, urged the people of Central and Eastern Europe to face the future and continue their quest for free government and privatized enterprise.

"Get a compass in front of you and put the weathervane behind you," the former secretary of state said in final remarks at the "Out of the Red: Economic Transitions in Central and Eastern Europe" conference at the Hoover Institution May 8-10.

Shultz, a distinguished fellow at the Hoover Institution and Parker Professor of International Economics at Stanford's Graduate School of Business, made his comments during a two-hour internationally televised conference.

A distinguished panel of experts that included Nobel laureates Milton Friedman and George Stigler, Shultz and senior- level government officials from six countries of Central and Eastern Europe discussed politics and economics, privatization, and financial markets and currency convertibility.

In his remarks, Shultz said that economic growth and a guiding set of economic and political principles are critical elements in the transformation.

"The key is not to worry about dividing the pie as it exists now, but how you can increase the size of the pie," he said. "Instability is set up when you have open, free, democratic political institutions without having open, free economic institutions."

Shultz added that instability also results when free economic institutions are linked with non-democratic political systems.

"Ultimately, (in the discussion of Eastern Europe) we must look at the importance of people," he said. "We must look at the talent, how educable the people are, how much they can bring. And I think they can bring a lot."

Broadcast over PBS' Adult Learning Satellite Service to universities and businesses in the United States, Canada, and Mexico, the session also was made available to large audiences in Central and Eastern Europe through WorldNet television.

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