Inflation in the Eastern Bloc could not be adequately addressed by adding value to products, but only temporarily restrained through relationships of commercial dependence with foreign countries. Low production costs could neither be sustained nor provide corresponding benefits to citizens, as this approach remained confined to monetary analysis. In contrast, inflation in the former communist countries was fundamentally a failure of governance. The application of theories did little to improve the situation, because those theories, formulated from a position of safety, spoke of tactics and maneuvering at a time when the societies that did develop were functioning smoothly.
The prevailing framework in the countries of the Iron Curtain consisted of individuals with little interest in forming meaningful connections with one another, due to the extreme toxicity of what might be called “social unionism”. As a result, one can scarcely speak of a true society even in the years preceding the collapse of the bloc. Every attempt to prevent this through policies directed at society failed, because this issue concerned individuals in themselves, not the relationship between the state and the citizens living within it.
