ABSTRACT
Up to J. V. Stalin's death the foreign trade of Socialist countries was dominated by national autarkic ambitions. The institutional framework in foreign trade is vastly different from that in a typical capitalist economy, in each Socialist country, there is a State foreign trade monopoly 'made necessary by the political nature of international exchanges and by the specific needs of the Socialist economy'. The actual foreign trade activities are, exclusively or mostly, carried on by specialized foreign trade corporations. The regional distribution of the Socialist countries' foreign trade is presented in a historical setting. Common ideology, geographical proximity and the difficulty of earning foreign exchange in capitalist countries have favoured mutual trade. In market economies, exchange rates normally relate domestic to foreign prices, and they roughly indicate the purchasing power of the national currency in terms of foreign currencies. Socialist countries have always suffered from shortages of foreign exchange.
