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Another writer who has analysed recent Cypriot economie history is Rodney
Wilson 69 . Wilson's brief analysis of the effect of the various exogenous shocks on
Cypriot trade in 1985 was expanded in 1992, the former of which forms a chapter
in the latter. In the 1992 publication, he outlines three almost simultaneous shocks:
the subdivision of an already small economy, the second oil shock and the
disruption to its trading relations when its main trading partner (the UK.) joined the
EC. Having twice tackled essentially the same question: the effects of exogenous
shocks on the Cypriot economy, he has helped to highlight some important
questions for future research. A question that remains vague throughout the Wilson
research is the extent to which the war itself resulted in the restructuring of the
economy, the re-routing of trade, increases in productivity and economie
modernisation generally. What have been the changes in economie priorities and the
level of communal and inter-communal redistribution?. What has been the extent
and cost of rebuilding or constructing from scratch, and then (in most cases) running
two separate infrastructures 70 . What were the physical and sectoral costs of
relocating labour and what was the extent of strategie shortages, the extent and
effect of the so called "brain drain", i.e. the high levels of skilled workers who left
Cyprus in large numbers during and after the upsurges of violence? What
69 Wilson R. 1985. The Impact Of Exogenous Shocks Of 1974 Qn Cvpriot Trade. University Of
Durham, Centre For Middle Eastern & Islamic Studies, Economie Research Paper No. 13 and
Wilson 1992. op. cit.
70 Sewage, and now neurological health services in the Capital and to a lesser extent and more
controversially, water and electricity supplies are run on a pan-Cypriot basis. Most of these cooperative
ventures have more to do with external relations (funding and constitutional anomalies)
than locai pragmatism or economie rationality.
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