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last bulwark of economic as well as political stability in the Balkans, inthe Black Sea area and in the Middle East region of today 39 .Despite its successes, Turkey stili has many problems. However,compared with the famous Sick Man of Europe, it may not be an exaggerationto characterize the achievements of the Turkish Republic throughoutits 75 years of existence as the Turkish miracle. In these decades, despitea population grovvth from around 10 to almost 68 million, lifeexceptancy increased more than 50 percent and educational indicatorsshovv strong uniform improvement ever since the foundation of the Republic.An adequate appraisal of the economic performance of Turkeythroughout this period, vvhich enabled these and other deep-rootedachievements in many areas of social development, hovvever, cannot beconfıned to the narrovv context of allocative efficiency. Such an assessmentdeserves the broader perspective as developed in the seminal vvorkof Douglass North by applying the concepts of path dependence andadaptive efficiency. It thus remains a majör task for the economic historiansof Turkey to integrate the Turkish experience into ongoing internationalresearch on the issues of "why do economies once on a path ofgrowth or stagnation tend to persist?" and "how to create adaptive efficiencyin the short run?". The progress of research on these issues promisesnot only to assert the extraordinary adaptive efficiency of the Turkisheconomy and society as the most outstanding developmental asset of thecountry on the threshold of the 2İst century. Future research vvork in thisarea vvill also reveal the eminent value of Atatürk's program of culturalevolution as the main impetus of this adaptive efficiency extending eveninto the 2İst century.39. See John Barham, "Basking in Asia's Stıadovv. Emerging Market Turbulence hasPlaced the Country in a More Positive Light", Financial Times Survey: Turkey, FinancialTimes, 23.06.1998, p. 14.772