In this volume practitioners and theorists from East and West assess the results of four years of transformation in Eastern Europe. In a general assessment of the stabilisation policies pursued, some authors take a critical view of the ‘conventional’ monetary and fiscal restrictive programmes which have helped to bring down inflation and to introduce elements of the market economy, but have also left the economies concerned with heavily reduced output and real incomes. An evolutionary strategy of structural transformation, and demand management should play a primary role in recovery from the ‘transformational recession’. Further issues discussed are the reform of the financial sector; liberalisation of foreign trade; privatisation and restructuring; and the social aspects of transformation.