ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book addresses the priorities iterated endlessly by international development agencies and organizations active in the region, the multinational investors, and myriad observers. It shows the explicitly ideological nature of market activity. Engagement in the market is not a moral-free activity but given value through the political-economic context in which it operates. The book analyses the activities of women entrepreneurs in post-Soviet Azerbaijan and the changing social values that surround them. It presents an account of the basically outward-looking orientation of people involved in the introduction of a Western-type institution into Hungary, the fast-food restaurant. The book focuses on the issues raised by the institutional transformations brought about by, or necessary to, the operation of ‘the market’. It addresses the Euro-American concepts and values underlying the market reforms and development discourse.
