ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book focuses on the complex and evolving role of the 'donor community' in the new 'development partnerships' which are supposed to be in place within Comprehensive Development Frameworks. It also focuses on disparate, but important, aspects of international development. Ian Livingstone was a leading international development economist, and was cruelly taken from us while still at the peak of his powers when he died in September 2001 as the result of a brain tumour, just a month short of his 68th birthday. The book examines how Vietnamese state-owned enterprises have been restructured under the post-1986 doi moi economic reforms in order to make them more internationally competitive, and the consequences of that restructuring for their workers.
