Introduction

Entrepreneurship and the development of small and medium enterprises is a key feature of market-based economies. This book is concerned with the nature and extent of entrepreneurship and small enterprise development in economies that were operating under the rules of central planning until less than 20 years ago. The second decade after the commencement of the process of market reform in these former socialist economies is an appropriate time to consider what has been achieved in terms of the development of entrepreneurship. A key question in this regard is the extent to which the forms of entrepreneurship that have occurred may be considered a distinct response to the specific external conditions that have existed. The answer has potentially important theoretical implications, in terms of the social embeddedness of entrepreneurship.