ABSTRACT
Interest in entrepreneurial behaviour in Europe's peripheral rural areas is growing as the European Union moves from a focus on supporting agricultural production to recognizing that rural economic development is now more complex. Entrepreneurship is at the heart of the post-socialism changes in Eastern Europe. It is an important source of job creation and new career opportunities for both men and women. In the early stages of the transition for most countries of Eastern Europe, with the exception of Hungary, women were proportionately more likely to be unemployed than men and to remain out of work for longer. In the western border area of Hungary this largely involves women brought in from the Ukraine, Belarus and Romania to work as prostitutes, while on the eastern border in addition to foreign prostitutes, Romanians of both sexes are present as traders and agricultural workers. Self-employment may offer the flexibility needed by many women in order to combine their productive and reproductive work.
