Book excerpt: The dramatic implosions of the centrally administered, non-democratic political systems in central and eastern Europe in the late 1980s have generated a body of research concerning the transition from public ownership, and the role of the market and other institutions in engendering good incentives for economic actors. The essays collected in this volume study property relations, their associated incentives and the consequent effects on welfare: the ubiquitous theme is that efficiency cannot be divorced from the distribution of productive assets.