Providing an important overview of the growing diversity in modern socialist economies, this collection contrasts economic developments in the Soviet Union, Hungary, Poland, Yugoslavia, China, and Cuba. On the basis of empirical country studies, the authors analyze the institutional setting, economic policies, and performance of each country for the first half of the 1980s and assess the prospects for the years ahead. They examine the factors behind the success or failure of each economy and discuss the main conflicts facing today’s socialist economies. This thorough evaluation provides a useful comparative view of the pressures and constraints of systemic changes in different types of socialist economies.