In vector optimization one investigates optimization problems in an abstract setting which have a not necessarily real-valued objective function. This scientific discipline is closely related to multi-objective optimization and multi-criteria decision making. This book contains refereed contributions to the International Conference on Vector Optimization held at the Technical University of Darmstadt from August 4-7, 1986. This meeting was an interdisciplinary forum devoted to new results in the theory, to applications as well as to the solution of vector optimization problems which are relevant in practice. Because of the great variety of topics covered by the contributions, the 25 articles of this volume are organized in different sections: Historical retrospect, mathematical theory, goal setting and decision making, engineering applications, and related topics. The papers of the invited State-of-the-Art Tutorials given by Professors J.M. Borwein, H. Eschenauer, W. Stadler and P.L. Yu are also included.