The three major themes of Janos Kornai's work reflected in the title of this book--planning, shortage, and transition, or transformation--figure prominently in the essays. After a philosophical introduction by Edmond Malinvaud, the book is divided into three sections: Markets and Organizations, Theory of Transition, and The Transitional Experience.Janos Kornai is one of the world's leading experts on the economics of socialism and transition. An early advocate of reform in Hungary, he has written penetrating analyses of centrally planned economies and their transformation to market-oriented systems. This volume is being published in celebration of Kornai's seventieth birthday.Contributors : Abram Bergson, Sharad Bhandari, Bernard Chavance, Mathias Dewatripont, Jacques Dreze, Michael Ellman, Richard Ericson, Istvan R. Gabor, Paul Hare, David M. Kemme, Janos Kollo, Georges Korsun, Mari Lacko, Marie Lavigne, Edmond Malinvaud, Bela Martos, Eric S. Maskin, Peter Murrell, Yingyi Qian, Richard Quandt, John Roemer, Gerard Roland, Jeffrey Sachs, Andras Simonovits, Robert Solow, Wim Swaan, Jorgen Weibull, Martin Weitzman, Wing Thye Woo, Chenggang Xu.