Honouring Ota Sik's economics, political life, and his social and humane concerns, this book brings together contributions from economists from East and West. It examines principally the evolution of different economic systems.

Sik's "Third Way" of economic reproduction and institutional change, Kurt Dopfer. Part 1 The interdisciplinary view: changing priorities, Jan Tinbergen; limitations to the interdependence of systems, Gehard Schwarz; economics, environment, and the Faustian imperative, Hans-Christoph Binswanger et al; systems reproduction in interdisciplinary perspective, Leonhard Bauer and Herbert Matis; why some reforms succeed, Gerhard O.Mensch; a cognitive-evolutionary theory of economic policy, Alfred Meier and Susanne Haury. Part 2 The evolution of market systems: evolution and stagnation of economic systems, Ernst Heuss; the self-organization of the economy, Michael Hutter; evolution and innovation, Jochen Ropke; waves in the long-term economic development, Rene Holtschi and Christian Rockstroh; plan, market and banking, A.Kregel; the market and the classical theory of prices, Bertram Schefold; some thoughts on plan and market, Alex Nove; an institutionalist view of the evolution of economic systems, Marc R.Tool. Part 3 The evolution of planning systems: socialist experience and Ota Sik's third way, Jiri Kosta; socialism as a socio-economic system, Branko Horvat; on the reformability of the Soviet type economic systems, Leszek Balcerowicz; strategic reappraisal and short-term adjustment - the external economic policy of socialist countries at the crossroads, Andras Inotai; the technological gap in the CMEA countries - missing incentives, Friedrich Levcik; innovation as the crucial problem of perestroika, Harry Maier; Gorbachev's "Radical Reform" and the future of the Soviet planning system, Hans-Hermann Hohmann; success and failure - emergence of economic reforms in Czechoslovakia, Tamas Bauer; the state of the debate on planning in Hungary, Jan Adam; the evolution of socialist economic theories and the strategic options of reform in China, Wu Jing Lian; the evolution of economic systems - a summary, Karl-Friedrich Raible.