Reforming Asian Socialism examines the process of transition from a centrally planned economy to a market economy, focusing on the development of new institutions and how markets are being created where they did not exist before.

Aspects of the reform process in China and Vietnam are examined. Poland and the Ukraine are used as comparisons, as is North Korea, a country that has not begun to reform. Because China's reforms started in the late 1970s, a decade or more before any other communist country (except Vietnam) began to change, the Chinese economy is examined closely.

Some fascinating experiments in novel institutional forms have occurred in Chinese rural industry: firms that have highly unusual ownership structures by comparison with textbook models and Western market-economy practice have proven to be remarkably successful. China serves as a useful laboratory for the study of transition processes.