CHRISTOPH BLUTH Visiting Professor, Centre for Euro-Asian Studies, University of Reading, and Professor of International Studies, University of LeedsSIMON BOOTH Director of Studies, Graduate Centre of International Business, University of ReadingJAN FRAIT Associate Professor, Department of Economics, Technical University of Ostrava, Czech RepublicAMY MYERS JAFFE Energy Research Coordinator, James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy, Rice UniversityMICHAEL KASER Emeritus Fellow, St Antony's College, University of Oxford OUMIRSERIK KASSENOV was the Director of the Institute for Strategic Studies under the President of KazakhstanMARTHA BRILL OLCOTT Senior Associate, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, and Professor of Political Science, Colgate UniversityRICHARD POMFRET Professor of Economics, University of AdelaideLUDEK RYCHETNIK Member of the Centre for Euro-Asian Studies, and former Lecturer at the University of ReadingGARETH M. WINROW Associate Professor, Department of International Relations, Istanbul Bilgi University

• Part 1 The politics of security in Euro-Asia: Euro-Asian conflicts and peacekeeping dilemmas; the "game" of security in Central Asia; a new great game in the Transcaucasus?; the geopolitics of Caspian energy. Part 2 The Euro-Asian economies in transition: modernization, neo-modernization and the transformation strategy; economic transition in the Czech Republic - a real success?; economic misconduct in Eastern Europe; economic transition in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan; Central Asian regional integration and new trade patterns.

'The transition of the central Asian and Caucasian republics of the former USSR to independent statehood and the development of market economies has proven to be a difficult and often destabilising process which calls for expert analysis. The diversity of the post-communist tradition process and the relatively unbalanced dislocation of political and economic links to the Russian Federation form the subject matter of this excellent volume of essays. Dr Kalyuzhnova and Dr Lynch have brought together expert, stimulating analyses which confirm the status of Reading University's Centre for Euro-Asian Studies as one of the premier academic institutes dealing with this region.' - Carol Cosgrove-Sacks, Director of Trade, UN / Economic Commission for Europe and Visiting Professor, College of Europe, Bruges 'Collecting the research output of the Centre for Euro-Asian Studies at the University of Reading, Dr. Kalyuzhnova and Dr. Lynch provide the reader with an extremely valuable and well-documented analysis of peacekeeping, security and economic transformation issues in the fascinating area that spreads from Central Europe to Kamtchatka. The coherence of the whole book resides in important similarities of all changes that have affected the very structure of politics, economics, identity and foreign policy in the post-Soviet world. Beyond the country differences in the process of nation building and a dramatic fragmentation of the region in security terms, the comparative analysis exhibits that, finally, neither shock therapy nor gradualism has guided transition in Euro-Asia. Instead, an empirical approach has emerged which is coined as 'incentive-conscious rent-seeking', including some 'economic misconduct'. The book is required reading for any eastward-looking student, academic or investor.' - Wladimir Andreff, Professor of Economics at the University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne and former President of the European Association for Comparative Economic Studies (1997-1998)