This title was first published in 2001: Exploring the relationship between the recession and labour supply in Kazakhstan during the 1990s, this volume develops an innovative new model of the transitional process in the context of the CIS. It departs from conventional economic models explaining the process of transition, transferring the focus of attention from labour demand to labour supply with a view to clarifying how the transitional recession has affected households and, in turn, how these changes modified the supply of labour. Paolo Verme examines how the dynamic of the reallocation of labour between state and private enterprises has been drastically altered by the growth of self-employment and also takes a much-needed look at the contribution of other factors, offering an original explanation of this most important economic phenomenon.

’In this book Paolo Verme offers a powerful new analysis and interpretation of developments in the Kazakh labour market since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Using previously unpublished data and new empirical research, he demonstrates that the transition in Kazakhstan has been from a planned economy not to a market economy of the first world but more to a market economy of the third world, where the dual labour market and the informal sector are the key to understanding developments. Paolo Verme is the most knowledgeable and authoritative economist working on the Kazakh labour market, and his analysis should be of key interest to all concerned with the problems of labour markets in the transition.’ Richard Jackman, Professor of Economics, London School of Economics

Paolo Verme, Dr, Consultant with World Bank, European Union and Asian Development Bank and The London School of Economics and Political Science, UK. The author is a development economist who has been working over the past ten years for various organisations including the World Institute for Development Economics Research, The