This volume is devoted to the central themes in Iván Szelényi 's sociological oeuvre, comprising empirical explorations and their theoretical refinement over the last 50 years. The contributors take interpretive and critical stances on his work, successfully clarifying the relevance of his insights. Taken together, their writing describes Szelényi 's rigorous scholarship as grounded in a complex program for the political economy of socialisms and post-socialist capitalisms, and introduces him as a neoclassical sociologist whose research projects continue to investigate inequalities created by the interaction of markets and redistributive structures in various societies. The volume includes a conclusion by Iván Szelényi, wherein he responds to the reflections presented by the book 's contributors.

Contributors include: Dorothee Bohle, Tamás Demeter, Gil Eyal, Béla Greskovits, Michael D. Kennedy, Tamás Kolosi, Karmo Kroos, Victor Nee, David Ost, Iván Szelényi, and Bruce Western.