The general theme of Volume 24 is the impact of, and reaction to, the spread of market systems and market liberalization by local communities. Part I examies cases in which migration has opened new market and entrepreneurial opportunities to local populations. Part II contains cases that describe ethnographically the impacts the oil industry market has had on towns of Louisiana's Gulf coast. The essays of Part III concern themselves with community repercussions that recent neoliberal market policies have had, while Part IV contains papers that analyze the process in which values of products and services are defined economically, culturally and politically in the context of developing markets and commoditization.