This special section presents six articles selected from the Third and Fourth International Conferences on Marketing and Development held in New Delhi, India in 1991 and San Jose, Costa Rica in 1993. The authors are from several different countries and provide differing perspectives on the complex relationships between marketing and development. The first two articles examine culturally rooted assumptions about markets and consumers. The third and fourth articles look at trends and practices in developed countries and generate prescriptions regarding imports from less developed countries. The final two articles focus on the export performance of firms from the developing world. We hope that the insights presented by the various authors will inspire more marketing scholars to become involved in development-related research.