It is because of the Bata Shoe Company's long association with Eastern Europe that I approached Thomas G. Bata for this interview. Bata, the chairman of Bata Limited (the Management Company) describes how, after having seen its assets expropriated by the Nazis and subsequently by the Communists, his company returned to its roots in Czechoslovakia in the early 1990s. Bata then shares his personal perspectives on the current and future climate for private enterprise and family business in some of the key former Warsaw Pact countries. He ends with some thoughts on opportunities for western consultants and family businesses in Eastern Europe.