With the entry of the United Kingdom into the European Economic Community on 1 January 1973, the opportunity presented itself for a study of open-end investment funds in the enlarged Community. The resulting book, which in a way is a natural sequel to the study Investment and Unit Trusts in Britain and America. (Elek: London, 1968), in which Dr Corner collaborated with Mr H. Burton, has been a long time in preparation, simply because of the sheer volume of statistical material- in particular, consistent sets of reports and accounts of all the EEC and Swiss investment funds - which has had to be collected. As a result, some of the analysis is based on what will inevitably be somewhat dated material at the time of publication. Unfortunately this is a handicap suffered by all such statistical work, unless one has large financial and manpower resources. We have done our best to update certain key statistics wherever this has been possible.