A central theme in this paper is that some of the most critical constraints in Asia to achieving larger farm production, the fruits of which are more equitably distributed, are beyond the control of individual farmers. If the field of farm management is to play an important role in improving me welfare of large numbers of poor Asian farmers, it must devote some of its analytic efforts to issues other than within-farm resource allocation as is characteristic of traditional western farm management. In particular, it must also examine factors exogenous to the farm, including those institutions and policies that control the access of operators of small farms and other groups o f poor people to the income streams from agriculture.