Even before the end of the one-party system, both Hungary and Slovenia experienced systematic internal market reforms. After the abrupt political transition there has been a complete shift to a market economy. In Hungary, this had clear features of a neoliberal transformation; but in Slovenia an alternative path was taken, involving neo-corporatism with its Keynesian welfare correlates. Yet during the last decade, a new wave of radical neoliberal change has occurred in both countries. In this article, I compare the transformations in both countries, in order to identify the conditions underlying the neoliberal turn in each.