This special issue addresses many of the more salient aspects of municipal finance. Colin Blaydon and Steven Gilford survey a number of social and economic issues that lie at the heart of any attempt to deal meaningfully with the current urban crisis. Donna Shalala and Carol Bellamy focus on the state's attempts to meet the financial emergency faced by New York City in 1975. Jan Lodal examines the necessity for reform in municipal financial information systems and suggests several ways in which these systems might be improved. Lawrence King's article describes the most recent federal effort to bring about an orderly distribution of the assets of a municipality for which all preventive measures have failed. The unique characteristics of the municipal securities market and the reaction of that market to the prospect of large-scale default are the subject of an article by John Petersen, Robert Doty, Ronald Forbes, and Donald Bourque. C. Richard Johnson and Robert Wheeler discuss the obligations and possible liabilities of bond counsel. Manly Mumford examines the use and abuse of "advance refunding." Three student articles on municipal securities and the city's relationship to creditors round off the volume. (Author/IRT)