First year of transformation and the behaviour of state-run enterprises

This paper summarizes a year of empirical research on the adjustment patterns of Polish state enterprises. The research was undertaken by the Research Group on Enterprise Adjustment at the Gdansk Institute for Market Economics. The paper is in three main parts. In the first section we give a thumbnail description of the macro-economic performance of the Polish economy during 1990. The second section reviews the changes in the organizational, legal and sociological structures of state-run enterprises. The third section discusses the performance of state firms and challenges a number of stereotypes concerning their activity. We argue that small and medium-sized enterprises adjusted more dynamically to the changing environment than their larger counterparts and also that state enterprises which were under competitive pressure and operating on the consumer markets were significantly more active than other firms.