A Study of the Redevelopment of Private Enterprise in Poland: Conditions and Policies for Continuing Growth
通过1991-1992年在波兰三地的调查，分析了私营企业的现状、企业家背景、管理能力及增长障碍，探讨了在国有经济主导下，政府是否应采取更积极的政策支持中小企业发展。
The majority of companies in the developed economies of the West are small and medium-sized businesses. In the United States, for example, more than 90 percent of all business enterprises could be classified as small. These companies have generated most of the jobs in the last decade, while the Fortune 500 firms have generally been downsizing. Even more importantly, it was the smaller entrepreneurial companies that have been responsible for most of the business innovations during recent years. Small and medium-sized businesses constitute a critical part of the economies of most developed countries. In contrast, the command economies of Eastern Europe have had a structure that was the exact opposite of the West. Practically all employment and resources in these countries were concentrated in large state-owned enterprises. There were few, if any, small enterprises in existence. Thus, changing to a market economy system not only involves the privatization of the large state-owned companies, but also the formation and development of hundreds of thousands of small, privately owned business enterprises. The process of transforming the command economies of Eastern Europe began with macroeconomic stabilization programs. The restructuring and privatization of large state-owned companies along with banking reform have been identified as the next priority issue. Although the establishment of small, private firms became possible once legal and bureaucratic restrictions were removed, the government policy has essentially been to leave the private sector to its own devices. Given the importance of small and medium-sized businesses to the process of economic development, it would seem doubtful if a laissez-faire policy is the correct approach where small business has to struggle to reenter an economy in which state-owned companies still hold the commanding heights of political and economic power. The primary objective of this study was to determine the nature and condition of private enterprise in Poland. Data were collected via a written survey and private interviews with senior company executives in late 1991 and early 1992 in the Gdansk, Krakow, and Lodz regions of Poland. Gdansk and Krakow represent large Polish urban centers, while Lodz is typical of a former center of light industry undergoing restructuring and suffering from a high rate of unemployment. The companies selected had demonstrated continuous business activity for a period of six months, had a minimum of five employees, and had experienced at least some record of sales growth. The questions covered subjects such as the motivation and backgrounds of the entrepreneurs, their management capabilities, technological assessment, expansion plans, capitalization and financial performance, operations and marketing, and evaluation of government policies. The samples were selected from statistical populations ranging from 1,100 to 1,350 private companies in each region. The names, addresses, and profiles of the private firms were obtained from the tax office in Gdansk and the County Statistical Offices in Krakow and Lodz. The preponderance of private companies in Poland at this time were small, employing fewer than 20 persons. To insure sufficiently large samples of the larger companies, a stratified, random sampling process was used with stratification by size as determined by number of employees. It was necessary to send surveys to about 180 companies in each region in order to obtain complete responses from 100 companies per region because a number of firms were not located at the given addresses, some owners/managers were not available, or the entrepreneurs declined to participate in the study. These problems are characteristic of the difficulty in conducting small business surveys, regardless of the culture or stage of economic development of the country. In addition, interviews with senior executives of 10 companies in each of the three regions were conducted to collect additional detailed information necessary for a comprehensive evaluation of company strengths and weaknesses, as well as the perceived obstacles to company growth and success. …