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At the beginning of the 1990s, the Polish economic situation was extremely difficult: high public debt, shortages, high inflation and more than 8,000 state-owned enterprises (SOEs) waiting to be restructured and/or privatised; along with a GDP per capita lower than in Ukraine.

This chapter provides an overview of the Polish economic transition, and presents the results of this process, taking into account four aspects of the changes, i.e. stabilisation, liberalisation, institutional reforms and privatisation. Special attention is paid to intentionally unfinished privatisation and the still significant role of state-owned enterprises, which have remained important economic agents.

Critical analyses were made of the literature dedicated to the economic transition and of the role and characteristics of state-owned enterprises. Empirical evidence is drawn from original datasets about the scale of SOEs in the contemporary economy and rotations in management and supervisory boards in Polish joint-stock companies.

Despite the unfavourable initial conditions, Poland soon emerged as a leader in economic growth, successfully stabilising, liberalising and privatising its economy. The institutional foundations of a democratic market economy were consistently built, and the applications for membership in the OECD, the EU and NATO were an important driver of institutional reforms. In terms of state institutions, political and economic freedom and quality of governance, Poland is more similar to the G7 countries than to the other post-socialist countries, though the need to maintain high-quality state institutions is still a priority. The significant share of SOE is regarded as a challenge of the Polish economy because state-owned enterprises are an object of rent-seeking by politicians and political parties.

This article seeks to examine the strategic options open to transition economies in Central and Eastern Europe in the face of intense competition in two highly sensitive economic sectors within the EU.

This exploratory paper makes use of cross‐country case analysis.

The investigation demonstrated that protective mechanisms are used in veiled fashion to some degree even amongst the more economically advanced members of the EU and not just the transition economies as commonly perceived. It further argues that whilst a free and open EU will contribute to the quicker full realisation of its common market aspirations, transition economies are currently not adequately prepared for its required economic adjustments. Transition economies may need to respond in measured phases, taking into account its economic and political limitations. Otherwise, it might not be able to withstand the full onslaught of globalisation.

This research challenges the one size fits all notion of zealous free marketers and offers a middle ground strategic option for transition economies in the EU for further evaluation by policy makers and academics alike.

This research uses two highly economic sectors in the EU to argue for a more middle ground strategic economic strategy for transition economies in Central and Eastern Europe. This contrasts with the more global agenda of liberal economics.

The purpose of this paper is to explore financial quality problems, based on the dynamics of the ownership structure, in the privatization process to clarify the internal relation among the ownership’s attribution of the commercial mixed ownership company, the company’s performance and its financial relationships. This paper also examines the mixed ownership enterprise’s potential problems during the development process.

Adopting the single case study method, the authors selected the mixed ownership public company Hubei Sanxia New Building Materials Co., Ltd. (stock code: 600293) to explore, from a privatization perspective, the impact of mixed ownership on financial quality.

The study found that Sanxia experienced tight cash flow and heavy debt burdens due to the privatization and that its controlling shareholders used non-operating income to support Sanxia, thus characterizing the dual role of “the grabbing hand” and “the helping hand.” Sanxia’s privatization process highlighted the volatility of performance, the exception of monetary funds and the existence of accounting fraud rather than the prosperous development of the capital combination.

These findings provided case support that privatization negatively affects the financial quality of the company. Previous studies have indicated that there should be greater focus more on the issue that state-owned shares rebound during the process of privatization and that, with respect to commercial mixed ownership reform of state-owned enterprises, such reform must avoid the passive transfer of corporate control, ensure the fairness of the related transactions, prevent the loss of state-owned assets and preclude the controlling shareholders from seizing interests of listed companies.

Two factors explain why the Serbian privatization experience deserves close attention from outside world. First, Serbia's starting conditions for privatization, with a historical tradition of workers’ management, strong trade unions, and an ambivalent initial attitude toward privatization, have as much in common with circumstances surrounding privatization in the developing countries as with those in the so-called economies in transition. Second, Serbia embarked on a resolute privatization path only in 2001, following more than 10 years of diverse privatization efforts in other post-socialist economies of the region. This makes Serbia a perfect case study of how a country can learn from the experience (both positive and negative) of other reformers.

Since the core issue of Chinese economics is to elucidate the logical relationship between socialism and the market economy, it necessitates a robust foundation for microeconomic analysis to uncover the behavioral patterns and characteristics of microeconomic agents in a socialist market economy and identify the conditions and methods for the functioning of market mechanisms.

The core issue of microeconomics with Chinese characteristics is to identify the economic logic of how market mechanisms play a decisive role in resource allocation under the basic socialist economic system based on China's reform.

The core issue in building the foundation of microeconomic analysis of Chinese economics is addressing the compatibility issue between SOEs and a market economy.

In the author’s view, this can be achieved under the logic of classified reform so as to build the microeconomic foundation for the effective functioning of a socialist market economy.

This chapter is intended to provide the reader with information and insights on the transition or transformation from socialism to a market economy in what are generally termed the transition economies. This includes countries in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), sometimes referred to as the Former Soviet Union (FSU), the South East European (SEE) countries, sometimes referred to as the Balkans and the major socialist economy of Asia, China. The chapter covers the critical years of reform for most of these countries, from 1990 to 2000. Some transition economies started reforming earlier, such as China which has continued state-owned enterprise (SOE) reforms to the present time. Other transition countries, primarily the SEE economies, lagged due to the conflict which raged throughout most of the region and the period of isolation which followed, particularly for Serbia. China and Serbia are sui generis for a number of reasons. They will be referenced as examples in this chapter, but they will not form part of the core statistical and data analysis.

Privatization has been a widely researched topic in the literature, both at the cross-country level as well as at the level of individual countries. However, the issue of partial privatization – where an entity is publicly listed although the government remains the controlling owner – has not been adequately discussed in the literature. The purpose of this paper is to employ data on Indian state-owned banks during 1992-2010 to explore the timing and intensity of privatization. Contextually, the authors also explore several associated hypotheses, such as the behavior of lending relationships by these banks and executive compensation.

Given the hypotheses being discussed, the authors use suitable methodology relevant to the hypothesis. Accordingly, the authors employ proportional hazard models to address the timing issue and the Tobit model to determine the factors impacting the intensity of privatization. As regards lending relationships, the authors employ ordered logit and Poisson regression models. Finally, the issue of executive compensation is addressed using OLS regression.

The evidence appears to suggest that smaller, riskier banks with higher levels of over-staffing are likely to be privatized at an early date. Among the political factors, the findings suggest that both the timing of elections as well as the fragmentation of the coalition impacts the timing of privatization. Regarding lending relationships, the analysis indicates that it is typically the large banks that act as the main bank for both foreign and state-owned firms. Finally, the evidence lends credence to the fact that bigger well-capitalized banks with smaller boards pay higher compensation.

How far do economic and political factors play a role in impacting the timing of partial privatization of state-owned banks remains an open empirical question. There is also admittedly limited evidence as to how bank-specific and political factors influence the intensity of privatization. Judged thus, to the best of the knowledge, this is one of the few studies to examine these issues within a coherent empirical framework for a leading emerging economy.

An estimated 52% of Pakistan’s population is under the age of 25, and like their counterparts elsewhere around the globe, Generation Z in Pakistan was born into a world overrun with technology, Internet, and social media. This generation of consumers possess information processing ability that is much faster than any other generation. Generation Z consumers in Pakistan are active users of social media platforms connecting with local and international users, brands and exchanging information, photos, videos, ideas, and opinions with people inside and outside Pakistan. To develop insights into the consumption patterns, preferences, attitudes, and preferences of this segment of consumers, this chapter provides an overview of cultural and social values underpinning consumption choices and social media preferences. The chapter identifies and discusses the dynamic nature of Generation Z in Pakistan by identifying some of its defining features: the generation consists of confident, able, and multilingual consumers who are largely collectivists in orientation but shows strong individualistic tendencies. Such consumers have a global outlook and actively seek engagement with brands via digital platforms and influencer marketers expecting authenticity, respect, and equality. The chapter discusses work-related implications such as the need for providing transformational leadership and training programs to harness the intellectual skills of Generation Z in Pakistan. The chapter concludes by identifying and discussing issues relevant to handling Generation consumers in Pakistan including effective marketing strategies.

The distribution of state property to the private sector has always been and will continue to be intensely political. Relinquishing hiring, production, investment, and other enterprise decisions constitute a significant loss of potential rents to those who exercise control rights in state-owned enterprises. Additionally, the large transfer of wealth that privatization on a large-scale entails, combined with the potential for unemployment, loss of access to enterprise-based social services (which were substantial in state-socialist economies) threatens to undermine public support for privatization and reform in general.

The main purpose of this paper is to approach the legal problems of mass privatisation in Poland. The authors present the structure of national investment funds which intend to be the experimental financial intermediaries in Poland. Their assets are quoted on the Stock Exchange in Warsaw from the beginning of May 1997. New and controversial roles of management firms are discussed in this paper.