Poland's Enterprise Environment - A Polish View
The paper briefly presents environment for business in Poland as of the end of the year 2005. A few comments, however, on its evolution in the course of the transition period are also made. The paper broaches administrative, legal and financial requirements to start and run business activities by both natural and legal persons. In addition, it presents government support schemes for investors. A brief description of the scope of the grey economy and corruption completes the picture of the business environment. The topic has been approached from the foreign investors perspective. Although foreign in-vestors are subject to the same laws as domestic (Polish) ones, in a limited number of cases they are treated differently than the latter. These cases, and specifically land purchase and employment of foreign citizens, are reviewed.
Barriers to Entry and their Impact on Private Sector Growth in Poland
At the beginning of transition Poland was already far ahead of other former socialist countries with regard to the role of the private sector in the economy. For example, Polish farmers were never deprived of their land, as it was the rule in other countries under the communist regime.1 With 4 million people self-employed and employed in private farms Poland was unique amongst countries embarking on the road from a “planned” to a market economy. Outside agriculture, a further 1.8 million people worked in private companies, constituting 13.3% of employment in non-agricultural enterprises.
Comparative Industrial Sociology and the Convergence Hypothesis
Industrial sociology grew spectacularly after World War II, concentrating on three areas: workers' relations with each other, their managers, and their unions; the social organization of the factory; and the impact of technology on social systems extending from the factory to the society. Unable to sus­ tain leadership in all of these areas, industrial sociology shrivelled as other fields invaded its domains. Human relations became the ideological property of the business schools; labor economics maintained its grip on industrial relations; industry-community relations waned as interest in community power soared; industrial organizations were absorbed into the study of com­ plex organizations; occupational sociology maintained research impetus in labor force analysis; and the sociology of the economy dominated the study of industry's institutional relationships. Industrial sociology survived on remnants: worker-machine relationships (job satisfaction, alienation, un­ employment), organizational responses to technological changes. and a bit of working-class ethnology. Enduring interest in technology, however, en­ abled industrial sociology to take part in sociology's expanding interest in comparative studies.