Ownership transformation in East-Central Europe in the pre EU-accession period. Inter-firm ties and control functions: The case of Poland.

Abstract

The Article focuses on the first period of political and socio-economic transformation in Poland (1989-2004) and describes the change in capital ownership links during the transition from a centrally planned to a free market economy. It constitutes an important research issue in the context of understanding the economic transformation in East-Central Europe, in particular the mechanisms of flow of foreign capital into certain areas in space. The processes have brought about a new organization of linkages between these realms, especially between large metropolitan areas. The spatial pattern of capital ownership links of large enterprises in Poland (1242 firms) is analyzed against the hierarchical structure of the national urban system. It is shown that in the process of inflow of foreign investments, the city of Warsaw has assumed a nodal position in the network of transnational and inward capital linkages, Spatial inter-firm ownership relations, as documented in the study are discussed and generalized in the form of a two-layer core-periphery model. The empirical results demonstrate how the foreign investments have contributed to the metropolization phenomena by fostering the position of the capital city as well as of other large urban centres.