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Innovation in State-owned Enterprises: Reconsidering the Conventional Wisdom

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  • Belloc, Filippo

Abstract

A very well established economic literature maintains that State-owned enterprises (SOEs) are inefficient comparatively to privately-owned ones (POEs). In this paper we argue that SOEs' inefficiency is not due to the State ownership per se, rather it is caused by some conditions other than ownership which SOEs often, but not necessarily, relate to. In particular, we focus on dynamic efficiency - specifically, the production of technological innovation - of SOEs in manufacturing industries, where SOEs should contend with POEs in a competitive environment. We suggest that targeted measures aimed at increasing managers' commitment to long-term investment strategies and at reducing corruption and political interference, though being complex and difficult to implement, can be much more (positively) incisive on long-run technical progress than the simple privatization of companies. This leaves room for exploration and implementation of policies that might reconcile State ownership and market competition in industrial sectors.

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  • Belloc, Filippo, 2013. "Innovation in State-owned Enterprises: Reconsidering the Conventional Wisdom," MPRA Paper 54748, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 01 Mar 2014.
    • Handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:54748
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    Cited by:

    1. Mario BENASSI & Matteo LANDONI, 2017. "State Owned Enterprises as Knowledge Explorer Agents," Departmental Working Papers 2017-13, Department of Economics, Management and Quantitative Methods at Università degli Studi di Milano.

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    Keywords

    State-owned enterprises; innovation; privatization.;

    JEL classification:

    • H11 - Public Economics - - Structure and Scope of Government - - - Structure and Scope of Government
    • L33 - Industrial Organization - - Nonprofit Organizations and Public Enterprise - - - Comparison of Public and Private Enterprise and Nonprofit Institutions; Privatization; Contracting Out
    • O31 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Innovation and Invention: Processes and Incentives
    • P12 - Economic Systems - - Capitalist Systems - - - Capitalist Enterprises

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