Heft36 1 - SFB 580 - Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena

AUTOMOTIVE MNCS IN CENTRAL EUROPE
5
AUTOMOTIVE MNCS IN CENTRAL EUROPE:
THE ENTERPRISE AS A SOURCE OF COMPETI-
TIVE INDUSTRIAL CAPABILITIES
Employment stability based on the administratively
set output targets was a
key feature of state socialist production
regime. A shift from state socialism to market
economy in this context meant an adaptation
of employment and production numbers to
‘market demands’ and market prices. In market
economies, the volatility in product demand
can imply an increased ‘flexibility’ of production
and, thus, employment levels that could
endanger employment stability. Thus, with the
introduction of a market economic rationale,
state socialist non-economic enterprise institutions
have been challenged by the new logic of
market-driven efficiency and competitiveness.
The combination of private ownership, pressures
of international competition and the increased
role of cost efficiency were expected to
contribute to making enterprises focus more on
their economic competitiveness as the first and
dominant measure of enterprise performance.
page 80
Alexandra Janovskaia
State withdrawal from the production
process and the arrival of foreign owners were
associated with a larger focus on profitability,
the new desired field of managerial action. In
other words, these reforms characterised by a
strong purposeful rationality considered social
relations in the enterprise as means, not ends
of social action. However, this paper argues
that despite important institutional changes in
the structure of markets and firm ownership,
preserving industrial capabilities has remained
an enterprise norm for local actors, an end in
itself. Thus, an understanding of the enterprise
as a social organism and a source of industrial
capabilities remains alive. Despite the new
institutions of increased competition, the
expectation of an enterprise commitment to its
employees survived from state socialist era to