About the Author

Carsten A Holz is Associate Professor in the Social Science Division of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. He has published widely on financial issues in China, including central and commercial banking, rural finance, and enterprise profitability, as well as on the reliability of Chinese statistics. In 2002, he was awarded the Gordon White Prize for the most original article or research report published in The China Quarterly in 2001.

After decades of declining profitability, China's industrial state-owned enterprises appear obsolete. This book relies on extensive data and quantitative analysis to examine the reasons for the decline in profitability, to ascertain their current profitability patterns across various dimensions, and to account for any profitability gap with enterprises in other ownership forms. Recent reform measures are evaluated. A differentiated picture emerges which makes past developments comprehensible and illuminates the prospects of the reform of industrial state-owned enterprises in China.

Contents:

• Explaining the Reform Period Decline in Industrial SOE Profitability:
• Tracing the Decline in Industrial SOE Profitability Through the Profit and Loss Account
• The Impact of Competition and Labor Remuneration on Profitability
• The Impact of the Liability–Asset Ratio on Profitability
• Industrial SOE Profitability in Perspective:
• SOEs versus Non-SOEs
• Profitability Across Industrial SOEs
• Recent Industrial SOE Reform Policies

"In this hugely detailed and statistically sophisticated volume, the author looks at industrial state-owned enterprises (SOEs) over the reform period and shows that there is reason to be optimistic about their performance. This marshalling of data and application of sophisticated analytical methods make this an original and important book ... The author has clearly made a very important contribution to our understanding of SOE performance and the fact that in terms of profitability they have done much better than commonly thought."

"It should prove useful for anyone who wants an interpretation of the relative performance of SOEs and non-SOEs over time and the privatization debate which differs from the mainstream perspective. A strength of the book lies in the fact that it gives a good overview of the literature on industrial SOEs and has a useful account of reform initiatives in the late 1990s which aimed to increase industrial SOE profitability ... this book is a very useful addition to the literature on China's experience with reforming its state-owned sector."

“This comprehensive and well-researched book should be essential reading for scholars of contemporary industrial SOEs in China. It makes a welcome, thought-provoking, and refreshing contribution to the literature.”