Corporate Governance Formation in Poland, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, and Ukraine

This paper presents a cross-country comparative study of corporate governance forma-tion in four transition countries that differ significantly in the reform design, implementation, and outcome. The analysis showed that corporate governance formation in these countries is characterized by both similarities and differences. Similarities originate first of all from the common features of the historical background of these countries, the features of centrally planned economy; from the similarities of the principles of the reform programs; and from similarities of certain basic, objective regularities of the post-Communist transition. Such common features include, e.g., highly insiderized initial ownership patterns, high role of man-agers, high ownership concentration, dual trends of ownership structures' evolution towards concentration and outsiderization, and many others. The differences originate, among others, from the specific features of the countries' historical, cultural, and institutional heritage, the soundness of the reform design and implementation, the main characteristics of the enter-prise sector, the quality of the legal base and enforcement mechanisms. Countries that had more favorable "background" (traditions of private entrepreneurship, capacities of the elites) and during the transition period managed to create good legal background for private sector and appropriate institutions are more likely to enjoy formation of more efficient corporate governance mechanisms and patterns.