ABSTRACT
This chapter explains the course of inward direct investment in the Czech Republic and to assess its impact on that country's post-1989 economic transformation. It focuses on transformation at the micro- level, in enterprises and individual sectors using data mainly from the automobile sector. The chapter outlines the Czech transformation and privatisation processes which created the framework within which inward investment has taken place. The policy approach to inward investment also points to the need for a slightly unusual bias in the focus of an analytical account. The story of lorry producers that found no partner contains some of the clearest disasters in the Czech transformation. The chapter provides an overview of the different cases starting with the case of the most substantial transformation, that of the passenger vehicle industry. Czech experience is consistent with the argument that an investment development path is 'idiosyncratic and country specific'.
