ABSTRACT
There is little in the developing countries that has been developing, as rapidly as the hybrid form of productive organisation termed public enterprise: that is, production for private consumption by firms which are owned by the government. The ubiquity of this phenomenon is one of the few constants where diversity of circumstance and inclination have led to substantial variety in the development strategies adopted. The trend is by no means confined to one end of the ideological spectrum. Even in presumably private enterprise oriented countries such as Brazil and South Korea, a third or more of new investment has typically gone to the public enterprise sector.
