ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a quite broad and deep survey of the literature on nonstate enterprises (NSEs), helping the reader to grasp the main issues regarding these enterprises within the context of China's political, legal, and social institutions and reform experiences. It gives a historical review of the ideological, political, legal, and policy environment of NSEs. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has a history of being very unfriendly or openly hostile to private enterprises. The chapter shows how firms behave under different types of ownership and in different market structures, contributing a great deal to the question of what to expect of Chinese firms in the marketplace. It shows the composition of the boards of China's listed companies in terms of their proportions of politicians, experts, and professionals. The chapter provides a rich picture of the history and the present situation of NSEs in China in the marketplace and the boardroom, and their implications for the economy.
