A Structure, Conduct, and Performance Paradigm for the Industrial Analysis of India Over Two Decades of Economic Reforms

Abstract

The Indian economic reforms of 1991 and other policy measures have brought changes in business conditions over the long-term. In order to assess how well firms have responded to these reforms and policy initiatives over the two decades of reforms in India, the structure-conduct and performance (S-C-P) approach was used to study the industrial sector of India. S-C-P, a standard industrial economics approach, has been considered as a brain child of the Harvard School of thought, which takes the structural, conduct, and market performance variables of firms into its ambit and tries to draw results on the basis of these variables. In this context, the present paper attempted to formulate or to modify the S-C-P framework according to the reforms and policy initiatives of the industrial sector of India, which takes all economic variables, apart from standard variables, which emerged as major changes for the industrial sector over the two decades of economic reforms in India. Albeit, the S-C-P approach is taken as a standard approach, but due to the emergence of various new variables after reforms and policy initiatives, it cannot be said that it depicts a true picture of the industrial sector until and unless it is formulated according to the Indian industrial sector and includes the major variables that reveal the true picture of the industrial sector of the Indian economy.