Exploring Foreign Direct Investment from Poland Using Grounded Theory Method

The aim of this study, conducted as part of the project “Polish direct investment in the mature markets of Western Europe”, was to propose a new concept, along the lines of a grounded theory, and emerging from the empirical data, seeking to explain the phenomenon of Polish investment abroad. Following methodological guidelines (GTM, or grounded theory method), including the steps of sampling, sorting and coding data, resulted in an analytic scheme that may provide a framework for the study of Polish FDI (foreign direct investment), particularly in the Western Europe. The results indicate that foreign expansion is sometimes regarded as a guarantee of a firm’s continued existence in Poland and beyond. A certain syncretism, or dialectic nature, of Polish investment in the markets of Western Europe, which may reflect the specific nature of FDI and may serve as a practical measure of this “diversity,” was identified in the course of this work. The results should enrich the existing literature concerning the relatively weakly conceptualized categories of Polish foreign investment and should contribute to the further development of research on this issue.