ABSTRACT
Public services in many parts of the world have been "privatized" or "marketized" during the 1980s and 1990s. In the United Kingdom, for example, the Thatcher and Major governments have privatized most of the publicly owned "nationalized" industries and utilities. When privatization involves the handing over of a public service to a private monopoly, this does not necessarily stimulate market forces. Conversely, marketization does not necessarily require privatization in strictly economic terms. Recent policy initiatives in relation to education and welfare services often involve introducing a "market" element into the provision of services that continue to be paid for largely out of taxation. This entails making public services behave more like an idealized view of the private sector. It may also involve "privatizing" them in the ideological sense of handing over to individuals and families decisions that were previously a matter of public policy, determined by politicians and bureaucrats. The term "quasi-market" is increasingly being used to characterize such attempts to introduce market forces and private decision making into the provision of welfare.
