ABSTRACT
The chapter is not concerned with the issue of whether privatization of state assets confirms the economic benefits claimed for it by its proponents. There is a substantial literature on this question (see, for example, Vickers and Yarrow, 1988) and in this writer’s view the jury is still out on whether ownership matters in the case of large-scale enterprises’ performance, or at least whether it is a relevant issue in the case of the former state socialist economies.
