Privatization in the Transition to a Market Economy

Privatization policies are the centrepiece of the historically unique transformation of the centrally planned, into market economies. Yet the peculiarities of the privatization process in Eastern Europe are little understood in the West because of differences in historical, socio-political and economic contexts relative to Western experience. Most research on privatization in the West is rather theoretical and thus pays insufficient attention to these contexts, perhaps because their importance is not widely appreciated and because there has been little information about them available. Moreover, the significant differences among East European countries in contexts and in policies are not well-understood even within the region, again because of a lack of information. This volume of studies by a group of active participants and analysts of the Eastern European privatization process aims to fill this gap. The papers are the result of a unique East-West cooperation, whereby the topics were originally defined by Western academics.
The Eastern European authors, experts on privatization in their countries, then wrote initial drafts drawing on a wealth of data as well as their own experiences in describing the complex patterns of development for which no data exists. The Western academics then directed multiple revisions of the work to make it clear and comprehensible and to focus the questions on matters of interest to Western readers.
 
Privatization policies are the centrepiece of the historically unique transformation of the centrally planned, into market economies. Yet the peculiarities of the privatization process in Eastern Europe are little understood in the West because of differences in historical, socio-political and economic contexts relative to Western experience. Most research on privatization in the West is rather theoretical and thus pays insufficient attention to these contexts, perhaps because their importance is not widely appreciated and because there has been little information about them available. Moreover, the significant differences among East European countries in contexts and in policies are not well-understood even within the region, again because of a lack of information. This volume of studies by a group of active participants and analysts of the Eastern European privatization process aims to fill this gap. The papers are the result of a unique East-West cooperation, whereby the topics were originally defined by Western academics.
The Eastern European authors, experts on privatization in their countries, then wrote initial drafts drawing on a wealth of data as well as their own experiences in describing the complex patterns of development for which no data exists. The Western academics then directed multiple revisions of the work to make it clear and comprehensible and to focus the questions on matters of interest to Western readers.