This working paper examines the question whether the privatization of network based utilities results from policy diffusion across the OECD world, and if so which diffusion mechanisms have been relevant. Therefore, a completely new panel data set on privatization in the telecommunication sector...

In this paper, we measure the extent and dissemination of the retreat of the state from entrepreneurial activities in 20 OECD countries during the 1980–2007 period using a three-dimensional concept and a new dataset, the REST database. We consider privatization, deregulation in network-based...

There is a huge body of literature in the social sciences that deals with the privatization of public enterprises in developed OECD countries after World War II. In the first part of this article, we present and critically examine empirical findings of comparative inquiries on the factors...

In the post war period, telecommunications – being services of “general economic interest” – were initially managed by public administrative bodies in many Western European countries. With the rise of New Public Management (NPM) in the 1980s, these bodies were often transformed into...

Many scholars have argued that partisan differences have disappeared since the 1980s due to ever increasing economic globalization and the deepening of European integration. Using a new primary data set on public ownership that contains detailed information on privatization in 20 countries...