Privatization and the decision-making process

Author(s)

Alexandre Sampaio Ferraz

• Document type: Doctoral Thesis
• Press: São Paulo.
• Institution: Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH/SBD)
• Defense date: 2005-09-16

Examining board members

Maria Herminia Brandao Tavares de Almeida; Adalberto Moreira Cardoso; Maria D Alva Gil Kinzo; Fernando de Magalhaes Papaterra Limongi; Iram Jácome Rodrigues

• Advisor: Maria Herminia Brandao Tavares de Almeida

Abstract

State intervention in the economy as a direct producer of goods and services has for a long time been a common strategy adopted by both developed and underdeveloped countries. However, as a result of the global economic crisis of the late 1970s and early 1980s, the same countries began to reconsider this type of intervention. At the moment, privatization has been placed on the political agenda as part of a broad strategy designed to reduce the scope of state action, adjust its fiscal capacity, and improve corporate performance by giving them greater autonomy. In spite of the common pressures that favored the adoption of privatization by different governments and countries, their timing, scope and format varied significantly. This finding led to the displacement of the analytical focus from purely technical and economic arguments to a set of variables that seek to capture the differences between the institutional arrangements of the political system in each country that contributed to this variation and to explain the different strategies pursued the main actors involved in privatization in each institutional context. Despite the advancement represented by this approach, little attention has been devoted to examining the influence of the intermediation system of interest in explaining the variation between privatization programs. The objective of this work was to discuss the influence or impact of the political system and intermediation of interest on the privatization of the telecommunications sector in three of the largest countries in Latin America, Mexico, Argentina and Brazil, and two in Europe France and England. The main conclusion is that in spite of the common converging pressures observed that led all five governments to adopt privatization in some measure, this has varied significantly from country to country, which can be explained by the differences in these two arenas mentioned and the preference of main actors involved in the process. In political systems where the executive power is more concentrated like Mexico, Argentina governments were able to privatize their state-owned companies in a short time or in a pioneering way as England did, and independent of the opposition. In political systems where power is more divided and where the constitution has imposed the formation of a \"supermajority\" for the realization of reforms, as in Brazil and France, governments have found it more difficult to privatize, only in the late 1990s. 1990, and in the case of France, maintaining the State as the main shareholder. (AU)