Partisan Politics,Globalization, and the Determinants of Privatization Proceeds in Advanced Democracies (1990–2000)

The 1990s have witnessed unprecedented attempts at privatizing state‐owned enterprises in virtually all OECD democracies. This contribution analyzes the extent to which the partisan control of the government can account for the differences in the privatization proceeds raised by EU and OECD countries between 1990 and 2000. It turns out that privatizations are part of a process of economic liberalization in previously highly regulated economies as well as a reaction to the fiscal policy challenges imposed by European integration and the globalization of financial markets. Partisan differences only emerge if economic problems are moderate, while intense economic, particularly fiscal, problems foreclose differing partisan strategies.