IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/annpce/v75y2004i4p525-548.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Privatization Policy and Enterprise Performance: the case of Ireland

Author

Listed:
  • Eoin Reeves
  • Dónal Palcic

Abstract

Compared to other industrialized economies Ireland has been slow to privatize state‐owed enterprises. The first divestitures in 1991 failed to trigger a systematic programme of sell‐offs due to fears of job losses in an economy characterized by low rates of growth and high levels of unemployment. Where subsequent sales occurred they took place on a pragmatic and case‐by‐case basis with the reasons for privatization varying across companies. Some of the earlier sales took place because the enterprises were financially unviable whereas more recent sales can be attributed to the influence of EU policy on competition and restrictions on state aids. Since the privatization of the state telecommunications company in 1999 there has been a significant increase in privatization activity and most of the remaining public enterprises are candidates for divestiture. By 2001 total revenues amounted to €8.1 bn (9 per cent of GNP for 2001). A consistent justification for privatization has been that a change in ownership will lead to improved performance. The analysis in this paper fails to support this argument. At this early stage of the programe the experience has been for cost‐cutting measures to lead to improved performance prior to privatization with little evidence of continued improvements after divestiture.

Suggested Citation

  • Eoin Reeves & Dónal Palcic, 2004. "Privatization Policy and Enterprise Performance: the case of Ireland," Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 75(4), pages 525-548, December.
  • Handle: RePEc:bla:annpce:v:75:y:2004:i:4:p:525-548
    DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-8292.2004.00261.x
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8292.2004.00261.x
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/j.1467-8292.2004.00261.x?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. repec:bla:jfinan:v:53:y:1998:i:3:p:1081-1110 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Attiat F. Ott & Keith Hartley (ed.), 1991. "Privatization And Economic Efficiency," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 345.
    3. Megginson, William L & Nash, Robert C & van Randenborgh, Matthias, 1994. "The Financial and Operating Performance of Newly Privatized Firms: An International Empirical Analysis," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 49(2), pages 403-452, June.
    4. Kay, J A & Thompson, D J, 1986. "Privatisation: A Policy in Search of a Rationale," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 96(381), pages 18-32, March.
    5. Bishop, Matthew R. & Kay, John A., 1989. "Privatization in the United Kingdom: Lessons from experience," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 17(5), pages 643-657, May.
    6. John Vickers & George Yarrow, 1988. "Privatization: An Economic Analysis," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262720116, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Vergés, Joaquim, 2014. "RESULTADOS y consecuencias DE LAS PRIVATIZACIONES de Empresas Públicas: Una perspectiva internacional [THE PRIVATISATION OF STATE OWNED ENTERPRISES. RESULTS AND CONSEQUENCES:An international empiri," MPRA Paper 62655, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 05 Mar 2015.
    2. Herrmann, Peter, 2008. "Social Economy and Social Economics –The Situation in the Republic of Ireland," MPRA Paper 10246, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    3. Fabienne Fecher & Benoît Lévesque, 2008. "The Public Sector And The Social Economy In The Annals (1975–2007): Towards A New Paradigm," Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 79(3‐4), pages 679-727, September.
    4. Laura Cabeza García & Silvia Gómez Ansón, 2012. "What Drives the Operating Performance of Privatised Firms?," Scottish Journal of Political Economy, Scottish Economic Society, vol. 59(1), pages 1-27, February.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Giovanni Fraquelli & Fabrizio Erbetta, 1999. "Privatization in Italy: an analysis of factors productivity and technical efficiency," CERIS Working Paper 199905, CNR-IRCrES Research Institute on Sustainable Economic Growth - Torino (TO) ITALY - former Institute for Economic Research on Firms and Growth - Moncalieri (TO) ITALY.
    2. Villalonga, Belen, 2000. "Privatization and efficiency: differentiating ownership effects from political, organizational, and dynamic effects," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 42(1), pages 43-74, May.
    3. Bozec, Richard, 2004. "L’analyse comparative de la performance entre les entreprises publiques et les entreprises privées : le problème de mesure et son impact sur les résultats," L'Actualité Economique, Société Canadienne de Science Economique, vol. 80(4), pages 619-654, Décembre.
    4. D Palcic & Eoin Reeves, 2015. "Privatization and the economic performance of Irish Sugar/Greencore," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 47(55), pages 5945-5961, November.
    5. Druk-Gal, Bat-Sheva & Yaari, Varda, 2006. "Incumbent employees' resistance to implementing privatization policy," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 59(3), pages 374-405, March.
    6. Ghulam, Yaseen, 2017. "Long-run performance of an industry after broader reforms including privatization," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 745-768.
    7. Jeffry M. Netter & William L. Megginson, 2001. "From State to Market: A Survey of Empirical Studies on Privatization," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 39(2), pages 321-389, June.
    8. Willner, Johan & Parker, David, 2002. "The Relative Performance of Public and Private Enterprise Under Conditions of Active and Passive Ownership," Centre on Regulation and Competition (CRC) Working papers 30591, University of Manchester, Institute for Development Policy and Management (IDPM).
    9. Saibal Ghosh, 2011. "Disinvestment, Lending Relationships and Executive Compensation," Global Business Review, International Management Institute, vol. 12(2), pages 213-235, June.
    10. Jorge Pinilla & Joaquim Vergés, 2007. "Efectos De La Privatización En La Eficiencia De Iberia Líneas Aéreas De España S.A," Revista Economía y Administración, Facultad de Ciencias Económicas y Administrativas, Universidad de Concepción, vol. 69, pages 7-38, December.
    11. Bozec, Yves & Laurin, Claude, 2000. "L’impact de l’annonce de la privatisation sur la performance," L'Actualité Economique, Société Canadienne de Science Economique, vol. 76(2), pages 265-298, juin.
    12. Chen, Gongmeng & Firth, Michael & Rui, Oliver, 2006. "Have China's enterprise reforms led to improved efficiency and profitability?," Emerging Markets Review, Elsevier, vol. 7(1), pages 82-109, March.
    13. Warren Moskowitz & Stephen Yeaple, 1995. "The literature on privatization," Research Paper 9514, Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
    14. Fabrizio Erbetta, 2001. "Technology Transfer: Spatial Indicators," CERIS Working Paper 200111, CNR-IRCrES Research Institute on Sustainable Economic Growth - Torino (TO) ITALY - former Institute for Economic Research on Firms and Growth - Moncalieri (TO) ITALY.
    15. Menyah, Kojo & Paudyal, Krishna & Inyangete, Charles G., 1995. "Subscriber return, underpricing, and long-term performance of U.K. privatization initial public offers," Journal of Economics and Business, Elsevier, vol. 47(5), pages 473-495, December.
    16. Juan Carlos Morales Piñero & Joaquim Vergés i Jaime, 2007. "Public Enterprise Reforms and Efficiency in Regulated Enviroments," Working Papers 0702, Departament Empresa, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, revised Jan 2007.
    17. David Parker, 2004. "The UK's Privatisation Experiment: The Passage of Time Permits a Sober Assessment," CESifo Working Paper Series 1126, CESifo.
    18. Abdella Abdou & Saeed Moshiri, 2009. "Privatization and capital formation in developing countries: an empirical analysis," International Review of Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 23(5), pages 557-575.
    19. Anastassios Gentzoglanis, 2002. "Privatization, Investment and Efficiency in the Telecommunications Industry: Theory and Empirical Evidence from MENA Countries," Working Papers 0230, Economic Research Forum, revised 10 Oct 2002.
    20. Héctor G. González Padilla, 2009. "La privatización de bancos públicos provinciales en Argentina en 1993-2001," CEMA Working Papers: Serie Documentos de Trabajo. 401, Universidad del CEMA.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:annpce:v:75:y:2004:i:4:p:525-548. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/journal.asp?ref=1370-4788 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.