Government and Markets: Theory and Concepts

The middle decades of the twentieth century saw a rise in the role of the state worldwide. State expenditure as a proportion of GDP rose dramatically, influenced in part by the replacement of the market with the state in the Soviet Union and China to stem perceived evils of capitalism, and by the popular clamour post-World War Two for better health, education and infrastructure. But with market economies outperforming centrally planned economies, and much state enterprise accumulating losses, the tide of ideology and state reform in the 1980s and 1990s turned towards expanding the private sector. The main targets for privatisation were state manufacturing and state farming enterprises. But state services were brought into the privatisation focus too.