How Governments Privatize
Subtitle: The Politics of Divestment in the United States and Germany (American Governance and Public Policy.)
Publisher: Georgetown University Press
Published: April 2002
Language: eng
Format: Hardcover
Number of pages: 301
ISBN-13: 9780878408795
Subjects: Central government policies; Privatization; Germany; Political Science; Business / Economics / Finance; United States; Politics/International Relations; USA; Public Policy - General; Development - Economic Development; Disinvestment; Resolution Trust Corporation (; Treuhandanstalt
First sentence: This is a story of how two remarkable public agencies managed two of the greatest public sales of assets in the twentieth century.
Description: "Governments throughout the world confront enormous challenges when divesting. Whether it is poor-performing bank loans in Japan and Korea, military bases in the United States, or real estate in Eastern Europe, the challenge of public divestment is more than just a question of how to map a path to economic efficiency.

Conventional wisdom in public management and privatization literature says that the execution of such enormous tasks as divestment is typically done poorly, and that the government strategy is likely to be inefficient.".

"Mark Cassell argues that privatization must be understood as a political and administrative puzzle rather than simply an exercise in economic efficiency. This study of two successful divestment agencies - the U.S.

Resolution Trust Corporation and the German Treuhandanstalt - presents a complex understanding of the two agencies' performance in privatizing hundreds of billions of dollars of assets following two very different crises, the savings and loan debacle in the United States and unification in Germany.".

"This book will be of interest to those interested in alternatives to traditional public-sector structures, electoral connections to bureaucracies, comparative political economy, and the historic events of the aftermath of the savings and loan crisis and German unification. It is crucial reading for policy and public administration practitioners and scholars alike."--BOOK JACKET.