SOE's: statism vs participatory democracy

Lewis Evans

No 373200, Competition & Regulation Times from New Zealand Institute for the Study of Competition and Regulation

Abstract: In the 1980s and 1990s a number of New Zealand government departments were transformed into state-owned enterprises (SOEs). Established with the objective of being good businesses, the SOEs were given a 'commercial' organisational structure and placed at arms length from political management. The objective was successful: as SOEs, their productivity improved markedly. Now the current Government has announced it's considering a partial sale of the energy-sector SOEs, with preference likely to be given to Kiwi investors. Lewis Evans, who's been observing SOEs for some years, believes this approach is fainthearted. He argues that opening up ownership of all SOEs to New Zealand citizens could improve both the performance of the SOEs and the ability of citizens to influence them - and that this would be a form of participatory democracy.

Date: 2011-03-01
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