This study analyzes the interaction of agency problems in public policy and of agency problems inside the firm: it investigates the case of a large privatized firm subject to many policy constraints. The last steps of Telefonica's privatization were designed to promote a disperse ownership and...

In the past two decades privatisation and liberalisation of network industries providing services of general economic interest (SGEI), have been particularly significant in the European Union. Wide variations around a common policy trend can, however, be observed across countries and sectors. We...

The Russian Federation is in the process of making major structural changes to its railway and electricity sectors. Both sectors will be at least partly vertically disintegrated, with the aim of creating competition in the "upstream" sector while maintaining state ownership and control of the...

"Regulatory reform" once meant either "alternatives to rate-of-return regulation" or "the advantages of privatization". Now that a broad consensus has been reached on each of these two topics, at least among economists, one subject that has moved to center stage is "vertical restructuring". Many...

Electricity reform typically involves little regard to the possibility that customer ownership might substitute for the "protections" of state ownership, or for investor ownership under regulatory safeguards, where market power is a concern. Recognising that regulation is itself costly, and that...

Russia in 2003 embarked on the restructuring of its electricity sector. The reform is intended to introduce competition into electricity production and supply, leaving dispatch, transmission and distribution as regulated natural monopolies with non-discriminatory third-party access to the...

The paper introduces insights into a methodology for developing regulation applicable to networked industries. Following telecommunications, the energy industry is most apt to undergo significant structural and regulatory reforms as a function technological advancement. The application of this...

This paper seeks to assess the impact of liberalisation and privatisation on performance in the generation segment of the electricity supply industry. Regulatory indicators for a panel of 19 OECD countries over a 10 year time period were constructed to examine the influence of regulatory reform...