Liberalisierungspolitik: eine Bestandsaufnahme von zweieinhalb Dekaden marktschaffender Politik in entwickelten Industrieländern: 09/7

Liberalization policy is defined as the politically implemented and politically legitimized delegation of allocation and distribution decisions to markets. It aims at promoting the principles of individual responsibility, decentralized decision-making and competition. Since many of the classic authors of political economy thought that a sustained trend of eliminating markets was inherent to capitalism, a protracted phase of liberalization encompassing several policy fields was considered unlikely and maybe even impossible. Using comparative, time-variant indicators from five economic and social policy fields, we show that, by the 1980s at the latest, the developed industrialized countries entered such a liberalization phase in which they not only pursued similar policies but witnessed increasingly converging levels of public intervention into markets as well. Our indicators encompass 21 OECD countries between 1980 and 2005. We distinguish two dimensions of liberalization policies: regulatory liberalization and distributive liberalization. We conclude by discussing the empirical, theoretical and methodological implications of convergence. [PUBLICATION ABSTRACT]