Privatization and Strategic Fit: Evidence from Rumania

This article is a contribution to the growing body of research on the privatisation process in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE). It reports on a study of enterprises in Rumania which sought to establish whether privatisation there improves performance and, if so, whether ownership by managers and employees is beneficial and whether smaller enterprises perform better than larger ones. Broadly, the authors conclude that the answer to all three of these questions is "yes". The article then outlines the implications for CEE policy-makers, in particular that they should speed up the process of privatisation, (even if foreign investors are not available) and split up large enterprises, whether state-owned or privatised.