Gasperin, Simone;
(2023)
Systems of State-Owned Enterprises: from Public Entrepreneurship to State Shareholding.
Doctoral thesis (Ph.D), UCL (University College London).
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Abstract
This thesis outlines a new analytical perspective on state ownership through the original concept of systems of state-owned enterprises (SOSOEs). It is argued that the SOSOEs concept adequately captures the evolution of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) in modern capitalist economies, challenging and enriching existing economic theories as well as contributing to reinstate the policy instrumentality of state ownership. The concept is defined from a comparative case study analysis of two distinct SOSOEs, operating within the same national context in different time periods. The first case concerns the Istituto per la Ricostruzione Industriale (IRI), Italy’s former and most relevant state holding company, that played a central role in the Country’s post-WWII economic development. This thesis advances an interpretation of IRI’s economic function based on an original empirical investigation of its archival and documentary sources, focusing on its main public policy missions and on its display of industrial entrepreneurship features. The second case examines the current Italian system of SOEs, assessing the still relevant presence of SOEs in the Italian national context and evaluating the overall governance of the system through a set of interviews with leading executives. Despite the similarity in size and sectoral diversification, the two SOSOEs differ significantly in terms of their operating configurations. In fact, they could be assimilated to two dichotomous ideal types: the IRI SOSOEs represents a template for the policy-oriented and dynamic ‘public entrepreneurship’ model, while the current Italian SOSOEs resembles the policy-neutral and passive ‘state shareholding’ variant. Implicit in these results is the opportunity for current SOSOEs to embrace a public entrepreneurship configuration, in order to exploit the full policy potential of state ownership in driving economic change. The thesis concludes with a proposal for reforming Italy’s current SOSOEs via the creation of a state holding company.
Type: | Thesis (Doctoral) |
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Qualification: | Ph.D |
Title: | Systems of State-Owned Enterprises: from Public Entrepreneurship to State Shareholding |
Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
Language: | English |
Additional information: | Copyright © The Author 2022. Original content in this thesis is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0) Licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/). Any third-party copyright material present remains the property of its respective owner(s) and is licensed under its existing terms. Access may initially be restricted at the author’s request. |
UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of the Built Environment UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of the Built Environment > Inst for Innovation and Public Purpose |
URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10172898 |
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