This article analyses the path to the privatization of public enterprise in Britain from the Era of Nationalization of 1945-1951, to the Era of Benign Neglect of 1951-1961, to the Era of Pseudo-Commercialism of 1961-1979. Set in a public policy context, this article argues that, though the adoption of private enterprise norms from 1961 onwards would seem to anticipate privatization, this latter policy only followed an exhaustion of a variety of attempted organizational and other solutions designed to sustain the public sector of the economy.
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