With Whose Hands: Privatization, Public Employment, and Democracy

Abstract

Privatization is the public sector analogue of the "runaway shop." In the private sector, the increasing mobility of capital has spawned unprecedented forms of labor discipline by allowing firms to transfer operations between states and even to foreign countries. Privatization- diverting work from the public to the private sector serves a similar purpose. Both privatization and capital flight enable employers to continue providing services or producing products while shedding a web of existing obligations to their employees. In the public sector, however, the rights of labor are coextensive with legislative and constitutional guarantees of fair, open, and vigorous government. The trend toward privatization amounts to a deliberate effort to evade the rules and procedures intrinsic to democratic government.