View source for State ownership

{{Short description|Ownership of industry, assets, or businesses by a public body}}
{{Redirect|State property|the socialist concept|Social ownership|other uses|State property (disambiguation)}}
{{Distinguish|Common good|Public good}}
{{Economic systems sidebar}}

[[File:State property no trespassing sign in Chicago (cropped).jpg|thumb|Sign denoting state property at a highway [[right of way]] in [[Chicago]], [[Illinois]], United States]]

'''State ownership''', also called '''public ownership''' or '''government ownership''', is the [[ownership]] of an [[industry (economics)|industry]], [[asset]], [[property]], or [[business|enterprise]] by the  national government of a country or [[state (polity)|state]], or a [[public body]] representing a community, as opposed to an [[individual]] or [[Private property|private party]].<ref>{{cite web |url=https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/public_ownership|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180126012439/https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/public_ownership|url-status=dead|archive-date=January 26, 2018|title=Public Ownership |website= Oxford Dictionaries |access-date=January 25, 2018|quote= Ownership by the government of an asset, corporation, or industry. }}</ref> Public ownership specifically refers to industries selling goods and services to consumers and differs from [[Public good|public good]]s and government services financed out of a [[Government budget|government's general budget]].<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/public-ownership/|title=Public Ownership |last= Tupper|first=Allan |publisher=Historica Canada |date=February 7, 2006 |website= The Canadian Encyclopedia |access-date=January 25, 2018|quote= public ownership generally refers to enterprises, wholly or partially government owned, which sell goods and services at a price according to use. According to this definition, government-owned railways, airlines, and utilities are examples of public ownership, but hospitals, highways and public schools are not. }}</ref> Public ownership can take place at the [[Central government|national]], [[regional government|regional]], [[local government|local]], or [[municipal]] levels of government; or can refer to non-governmental public ownership vested in autonomous [[public enterprise]]s. Public ownership is one of the three major forms of property ownership, differentiated from private, [[Collective ownership|collective]]/[[cooperative]], and [[common ownership]].<ref>{{cite book |title=Comparing Economic Systems in the Twenty-First Century |year=2003 |last1=Gregory |first1=Paul R. |last2=Stuart |first2=Robert C. |location=Boston |publisher=Houghton Mifflin |isbn=0-618-26181-8 |pages=27 |quote=There are three broad forms of property ownership-private, public, and collective (cooperative).}}</ref>

In [[market-based]] economies, state-owned assets are often managed and operated as [[joint-stock corporation]]s with a government owning all or a controlling stake of the company's [[Share (finance)|shares]]. This form is often referred to as a [[state-owned enterprise]]. A state-owned enterprise might variously operate as a [[Nonprofit corporation]], as it may not be required to generate a profit; as a commercial enterprise in competitive sectors; or as a [[natural monopoly]]. Governments may also use the profitable entities they own to support the general budget. The creation of a state-owned enterprise from other forms of public property is called [[corporatization]].

In [[Soviet-type economies]], state property was the dominant form of industry as property. The state held a monopoly on land and natural resources, and enterprises operated under the legal framework of a nominally [[planned economy]], and thus according to different criteria than enterprises in market and mixed economies.

[[Nationalization]] is a process of transferring private or municipal assets to a central government or state entity. [[Municipalization]] is the process of transferring private or state assets to a municipal government.

== State-owned enterprise ==
{{main|State-owned enterprise}}
A state-owned enterprise is a commercial enterprise owned by a government entity in a [[capitalist]] market or [[mixed economy]]. Reasons for state ownership of commercial enterprises are that the enterprise in question is a [[natural monopoly]] or because the government is promoting [[economic development]] and [[Industrialisation|industrialization]]. State-owned enterprises may or may not be expected to operate in a broadly commercial manner and may or may not have [[monopoly|monopolies]] in their areas of activity. The transformation of public entities and government agencies into government-owned corporations is sometimes a precursor to [[privatization]].

[[State capitalist]] economies are capitalist market economies that have high degrees of government-owned businesses.

== Relation to socialism ==
{{see also|Social ownership|State socialism}}
[[File:Valsts ipasums Meistaru iela 23.jpg|thumb|A house number plaque marking state property in [[Riga]], Latvia]]

Public ownership of the [[means of production]] is a subset of [[social ownership]], which is the defining characteristic of a [[socialist]] economy. However, state ownership and nationalization by themselves are not socialist, as they can exist under a wide variety of different [[Political system|political]] and [[economic system]]s for a variety of different reasons. State ownership by itself does not imply social ownership where income rights belong to society as a whole. As such, state ownership is only one possible expression of public ownership, which itself is one variation of the broader concept of social ownership.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Hastings |last2=Mason |last3=Pyper |first1=Adrian |first2=Alistair |first3=Hugh |title=The Oxford Companion to Christian Thought |publisher=Oxford University Press |date=December 21, 2000 |isbn=978-0198600244 |page=[https://archive.org/details/oxfordcompaniont00hast/page/677 677] |quote=Socialists have always recognized that there are many possible forms of social ownership of which co-operative ownership is one. Nationalization in itself has nothing particularly to do with socialism and has existed under non-socialist and anti-socialist regimes. Kautsky in 1891 pointed out that a ‘co-operative commonwealth’ could not be the result of the ‘general nationalization of all industries’ unless there was a change in ‘the character of the state’. |url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/oxfordcompaniont00hast/page/677 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Ellman |first=Michael |title=Socialist Planning |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=1989 |isbn=0-521-35866-3 |page=327 |quote=State ownership of the means of production is not necessarily social ownership and state ownership can hinder efficiency.}}</ref>

In the context of socialism, public ownership implies that the [[surplus product]] generated by publicly owned assets accrues to all of society in the form of a [[social dividend]], as opposed to a distinct class of private capital owners. There is a wide variety of organizational forms for state-run industry, ranging from specialized technocratic management to direct [[workers' self-management]]. In traditional conceptions of non-market socialism, public ownership is a tool to consolidate the means of production as a precursor to the establishment of [[economic planning]] for the allocation of resources between organizations, as required by government or by the state.

State ownership is advocated as a form of social ownership for practical concerns, with the state being seen as the obvious candidate for owning and operating the means of production. Proponents assume that the state, as the representative of the [[public interest]], would manage resources and production for the benefit of the public.<ref>{{cite book |last=Arnold |first=Scott |title=The Philosophy and Economics of Market Socialism: A Critical Study |url=https://archive.org/details/philosophyeconom00arno |url-access=limited |publisher=Oxford University Press |date=1994 |isbn=978-0195088274 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/philosophyeconom00arno/page/n58 44] |quote=For a variety of philosophical and practical reasons touched on in chapter 1, the most obvious candidate in modern societies for that role has been the state. In the past, this led socialists to favor nationalization as the primary way of socializing the means of production…The idea is that just as private ownership serves private interests, public or state ownership would serve the public interest.}}</ref> As a form of social ownership, state ownership may be contrasted with cooperatives and common ownership. Socialist theories and political ideologies that favor state ownership of the means of production may be labelled [[state socialism]].

State ownership was recognized by [[Friedrich Engels]] in ''Socialism: Utopian and Scientific'' as, by itself, not doing away with capitalism, including the process of [[capital accumulation]] and structure of wage labor. Engels argued that state ownership of commercial industry would represent the final stage of capitalism, consisting of ownership and management of large-scale production and manufacture by the state.<ref>{{cite web |author=Frederick Engels |url=http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1880/soc-utop/ch03.htm |title=Socialism: Utopian and Scientific (Chpt. 3) |publisher=[[Marxists.org]] |access-date=2014-01-08}}</ref>

Within the United Kingdom, public ownership is mostly associated with the [[Labour Party (UK)|Labour Party]] (a [[centre-left]] [[democratic socialist]] party), specifically due to the creation of [[Clause IV]] of the "Labour Party Manifesto" in 1918. "Clause IV" was written by [[Fabian Society]] member [[Sidney Webb]].

== Public property ==
{{main|Public property}}
There is a distinction to be made between state ownership and public property. The former may refer to assets operated by a specific state institution or branch of government, used exclusively by that branch, such as a research laboratory. The latter refers to assets and resources owned by the population of a state which are mostly available to the entire public for use, such as a public park (see [[public space]]).

== Criticism ==
In [[neoclassical economic theory]], the desirability of state ownership has been studied using [[contract theory]]. According to the property rights approach based on [[Incomplete contracts|incomplete contracting]] (developed by [[Oliver Hart (economist)|Oliver Hart]] and his co-authors), ownership matters because it determines what happens in contingencies that were not considered in prevailing contracts.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Firms, Contracts, and Financial Structure |url=https://ideas.repec.org/b/oxp/obooks/9780198288817.html |publisher=Oxford University Press |date=1995 |first=Oliver |last=Hart}}</ref>

The work by Hart, Shleifer and Vishny (1997) is the leading application of the property rights approach to the question whether state ownership or private ownership is desirable.<ref>{{cite journal |title=The Proper Scope of Government: Theory and an Application to Prisons |journal=The Quarterly Journal of Economics |date=1997 |issn=0033-5533 |pages=1127–1161 |volume=112 |issue=4 |doi=10.1162/003355300555448 |language=en |first1=Oliver |last1=Hart |first2=Andrei |last2=Shleifer |first3=Robert W. |last3=Vishny|s2cid=16270301 |url=https://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/1/30727607/1/w5744.pdf }}</ref> In their model, the government and a private firm can invest to improve the quality of a public good and to reduce its production costs. It turns out that private ownership results in strong incentives to reduce costs, but it may also lead to poor quality. Hence, depending on the available investment technologies, there are situations in which state ownership is better. The Hart-Shleifer-Vishny theory has been extended in many directions. For instance, some authors have also considered mixed forms of private ownership and state ownership.<ref>{{cite journal |title=Public versus private ownership: Quantity contracts and the allocation of investment tasks |journal=Journal of Public Economics |date=2010 |pages=258–268 |volume=94 |issue=3–4 |doi=10.1016/j.jpubeco.2009.11.009 |first1=Eva I. |last1=Hoppe |first2=Patrick W. |last2=Schmitz}}</ref> In the Hart-Shleifer-Vishny model it is assumed that all parties have the same information, while Schmitz (2023) has studied an extension of their analysis allowing for [[Information asymmetry|asymmetric information]].<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Schmitz |first=Patrick W. |date=2023 |title=The proper scope of government reconsidered: Asymmetric information and incentive contracts |journal=European Economic Review |language=en |volume=157 |article-number=104511 |doi=10.1016/j.euroecorev.2023.104511 |s2cid=259487043 |issn=0014-2921|doi-access=free |url=https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/117742/1/Proper-Scope-of-Gov-Asym-Inform_DP.pdf }}</ref> Moreover, the Hart-Shleifer-Vishny model assumes that the private party derives no utility from provision of the public good. Besley and Ghatak (2001) have shown that if the private party (a non-governmental organization) cares about the public good, then the party with the larger valuation of the public good should always be the owner, regardless of the parties' investment technologies.<ref>{{cite journal |title=Government versus Private Ownership of Public Goods |jstor=2696461 |journal=The Quarterly Journal of Economics |date=2001 |pages=1343–1372 |volume=116 |issue=4 |first1=Timothy |last1=Besley |first2=Maitreesh |last2=Ghatak |doi=10.1162/003355301753265598|s2cid=39187118 |citeseerx=10.1.1.584.6739}}</ref>

More recently, some authors have shown that the investment technology also matters in the Besley-Ghatak framework if an investing party is indispensable<ref>{{cite journal |title=Nature of human capital, technology and ownership of public goods |journal=Journal of Public Economics |date=2012 |pages=939–945 |volume=96 |series=Fiscal Federalism |issue=11–12 |doi=10.1016/j.jpubeco.2012.07.005 |first=Maija |last=Halonen-Akatwijuka|s2cid=154075467 |citeseerx=10.1.1.173.3797 }}</ref> or if there are bargaining frictions between the government and the private party.<ref>{{Cite journal |title=Government versus private ownership of public goods: The role of bargaining frictions |journal=Journal of Public Economics |date=2015 |pages=23–31 |volume=132 |doi=10.1016/j.jpubeco.2015.09.009 |first=Patrick W. |last=Schmitz|doi-access=free }}</ref>

== See also ==
{{cols|colwidth=21em}}
* [[Common ownership]]
* [[List of government-owned companies]]
* [[Municipalization]]
* [[Nationalization]]
* [[Private property]]
* [[Property rights (economics)]]
* [[Public good]]
* [[Public sector]]
* [[Public finance]]
* [[Public property]]
* [[Social ownership]]
* [[State-owned enterprise]]
{{colend}}

== References ==
{{Reflist}}

== Further reading ==
*Jewellord Nem Singh; Geoffrey C. Chen (2018), ''[https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/01436597.2017.1333888 State-owned enterprises and the political economy of state–state relations in the developing world]'', Third World Quarterly, 39:6, 1077–1097, {{doi|10.1080/01436597.2017.1333888}}

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[[Category:Capitalism|State capitalism]]
[[Category:Economic systems]]
[[Category:Ownership]]
[[Category:Property law]]
[[Category:State ownership| ]]
[[Category:Socialism]]
[[Category:Types of socialism|State socialism]]