Privatisation in Slovakia – "Quo Vadis"?

Over the past 20 years Slovakia has gained extensive experience in privatisation as part of the process of transferring state property into private hands. Slovakia's privatisation backlog started shortly after the fall of the Iron Curtain, continues to the present day and, apparently, will have to be dealt with for some time to come.

Over those years, Slovakia saw a number of privatisations and experienced a range of privatisation policies: from the conviction that the state is a good owner to the exact opposite; from preferring voucher privatisation in favour of "all citizens" to preferable privatisation to selected "domestic capitalists".

The golden age of privatisation

The golden era of privatisation was during the two terms of Prime Minister Dzurinda, between 1998 and 2006, when for the sake of tackling the country's economic lag, a liberal attitude prevailed that led to the extensive privatisation of substantial parts of the economy. Due to this, reputable